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Today’s top stories
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen is in Beijing today to meet with senior government officials on the heels of a trip from Secretary of State Antony Blinken last month. Her visit comes amid rising tensions around trade restrictions, national security concerns, Taiwan and the South China Sea.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen testifies before the House Financial Services Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., on June 13, 2023. Yellen is traveling to China amid tensions over a number of issues including Taiwan.
Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
- NPR’s Emily Feng has been reporting on China since 2019. On Up First, she says Yellen will be dealing with the same trade war issues from that period, on top of national security issues related to American export controls. She adds U.S. officials are “really downplaying expectations” for the visit and say it’s “just to maintain contact so the two sides understand each other.”
Facebook’s parent company Meta launched Threads late yesterday. The text-based version of its app Instagram could be an alternative to Elon Musk’s Twitter. More than 10 million people have joined in the first seven hours since the app was launched.
- “It really shows just how much frustration there is with the current state of Twitter,” says NPR’s Bobby Allyn. He adds that one advantage Threads has over other Twitter rivals is its data. Users can “instantly port over” their Instagram data and keep their network. But that could also prevent younger people from joining because they don’t want…
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