El presidente de Estados Unidos, Donald Trump, amenazó este miércoles con imponer fuertes aranceles e incluso interrumpir parte del comercio con la Unión Europea si el bloque avanza con el proyecto para convertir a Canadá en su primer “miembro asociado”.

“Creo que es ridículo”, respondió Trump ante una consulta de periodistas durante una visita a Carolina del Norte. El mandatario sostuvo que analizará las características del eventual acuerdo antes de decidir una respuesta y advirtió: “Si considero que es un acto hostil, impondré aranceles muy serios o dejaré de comerciar con Europa”.

Trump planteó además la posibilidad de cortar los intercambios en determinados sectores y volvió a cuestionar la relación comercial de Estados Unidos con Canadá, en momentos en que las tensiones entre Washington y Ottawa atraviesan una nueva escalada.

La advertencia llegó horas después de que la presidenta de la Comisión Europea, Ursula von der Leyen, propusiera formalmente abrir la puerta para que Canadá se convierta en el primer “miembro asociado” de la Unión Europea.

Qué propone la Unión Europea para Canadá

Von der Leyen hizo el anuncio durante su discurso anual sobre el Estado de la Unión ante el Parlamento Europeo, en Estrasburgo, al que asistió el primer ministro canadiense, Mark Carney.

“Me gustaría trabajar con usted para abrir la puerta a que Canadá sea el primer miembro asociado de la Unión Europea”, sostuvo la dirigente europea.

La propuesta, sin embargo, está todavía en una etapa inicial. Los tratados europeos no contemplan actualmente la figura de “miembro asociado”, por lo que su alcance jurídico, económico y político tendrá que ser definido. Además, cualquier avance de esta magnitud requeriría negociaciones dentro del bloque y la participación de los Estados miembros.

UE

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In a series of exclusive interviews with Digital, lawmakers on the House Foreign Affairs Committee sounded the alarm on a sprawling network of «Trojan horse» activists, nonprofits and social media influencers allegedly amplifying the hostile messages of foreign adversaries straight through the open gates of American democracy.

The warning came into sharp focus Tuesday when CodePink co-founder Medea Benjamin and two fellow activists walked into House Rayburn 2172 for a hearing on covert foreign influence operations, then strategically positioned themselves behind witnesses in T-shirts supporting the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Communist Party of Cuba.

About 30 minutes into the hearing, South and Central Asia Subcommittee Chairman Bill Huizenga, R-Mich., stopped the hearing and had Capitol Police escort them out.

LAWMAKERS THROW OUT ‘TROJAN HORSE’ ACTIVISTS THEY SAY ARE ENGAGED IN AMERICAN SUBVERSION

«They’re coming in, trying to look like one thing, but we know that once they’re inside the gates that those doors are going to spring open, and there’s a whole other motivation for what they’re trying to do,» Huizenga told Digital.

At the center of the controversy is communist tech tycoon Neville Roy Singham, who married CodePink co-founder Jodie Evans in a tropical wedding in Jamaica in 2017, soon after funneling $285 million to six pro-China, pro-communist, anti-American nonprofits in the U.S., including CodePink, according to a Digital investigation.

Lawmakers say the answer is transparency and following the money and exposing who finances the alleged «Trojan horse.»

In their series of interviews, Huizenga and other committee members explained how the modern «Trojan horse» isn’t made of wood but rather a network of activists, nonprofits, social media influencers and other ostensibly American voices that foreign governments and foreign-linked actors can allegedly fund, amplify or exploit to carry their messages through the open gates of American democracy.

«They’re coming in, trying to look like one thing, but we know that once they’re inside the gates that those doors are going to spring open and there’s a whole other motivation for what they’re trying to do,» Huizenga told Digital.

At the hearing, devoted to «Trojan Horses: Covert Foreign Malign Influence Operations in America,» lawmakers expressed concern about how the Communist Party of China, Russia, the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Communist Party of Cuba spread their propaganda and influence in the U.S.

The phrase «Trojan horse» comes from the ancient Greek story of soldiers concealed inside a wooden horse presented to the city of Troy. Once the horse was taken behind the city’s fortified walls, the soldiers emerged and opened the gates, destroying Troy.

Huizenga stressed that Americans can hold sincere beliefs while also having those messages funded or amplified by foreign actors without necessarily knowing it. He argued that the answer to foreign influence is exposing the origins of the messaging through transparency and robust debate.

Inside the hearing room, as Digital reported, Benjamin and her fellow CodePink activists offered a vivid illustration of the debate over how political messages are created and amplified.

They sat directly behind the witnesses, placing their T-shirts in the sight line of the official committee cameras.

Benjamin then turned toward a television monitor on the side of the hearing room displaying the official video feed. She pulled out her phone, zoomed in on the image of herself and a fellow activist appearing behind the witnesses and took photo after photo of the screen.

HOUSE PANEL PROBES FOREIGN ‘TROJAN HORSES’ AS SINGHAM SCRUTINY WIDENS

Huizenga said he viewed the episode as political theater designed for an audience beyond the committee room.

«This isn’t about discourse. This is about disruption,» Huizenga told Digital. «It’s all planned out. You see people in the crowd filming with their phones, getting ready. You knew something was going to happen because, all of a sudden, the phones would come out.

«It’s really about theatrics,» he added, arguing that confrontations can subsequently be circulated on social media to attract attention, donations and volunteers.

The episode captured the central tension running through the hearing: How does the United States expose genuine covert foreign influence without treating protected American political speech as foreign subversion?

«Transparency. Transparency is the watchword,» Huizenga told Digital. «We really need to make sure that people know not only the why, but the who is behind all this.»

Rep. Michael Baumgartner, R-Wash., told Digital that America’s open political system creates opportunities for foreign governments to try to influence legitimate domestic debates through social media, universities and other institutions.

«The American people need transparency and need to understand what is going on in these public policy discussions and whether it’s podcast hosts, certain actors on social media or things going on our college campuses,» Baumgartner said. «We need to know who’s behind it and what their motivations are.»

Baumgartner pointed to «clear transparency on this issue» as a solution, adding that if evidence showed organizations were acting on behalf of foreign governments without complying with applicable disclosure laws, the matter could potentially be referred to the Justice Department, which oversees the Foreign Agent Registration Act, or FARA. The law requires that people and organizations acting on behalf of foreign interests register with the Justice Department.

Other lawmakers said the modern Trojan horse doesn’t necessarily have to walk physically through the doors of Congress, but rather arrive via social media.

Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla., described social media, influencers and protests as potential channels through which foreign governments influence American political debate. He said «it’s a real issue, whether it’s on social media, influencers, protests, these things are all designed to destabilize our country.»

Fine characterized what experts call «cognitive warfare» as «using our information platforms to try to poison people’s minds and to create division from within.»

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., focused on another battlefield: artificial intelligence.

«Trojan horses are things like the announcement that we should slow down on AI,» Issa told Digital, arguing that foreign adversaries can benefit when American political pressure slows U.S. technological development.

«We are in a war in which the other side uses all the clandestine tools,» Issa said. «They use their, quite frankly, their social media to our detriment.»

Huizenga similarly argued that Americans should view the organizations under examination not individually but as a network.

«It’s a network. It’s not independent organizations or even people,» he said. «You will see some of the same people at different organizations, rallies, or protests.»

At the center of much of the hearing were findings from a Digital investigation into Neville Roy Singham, an American-born communist tech tycoon who lives in Shanghai and has pumped $285 million into six nonprofits, including CodePink, the People’s Forum and other groups examined during the hearing.

Huizenga alleged in his official opening remarks that Singham uses his wealth and relationships in China to support organizations that promote communist ideology and destabilize American society. He explicitly described Singham, CodePink and a growing network of pro-communist, pro-China groups as «Trojan horses.»

‘TROJAN HORSES’ IN AMERICA: CONGRESS PROBES INFLUENCE NETWORKS TIED TO CHINA, IRAN AND CUBA

Singham and CodePink have denied taking direction from the Chinese government. Singham has said his activities reflect his own political beliefs, while Benjamin has said CodePink doesn’t receive money from the Chinese Communist Party.

As Digital reported in June, the Justice Department and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York have convened a grand jury investigation into alleged money laundering, bank fraud and wire fraud by Singham and the organizations he has funded.

No criminal charges have been filed against Singham or CodePink with respect to those allegations.

Huizenga argued that the funding relationships deserve scrutiny.

«Oftentimes, it’s frankly the origins aren’t organic, or if there is a part of it being organic, this is getting fed by outside organizations, oftentimes even outside countries,» Huizenga alleged.

Being escorted through the committee room doors didn’t end CodePink’s political theater.

Outside the hearing room, Benjamin positioned herself beside the House Foreign Affairs Committee placard and began recording another video, pulling out a comb first to straighten her hair.

When Rep. Fine emerged from the hearing, Benjamin followed him down the hallway firing questions as another member of her team recorded the encounter.

After Fine disappeared into an office, Benjamin returned to the committee entrance, straightened her hair with a comb and resumed recording.

HOUSE COMMITTEE PASSES FOREIGN FUNDING TRANSPARENCY ACT TO EXPOSE FOREIGN DONATIONS TO NONPROFITS

About two hours after Capitol Police escorted the activists from the hearing, CodePink posted a carefully edited video of the day’s confrontation on social media, where activists in the broader network began sharing it.

The physical protest was over, but the images it produced were just beginning to travel.

That sequence was precisely why lawmakers said Americans should look beyond the spectacle to who finances and amplifies political messaging.

«This is theater for many of these people,» Huizenga said. He said he wanted Americans, through «transparency and disclosure,» to understand «not just the what they are doing, but the who is financing them.»

The lawmakers gathered to investigate modern «Trojan horses» said the lesson of the ancient story wasn’t simply to keep the horse outside the gates but also to understand what — and who — might be inside.

«Transparency. Transparency is the watchword,» Huizenga said.

Lawmakers say ‘transparency and disclosure’ are the best defense against influence campaigns exploiting America’s democracy.

Digital’s Reagan Schroeder and Brooke Curto contributed to this report.

politics, foreign affairs, china, russia, iran, cuba

La exposición al humo de incendios forestales reduce la diversidad de aves en Estados Unidos durante la temporada de reproducción posterior, según un estudio de Sarah Meier, economista ambiental de la ETH Zúrich, y Eric Strobl, de la Universidad de Berna, publicado en la revista Journal of Environmental Economics and Management.

Los autores llegaron a esa conclusión al cruzar 15 años de censos de pájaros con registros de contaminación por partículas causada por incendios. La investigación analizó cerca de 2.800 rutas de monitoreo distribuidas en el país entre 2008 y 2022.

Según Phys.org, el trabajo examinó la cantidad de especies presentes, la distribución de estas y sus diferencias evolutivas, es decir, el grado de parentesco que existe entre ellas.

El aumento de la contaminación se asocia con menos especies

Los investigadores usaron información del Programa de Monitoreo de Aves Reproductoras de América del Norte, que sigue poblaciones de aves desde 1966. En ese esquema, voluntarios capacitados registran los ejemplares que ven u oyen en recorridos fijos de unos 40 kilómetros, con alrededor de 50 paradas por ruta.

Al combinar esos conteos con datos de alta resolución sobre la contaminación por partículas liberadas en incendios, Meier y Strobl detectaron que las zonas expuestas a una mayor concentración de humo durante un año registraban una menor diversidad de ejemplares en la siguiente época de cría.

El cálculo indica que, si la contaminación pasa de un nivel promedio a uno considerablemente más alto, el número de clases cae alrededor de un 3%. En una ruta media, donde se contabilizan 55 especies, esa variación representa la ausencia de 1 o 2 grupos. En los puntos con mayor exposición, la reducción fue más pronunciada.

El modelo separó humo, sequía y calor

“No estaba segura de si veríamos algún efecto en una zona tan extensa y ecológicamente diversa”, afirmó Meier. El resultado, de acuerdo con la investigadora, adquiere relevancia porque no permite anticipar qué especies dejarán de aparecer ni cuáles son esenciales para el funcionamiento de cada ecosistema.

Los incendios suelen coincidir con altas temperaturas y sequías, y estas condiciones pueden afectar directamente a las aves. Para distinguir la influencia del humo, el equipo aplicó un método econométrico: una técnica estadística que permite comparar los cambios en las mismas áreas durante varios años y aislar el peso de distintos factores.

El modelo tuvo en cuenta el clima, el uso del suelo y las diferencias en la metodología de los censos. También evaluó si la pérdida de diversidad podía explicarse por la quema directa de los hábitats. Sin embargo, la reducción se mantuvo incluso en rutas donde no se habían registrado superficies incendiadas en un radio de 5 kilómetros.

El efecto persistió pese a los desplazamientos

Otra posibilidad considerada fue que los pájaros se hubieran trasladado a sectores cercanos para evitar el aire contaminado. Los autores incorporaron esos cambios locales en el análisis, pero el descenso de la diversidad aviar continuó presente, lo que reforzó la asociación entre el humo y los resultados de los censos posteriores.

La investigación no determina con precisión qué ocurre con las poblaciones aviares expuestas. Estudios previos citados por los investigadores sugieren que el humo podría debilitarlas, causar pérdida de peso y daños respiratorios. Durante el período reproductivo, además, su conducta puede modificarse.

Meier advirtió que incluso una baja moderada puede alterar el equilibrio natural si desaparecen poblaciones con funciones específicas. Las aves dispersan semillas, polinizan plantas y ayudan a controlar plagas; por eso, un cambio en su diversidad puede repercutir en otras variedades de animales y vegetales.

El trabajo no calcula aún el costo económico

El estudio no estima el valor económico de la reducción de especies. La prioridad de los investigadores fue identificar con fiabilidad un impacto individual de los incendios forestales que suele quedar fuera de las evaluaciones tradicionales de daños.

“En el caso de edificios incendiados, podemos cuantificar con relativa facilidad el coste de los daños. Con la biodiversidad, la situación es mucho más compleja”, señaló Meier. Según la autora, los efectos sobre las aves pueden terminar afectando actividades como la agricultura y la silvicultura por las funciones que cumplen dentro de los ecosistemas.

“Existen otras consecuencias de los incendios forestales que apenas hemos tenido en cuenta hasta la fecha, a pesar de que tienen un impacto en la sociedad”, añadió la economista ambiental.

incendio forestal,pájaro cantor,ceniza,bosque de pinos,humo