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Bank of America Announces Full Redemption of Its Series MM Preferred Stock and Related Depositary SharesWith U.S. Steel’s proposed sale to Japanese firm Nippon Steel in peril, local officials are making a final attempt to build support for it — while other backers hope Gov. Josh Shapiro will weigh in as well. Clairton Mayor Rich Lattanzi, for one, plans to speak at a Thursday-afternoon rally at the Clairton Coke Works in favor of the deal. Because without it, he said, “We would be done. I love my town and all that, but I'd be the first one to pack it in and go home and try to find a new hobby. ” The rally is a last gasp effort by the company and by Lattanzi to try to push the deal to go through. Both President Joe Biden and President-elect Donald Trump have signaled their opposition to the deal. Some reports suggest that the Committee on Foreign Investment, which reviews transactions involving foreign-owned companies, plans to block the deal on national security grounds. Similar reports before this fall’s presidential election proved premature. But the committee has to make a decision within the next two weeks. And if the deal doesn’t go through, Lattanzi believes the plant will close within five years. If that happens, he fears, the town won’t just just lose thousands of jobs and a third of its tax base: It will also forfeit the other businesses and people that support, and are supported by, the plant and its workers. By contrast, he said, “Nippon with the kind of money that they’re investing would be a great infusion for the Mon Valley works.” Thursday’s rally is one of several last-ditch efforts to salvage the deal. On Tuesday Nippon offered a $5,000 “closing bonus” to U.S. Steel employees if the deal goes through. And on Monday the company offered some additional details about its plans. Last week Nippon sent a letter the president of the United Steelworkers Union, Dave McCall, promising that the $2.4 billion in commitments to improving facilities would cover long-term investments such as relining blast furnaces. A spokesperson for Nippon referred WESA to letters it had sent to U.S. Steel employees this week. “We also affirmed to President McCall that technology sharing with U. S. Steel would not be counted against profit sharing and that we were committed to not pushing debt incurred to finance this transaction onto U. S. Steel,” Takahiro Mori, the representative director and vice Chairman at Nippon Steel Corporation wrote to employees. The Steelworkers’ union didn’t respond to a request for comment by WESA, but in a Tuesday press release called Nippon’s the $5,000 offer “bribery.” “We have seen this sort of corporate behavior before, and we know what it really means,” the Steelworkers’ statement said. “Nippon is begging union members to trade our long-term stability and bargaining power in exchange for a single payment.” Lattanzi worked hard for the company for three decades and was a longtime Steelworkers union member. He doesn’t fault the union for doing its due diligence and being skeptical of Nippon’s promises not to move its operations to Arkansas, where the climate is hostile to unions and where the firm has opened other plants. But Lattanzi said he doesn’t think U.S. Steel has been properly maintaining its facilities. And he says he was reassured about Nippon’s intentions after speaking to executives and employees at one of the company’s West Virginia plants. “I asked them some critical things: ‘Are you going to preserve these union jobs? Are you going to invest in the Mon Valley? Are you going to clean up the environment? Are you going to be a good community partner to myself in the city of Clairton?’” he said. Lattanzi said the Nippon executive “looked me right in the face, eyes right at me and said, ‘Yes, sir. ’” And while he said they wouldn’t make commitments three to five years into the future, “I believe they’re honorable people, I really do.” Although the political winds are blowing in the opposite direction, Lattanzi thinks it’s still important to speak out one last time. “I'm showing up tomorrow because I've learned a long time ago, if you don't say nothing, then don't expect anything in return,” he said. Could Shapiro save the deal? A state manufacturing leader says Gov. Josh Shapiro must add his voice to the debate, and soon, to rescue the deal. David Taylor, president and CEO of the Pennsylvania Manufacturers Association, said Shapiro is “the only one who conceivably could talk sense to Biden” to let Nippon Steel invest in U.S. Steel’s Mon Valley facilities. “This is going to happen on President Biden's watch in his last days in office, and I can't see anybody other than Governor Shapiro potentially intervening to save the deal,” Taylor said. “Our ally Japan, through Nippon Steel, is attempting to help us,” he said, adding he’s “embarrassed” the deal has faced so much opposition. “It should never have taken this long,” he said. “We should never have given our allies this much grief, and I only hope that somehow we can save the day before the whole thing collapses.” Shapiro spokesman Manuel Bonder said the governor is focused on the future of steelmaking in Pennsylvania. But while Shapiro has said he is seeking to protect jobs, he hasn’t taken a stance on the sale itself: “The final decision ... will ultimately be made by the White House alone,” his office said in a recent statement. Bonder didn’t commit to a position on the sale Wednesday either. “Governor Shapiro has been engaged with all parties in this deal throughout this entire process. He spoke to USW, U.S. Steel, and Nippon leadership the day the proposed merger was announced,” Bonder told WESA. “And he has stayed in close contact with the Biden Administration, state leaders from both parties, private sector leaders, and many others as he works to protect Pennsylvania jobs.” Nippon this year hired one-time CIA director and Trump’s former Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, to help guide the sale through the U.S. approval process. Taylor called Pompeo “an important and influential voice... who has a pretty good view of national security concerns and international relations.” But both Biden and President-elect Donald Trump have said selling U.S. Steel poses a national security risk. Some local and state officials, meanwhile, have backed the sale. They include Republican Senate President Pro Tempore Kim Ward (R-Westmoreland) and Democratic Allegheny County Councilor Dan Gryzbek. Gryzbek said that he thinks a sale to Nippon Steel offers the best potential to save the jobs and improve the region’s air quality. He and the county council voted against a measure earlier this year that would have signaled opposition to the deal. Arguments about national security risks don’t make sense, Gryzbek said, since Japan and the U.S. already cooperate so much. And he also thinks the amount of money Nippon has offered for U.S. Steel reflects a genuine commitment to the region. “Clearly this is something that they very much value,” he said. “It wouldn't really make a whole lot of sense to just go ahead and scrap something like the Mon Valley Works.” Patrick Campbell, the executive director for the nonprofit Group Against Smog and Pollution, said his group isn’t taking a position on the sale, because it’s hard to say for sure what would be better for the region’s air quality. Campbell’s group continues to push U.S. Steel to invest in air-pollution control technology. And while he’d like to see more sweeping changes in how steel is made in the Mon Valley, Campbell acknowledges that pollution could decrease if Nippon invested in the Mon Valley facilities. “If they were maintained and upgraded as necessary, we surely would be seeing reduced emissions violations,” he said. But Campbell is skeptical of the recent threats made by U.S. Steel to relocate if the deal with Nippon doesn’t go through. Campbell said the company has been threatening to leave the Pittsburgh area for decades, in an apparent effort to gain leverage in talks over labor contracts and environmental regulations. He said it was “a terrible thing to do to workers, to put them into that kind of limbo where they have no idea if the future of their position is secure.”In the late 1970s, America was not in a good place; reeling from a war and from Watergate. Then came a man called Jimmy. "Jimmy who?" the nation asked. It was the dismissive reaction from many when a peanut farmer called Jimmy Carter announced a run for the White House. Beyond his home state of Georgia, where he had served as Governor, James Earl Carter Jr was not well known. But it would turn out, Jimmy Carter was just what 1970s America needed. After the political turmoil of Nixon and Watergate and the quagmire of the Vietnam War, America craved stability, calm and integrity. More on United States Former US president Jimmy Carter dies US attorney general tried to block Gerry Adams fundraising in 1995 over IRA weapons fears, unearthed records reveal Joe Biden reduces all but three US federal death sentences to life imprisonment Related Topics: United States The 39th president of the United States did not provide the drama of those who came before him or those who would follow him. Yet over a remarkably long life, punctuated by a short presidency, Jimmy Carter built a considerable legacy deserving of considerable reflection. Carter the healer "Compassionate", "honourable", a "peacemaker", a "healer". They are words so often used to describe the American leader who lived a life longer than any other. Late 1970s America was a nation reeling from the Watergate scandal and the disgraced presidency of Richard Nixon followed by the accidental presidency of Gerald Ford. Read more: Former US president Jimmy Carter dies The wider backdrop was a long war in Vietnam, ending in a humiliating defeat and a fresh blot in a proud nation's history. Enter Jimmy Carter, 52-years-old; five feet seven inches - unassuming and unimposing both physically and in character. Peanut farmer, turned submariner, turned politician; he was a man of the people whose core instinct was that a government is only as good as its people. His healing qualities, clearly threaded through his life, were displayed on day one of his presidency. In a bold move he granted unconditional pardons to hundreds of thousands of men who evaded the Vietnam War draft. He had said the pardon was needed "to heal our country after the Vietnam War". Of the bitter divisions sparked by the war, he said: "We can now agree to respect those differences and to forget them." He pioneered a bold vision for compassionate centre-left politics which would, many years later, be emulated by presidents Clinton, Obama and Biden. Yet Jimmy Carter would survive only one term as president. In those four years he faced huge challenges - an energy crisis, Soviet aggression and Iran - themes which, it turns out, endure. A childhood which shaped a presidency Jimmy Carter was born where he died, in the town of Plains, Georgia on 1 October 1924. His childhood unquestionably moulded the person and politician he would become. 1930s Georgia was a place of segregation. Two Americas existed side by side, separated by racism. But Carter's mother, a nurse, boldly ignored the state's segregation laws, and so young Jimmy's upbringing was one of coexistence in a place where there was none. Decades later Carter would tell American talk show host Oprah Winfrey how every one of his childhood friends was black. It was an experience which moulded his mind and would allow him to help change history decades later. Young Jimmy Carter joined the Navy, serving as a submariner - a role that surely takes a particular type of character. His father's death in 1953 brought him back to Georgia where he ran the family peanut farm. But politics beckoned. It was race and racism which lured Carter to activism with the Democratic Party. By the 1960s it would propel him to the state senate and, by 1970, to the top job in Georgia - governor. The long-shot president He was the dark horse for president; a long-shot candidate who made it all the way. His childhood experiences of coexistence over division were threaded through his term in office and led to significant yet oft-forgotten achievements. President Carter recognised and valued the power of American leadership in the protection of human rights. Global achievements It was his blunt message to the white rulers in South Africa which helped to precipitate the end of Apartheid and a peaceful coexistence many years later. His influence in the Middle East was profound, but controversial too. The Camp David accords represented Carter's greatest foreign policy achievement. He brought together Israel and its greatest enemy of the time, Egypt. The image of Carter cupping the clasped hands of Egyptian President Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Begin on the north lawn of the White House in September 1978 is iconic. It represented the framework on which coexistence in the Middle East continues to be built. With the deal he did more for Israeli security than any American president since, and yet he maintained a compassion for the Palestinian cause that no other American president has come close to. Years later, out of office, he was among the first to accuse Israel of its own apartheid regime against the Palestinians. A presidency dominated by 'events' Under his presidency, the Cold War got hotter. A wary Carter ditched a key arms reduction treaty with the Soviet Union. It would raise tensions but eventually help precipitate the collapse of the USSR. With Britain, he fostered the so-called 'special relationship'; he and British prime minister James Callaghan were close. But 'events' overtook his vision and his presidency unravelled. In Iran, revolution came and US hostages were taken. American diplomats were held hostage for more than a year. A risky rescue ordered by President Carter went wrong, eight US servicemen were killed and Carter was blamed. After just one term, Carter was out. The American people, struggling economically, chose the Republican showman Ronald Reagan and an optimism they could no longer find in Carter. Misjudged by history? History is so often cruel and distorted. It would hand many achievements built by Carter to Reagan instead. It was Carter who laid the foundations for Middle East coexistence, and though he would be let down by partners later, and coexistence seems at times to be very far off, his vision remains at the core of the solution. He has arguably done more to fix to the Middle East conundrum than any other American president since. Be the first to get Breaking News Install the Sky News app for free On the Cold War, it was Carter's decision to ditch the detente with the Soviet Union which would eventually seal its demise. Reagan would not have been able to demand Gorbachev 'tear down this wall' without Carter's leadership in the years before. The Democrat presidents since have often borrowed Carter's core principles and yet the party orphaned him. A legacy beyond politics This 'involuntary retirement', as Carter would later put it, left much undone and it was really only after leaving office that he began to build the legacy he'd want to be remembered for. With his wife, Rosalynn, he founded The Carter Center, a charity with his principle of healing at its heart. Follow our channel and never miss an update The charity's work - conflict resolution, disease prevention and the promotion of democracy - continues to this day. It represents president Carter's legacy in 80 nations around the world. In 2002, it was this work which earned him the Nobel Peace Prize. Since then, under his leadership, its work has helped to nearly eradicate Guinea Worm Disease. As of 2021 there were just 15 cases reported globally. An extraordinary achievement. At home in America, the charity Habitat for Humanity was a central part of the Carters' fundraising efforts. Over many years, Jimmy and his wife were seen building and renovating homes for some of the nation's poorest. And away from this spotlight at his lifelong home in Plains, Georgia, president Carter was a painter, a furniture maker, a winemaker, and an author of a remarkable 32 books. The death of his wife Rosalynn last year must have been an enormous blow for Carter. She had been at his side always, and so often hand in hand. His best friend, his counsel, his 'chief advisor', his wife since 1946. So often over the years, he's been asked to reveal the magic of their bond. His answer: 'never go to bed angry.' 'Always make peace,' he said. In much more than just marriage, that was President Carter's defining principle. He's survived by his four children Jack, James (Chip), Donnel (Jeff) and Amy, 11 grandchildren and 14 great grandchildren.

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