Turkey, The Latest Country To Set Up Military Shop in Somalia: Turkey opened its largest overseas military base in Somalia this past Saturday that will train more than 10,000 soldiers, help in the battle against the terrorist group al-Shabaab, and expand Turkish influence into more towns and regions. Turkey is not alone in placing great importance on a military presence in Somalia: The US runs clandestine operations from a base in the Lower Shabelle region, and the United Arab Emirates is soon expected to build a base in the region of Somaliland. Turkey has spent millions of dollars in humanitarian aid to Somalia, in sectors that include health, infrastructure, education, and trade. In 2011, current president and then Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to Somalia was the first high-profile visit by a non-African head of state in almost twenty years. Erdogan built Turkey’s largest embassy in the world in Mogadishu, the capital. Turkey has also built schools, mosques, and hospitals—including the largest medical complex in the country.

Since 2005, Africa has been central to Turkey’s attempt at global expansion. In the last eight years, Turkey has increased its diplomatic missions in Africa from 12 to 39. Turkey’s increased interest in sub-Saharan Africa is “driven by the region’s growing economic importance to Ankara; its interest in diversifying away from the Middle East; and the apparent desire for influence among sub-Saharan Africa’s large Muslim population.”

Spain’s King Condemns Catalan Leaders As Thousands Protest: On Tuesday, thousands in Catalonia protested the violent police crackdown against Sunday’s banned independence referendum. In a televised speech that same day, Spain’s King Felipe VI accused Catalan secessionist leaders of undermining democratic principles and dividing Catalan society. It was a rare intervention by Spain’s monarch, who is normally silent on politics, and an indication of how deeply Spain has been shaken by the Catalan vote and the police crackdown that injured 900 people. Late Tuesday, Catalonia’s leader Carles Puigdemont told the BBC that the region will declare independence in a matter of days. In his televised address, King Felipe said: “Today Catalan society is fractured and in conflict. They [the Catalan leaders] have infringed on the system of legally approved rules with their decisions, showing an unacceptable disloyalty towards the powers of the state.”

US Expels 15 Cuban Diplomats: Last week, the US announced it was withdrawing 60 percent of its diplomats from Havana because of unexplained attacks that started nearly a year ago and remain unexplained despite harming at least 22 Americans. Yesterday the United States expelled 15 of Cuba’s diplomats to protest the country’s failure to protect Americans. Now the US and Cuba are set to cut their embassies by more than half, which means that diplomatic staffing in both countries will drop to their lowest levels in years. The State Department gave Cuba’s ambassador a list of 15 names and ordered the individuals out within one week in a move that aims to “ensure equity” between each nation’s embassy staffing. Nonetheless, US officials emphasized they were not accusing Cuba of either culpability or complicity, merely a failure to stop whatever has caused the physical harm to diplomats and staff at the American embassy in Havana.

President Trump Visits Puerto Rico: President Trump arrived in Puerto Rico Tuesday, along with first lady Melania and several cabinet members, two weeks after Hurricane Maria devastated the island territory. Trump spoke at a briefing at Muñiz Air National Guard Base, and did his best to make light of the grave situation on the island. With a nod to his budget director, Trump cracked, “I hate to tell you, Puerto Rico, but you’re throwing our budget out of whack.” Then he told Puerto Rican officials they should be proud that only 16 people died in Hurricane Maria, compared with the thousands killed “in a real catastrophe” like Hurricane Katrina.

He also shook hands with San Juan mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz, who last weekend had criticized the administration’s slow response to the recovery effort. Trump did not ask her to speak, recognizing instead Puerto Rico’s governor, who “did not play politics.” Trump also praised the Federal Emergency Management Agency director, cabinet members, and military commanders. Then he told reporters “I think it’s now acknowledged what a great job we’ve done,” asserting that this relief effort was as competent as those in Texas and Florida, but adding that actually the Puerto Rico situation was “much tougher.” He then repeated his earlier criticism that Puerto Ricans were not doing enough to help themselves, saying truck drivers were not transporting enough supplies. “We need their truck drivers to start driving trucks,” the president said. “On a local level, they have to give us more help.”

Texas Firm’s Hate Speech Wins Votes For German Party: Angela Merkel, Germany’s moderate-leaning chancellor,  won a fourth term ten days ago. But voters also handed a small victory to the country’s alt-right movement thanks to Harris Media, a right-wing advertising agency in Austin, Texas, which was hired by the Alternative for Germany party (AfD) to  create a divisive social media campaign based on an anti-immigrant, anti-Islam, economic populist platform.

The hate-filled digital campaign successfully helped AfD become the third-largest party in Germany’s Parliament by playing on the fear and nationalism that has enraged some voters since Merkel’s Germany opened its doors to predominantly Muslim refugees from war-torn Middle Eastern nations like Syria. One slogan  Harris suggested to AfD “Germany for Germans,” was  deemed so nationalistic the party declined to use it. So Harris came up others ideas that were used, such as a  poster with an image of a pregnant white woman lying in the grass with  the slogan, “New Germans? We’ll make them ourselves”, and a poster with the slogan, “Burkas? We prefer bikinis,” superimposed on two white women at the beach.

The firm is led by Vincent Harris, a 29-year-old Virginia native described in a  2014 Bloomberg profile as a “Christian conservative fan of Britney Spears”, and “the man who invented the Republican internet.”

As a teenager Harris helped campaign for his local state representative in Virginia, an experience that helped him learn, as Bloomberg wrote, “that politics was about attention, no matter how it was obtained.” The Baylor (Texas) University graduate and young entrepreneur started Harris Media in his college dorm room in 2008, breaking onto the political scene in 2011 at age 23 when he linked up with a then-unknown Ted Cruz who was running for US Senate. Since then, Harris Media has handled digital strategy for prominent Republicans like current US Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, Senator Rand Paul, and for a brief period in the summer of 2016, Donald Trump.

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