US Domestic News Roundup: Biden says 'I'm gonna raise some taxes' in March budget proposal; Family of late basketball star Kobe Bryant awarded nearly $29M in photos case and more

The committee delayed a vote on the measure until Wednesday. Explainer-Can Republicans topple Biden's ESG investing rule in court? The Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to block a Biden administration rule allowing employee retirement plans to consider environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) factors when selecting investments.

Following is a summary of current US domestic news briefs.

Biden says 'I'm gonna raise some taxes' in March budget proposal

President Joe Biden said on Tuesday that his March 9 budget proposal to the U.S. Congress will include some higher taxes, including on billionaires, but will not violate his pledge not to raise rates on Americans making less than $400,000 a year. "On March the 9th, I'm going to lay down in detail every single thing, every tax that's out there that I'm proposing, and no one ... making less than $400,000 is going to pay a penny more in taxes," Biden told an audience in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

Family of late basketball star Kobe Bryant awarded nearly $29M in photos case

Los Angeles County will pay the wife of late basketball star Kobe Bryant nearly $29 million to settle a lawsuit over allegations that sheriff officers and firefighters shared gruesome photos of the helicopter crash that killed Bryant and his 13-year-old daughter. "Today marks the successful culmination of Mrs. Bryant's courageous battle to hold accountable those who engaged in this grotesque conduct," said Luis Li, attorney for Vanessa Bryant, Kobe Bryant's wife. "She fought for her husband, her daughter, and all those in the community whose deceased family were treated with similar disrespect."

Closing arguments set for Murdaugh South Carolina murder trial

Closing arguments are set to start on Wednesday in the trial of Richard "Alex" Murdaugh, the now-disbarred South Carolina lawyer charged with gunning down his wife and son in a complex and grisly case that has garnered international attention. After sitting through more than a month of testimony, jurors on Wednesday morning will visit the Murdaugh family estate for a "jury view" of the crime scene before returning to the courtroom to hear final remarks from the prosecution and the defense.

Massachusetts U.S. Attorney taps ex-DOJ watchdog to defend her in ethics probe

Massachusetts U.S. Attorney Rachael Rollins has hired a former Justice Department inspector general to defend her in a widening ethics investigation into her appearance at a political fundraiser and her travel. Michael Bromwich, an attorney at Steptoe & Johnson LLP who served as the Justice Department's top internal watchdog from 1994 to 1999, told Reuters he is representing Rollins in a wide-ranging ethics probe led by the department's current inspector general, Michael Horowitz.

Chicago's incumbent mayor Lightfoot loses re-election bid

Chicago's incumbent Mayor Lori Lightfoot lost her re-election bid on Tuesday, with vote totals showing that two of her rivals will face each other in an April runoff ballot. Paul Vallas, the former public schools chief in Chicago and Philadelphia who ran unsuccessfully for Chicago mayor in 2019, secured the top spot, taking 34.9% of the vote with 91% of precincts reporting, the Chicago Tribune reported.

US House Democrat opposes giving Biden power to ban TikTok

The top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee said on Tuesday he opposed a Republican bill that would give President Joe Biden the power to ban Chinese-owned social media app TikTok and other apps. The committee opened debate on Tuesday on the measure, which Republican committee chair Michael McCaul sponsored to grant the administration new powers to ban the ByteDance-owned app that is used by more than 100 million Americans. The committee delayed a vote on the measure until Wednesday.

Explainer-Can Republicans topple Biden's ESG investing rule in court?

The Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to block a Biden administration rule allowing employee retirement plans to consider environmental, social and corporate governance (ESG) factors when selecting investments. President Joe Biden has promised to veto the bill if it passes the Senate, but Republican-led states and the oil industry are also challenging the rule in federal court in Texas. WHAT DOES THE NEW RULE DO?

Ghislaine Maxwell seeks to void conviction in Jeffrey Epstein case

Ghislaine Maxwell asked a U.S. appeals court to throw out her conviction for helping the financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls, saying she was immune from prosecution and citing a slew of errors that allegedly tainted her trial. In a Tuesday night filing with the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, Maxwell said that if her conviction and the underlying indictment were not thrown out, she deserved a new trial or a resentencing.

Biden admin grilled over $23 billion in licenses for blacklisted Chinese firms

The Biden administration approved more than $23 billion worth of licenses for companies to ship U.S. goods and technology to blacklisted Chinese companies in the first quarter of 2022, a Republican lawmaker said on Tuesday. The data comes amid growing pressure on the administration of Democratic President Joe Biden to further expand a broad crackdown on shipments of sensitive U.S. technology to China from Republican lawmakers, who now control the House of Representatives.

US Supreme Court doubt over student debt relief looms over Biden agenda

The skepticism expressed by conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices toward President Joe Biden's move to forgive $430 billion in student debt not only cast doubt on the plan's fate but also signaled trouble ahead for the use of executive power to get things done in his remaining time in office. Questions posed by the conservative justices during arguments on Tuesday over Biden's debt relief indicated that the conservative-majority court could strike down the plan as an unlawful overreach of executive power.