(CNN) – After U.S. President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel discussed hot-button issues like America's surveillance programs during his visit to Berlin on Wednesday, the leaders addressed them with reporters.
Obama visited Germany, the United States' largest European trading partner, after attending a G8 conference earlier this week in Northern Ireland. Below is a quick look at what Obama said Wednesday - a few hours before he spoke to the public at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate - on European concerns about U.S. surveillance programs, Russia's disagreement with the United States over Syria, and more:
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(CNN) – U.S. President Barack Obama followed in the footsteps of past U.S. leaders with a speech Wednesday at Berlin's iconic Brandenburg Gate that a senior administration official said would ask Russia to join the United States in slashing its supply of strategic nuclear warheads.
"Hello, Berlin," Obama said twice to cheers, then told the crowd standing in bright sunshine he would remove his jacket due to the heat. "We can be a little more informal among friends."
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(CNN) – Critics who have compared President Barack Obama's stance on government surveillance to that of hawkish former Vice President Dick Cheney are missing his insistence on proper systematic balances, Obama said in an interview that aired Monday.
Defending at length the recently revealed government programs that gather information about phone calls and Internet usage, Obama said his focus has always been on allowing information to be gathered while ensuring necessary oversight.
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(CNN) – The names of dozens of detainees held at the military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, were released for the first time on Monday after a newspaper sued the federal government for the information.
The list identifies 46 inmates being held for “continued detention” at the facility, which President Barack Obama has vowed to close. The report was made public after a lawsuit from the Miami Herald. The Obama administration first acknowledged that detainees were being held indefinitely in Guantanamo in 2010, but didn't make their identities public until now.
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Washington (CNN) - It's a glaring number in a national poll that's making headlines.
President Barack Obama's approval rating dropped 8 percentage points over the past month to 45%, the president's lowest rating in more than 18 months, according to a CNN/ORC International survey released on Monday.
And Obama's disapproval rating soared 9 points to 54% since mid-May.
FULL STORY[Breaking news update at 10:31 a.m. Monday ]
(CNN) – The first round of negotiations for a possible new trans-Atlantic trade deal between the United States and the European Union will take place next month in Washington, U.S. President Barack Obama said Monday at the Group of Eight summit in Northern Ireland. "I believe that we can form an economic alliance as strong as our diplomatic and security alliances," President Obama said.
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(CNN) – President Barack Obama will appoint Washington, D.C. lawyer Clifford Sloan to re-open the State Department's Office of Guantanamo Closure, according to a senior administration official.
The administration’s efforts to shut down the detention facility have been stalled since January, when the State Department shuttered the office tasked with handling the closure, and reassigned its special envoy.
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Washington (CNN) – President Barack Obama's approval rating dropped eight percentage points over the past month, to 45%, the president's lowest rating in more than a year and a half, according to a new national poll.
The CNN/ORC International survey released Monday morning comes as the White House has been reacting to controversies over a massive U.S. government surveillance program; the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of tea party and other conservative groups who applied for tax-exempt status; the administration's handling of last September's attack in Benghazi that left the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other Americans dead; and the Justice Department's secret collection of journalists' phone records as part of a government investigation into classified leaks.
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(CNN) – President Barack Obama does not feel that he has violated the privacy of any American, his chief of staff, Denis McDonough, confirmed Sunday.
Asked directly if Obama feels that way regarding the government's controversial surveillance programs, McDonough said simply, "He does not."
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(CNN) – Former Vice President Dick Cheney vehemently defended the National Security Agency surveillance programs that started under President George W. Bush but argued the current administration has lost credibility.
"Part of the problem is the administration's credibility - because of Benghazi and the IRS scandal - is less effective. Nonexistent, if you will, when you get over to the NSA program, which ought to be defended," he told CNN.
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