Wednesday morning news: September 11, 2019

President set to name new national security adviser » President Trump said Tuesday that he will name a new national security adviser next week. 

That announcement came just hours after he fired national security adviser John Bolton. White House spokesman Hogan Gidley explained the move this way… 

GIDLEY: John Bolton’s policies and priorities did not align with President Trump’s, and the president of the United States has the right to put people in positions that agree with executing the policies that he sees fit to protect this country. 

Trump tweeted that he “disagreed strongly” with many of Bolton’s suggestions, and he said other officials in his administration did too. 

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was one of them. 

POMPEO: I know everyone’s talked about this for an awfully long time. There were definitely places where Bolton and I had different views about how we should proceed. 

Bolton’s ouster came as a surprise to at least some in the White House. Just an hour before Trump’s tweet, the press office announced that Bolton would join Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin in a briefing.

John Bolton took the job in April of last year, taking over for H. R. McMaster. Before that he served as U.S. ambassador to the UN. 

Families of 9/11 victims to gather for remembrances » Families of the victims of the September 11th terror attacks will gather this morning at the 9/11 Memorial plaza. WORLD Radio’s Anna Johansen has details. 

ANNA JOHANSEN, REPORTER: The Memorial plaza rests where the twin towers once soared above Lower Manhattan. The ceremony begins at 8:40 a.m. and will pause six minutes later to mark the moment when the first plane struck the North Tower. 

It will pause five more times after that, marking the time the second tower was hit and the moments each tower fell—as well the moments that hijacked planes crashed in Washington and Pennsylvania.  

A ceremony in Washington, will observe a moment of silence at 9:37 a.m. to mark the Pentagon attack. 

And in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, a service begins at 9:45 to remember those killed aboard Flight 93. Vice President Mike Pence is scheduled to speak at that ceremony. 

Reporting for WORLD Radio, I’m Anna Johansen. 

Republicans sweep N.C. special election, gain two U.S. House seats » Republicans gained two seats in the House of Representatives last night—after sweeping a special election in North Carolina. 

The first race in District 3 along the state’s Atlantic coast filled a seat that has sat vacant since GOP Congressman Walter Jones Jr. died in February. President Trump won the district in 2016. And Republican Greg Murphy comfortably won it—beating Democrat Allen Thomas by 24 points. 

The race in the 9th District on state’s southern border was a much closer contest, but still a win for Republican Dan Bishop.

BISHOP: This is the greatest campaign staff ever put together right here…

He won 51 percent of the vote to Democrat Dan McCready’s 49.  

That race was a do-over. The State Board of Elections tossed out the results of last year’s election in the district after finding evidence of ballot fraud.    

NRA sues San Francisco over ‘domestic terrorist’ designation » The National Rifle Association is suing San Francisco after city leaders declared it a “terrorist organization.” WORLD Radio’s Kristen Flavin reports. 

KRISTEN FLAVIN, REPORTER: Last week, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed a resolution calling the NRA a “domestic terrorist organization.” The board said the group seeks to deceive the public about the dangers of gun violence.

But the NRA says city officials are really just trying to blacklist anyone associated with the gun rights group. The lawsuit asks the court to step in and—quote—“instruct elected officials that freedom of speech means you cannot silence or punish those with whom you disagree.”

Reporting for WORLD Radio, I’m Kristen Flavin. 

Japan weighing options to dispose of radioactive water » Radioactive water from Japan’s nuclear power plant in Fukushima may end up in the Pacific Ocean. 

Operators of the plant are running out of room to store massive amounts of toxic water used to keep fuel cores from melting down after the 2011 earthquake. They say they’ll run out space within three years. 

Japan’s Environment Minister Yoshiaki Harada said Tuesday he believes “the only option will be to drain it into the sea and dilute it.”

But hours later Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga made clear that the environment minister was only offering his opinion. Suga said the government is waiting on a report from a group of experts before deciding what to do with the toxic water.

(AP Photo/Cliff Owen, File) In this Dec. 13, 2018 file photo, national security adviser John Bolton unveils the Trump Administration’s Africa Strategy at the Heritage Foundation in Washington. 

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