Hasta La Gadget!

<span class="articleLocation”>A U.S. judge on Friday approved a $25 million settlement to resolve a class action lawsuit that claimed fraud against President Donald Trump and his Trump University real estate seminars.

The ruling from U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel in San Diego concluded a lengthy and contentious lawsuit that played a prominent role in the presidential campaign last year.

The Trump University students, who paid as much as $35,000 for the seminars, claimed they were lured by false promises that they would learn Trump’s investing “secrets” from his “hand-picked” instructors.

One Trump University student objected to the deal, in particular a provision blocking students from opting out of it. She said in court papers she would like to seek full recovery from Trump, plus punitive damages and other relief.

An attorney for that student could not immediately be reached for comment.

During the campaign, Trump vowed to continue fighting the fraud claims but agreed to the settlement soon after he was elected. He has admitted he did not personally select the instructors, but his lawyers have described the claim as sales “puffery.”

Last year, Trump accused Judge Curiel of bias based on the Indiana-born judge’s Mexican ancestry.

In his ruling on Friday, Curiel called the $25 million settlement “extraordinary” in that it represented an estimated 80 percent recovery for the students.

“The amount offered in settlement provides significant and immediate recovery,” Curiel wrote.

(Reporting by Dan Levine in San Francisco; Editing by Toni Reinhold)

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin defended his comments last week promoting the “Lego Batman” movie, which he financed, in a letter to the Office of Government Ethics obtained by NBC News.

Mnuchin acknowledged that he should not have made the comment (federal employees are prohibited from using their jobs to sell products), but said “it was not my intention to make a product endorsement.” Mnuchin says in the letter that he takes his ethical responsibilities seriously.

The letter comes after Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), ranking member of the Senate Finance Committee, requested the ethics office review the treasury secretary’s comments.

In an interview last week, Mnuchin plugged his “Lego Batman” movie with a wink. “I’m not allowed to promote anything that I’m involved in. So I just want to have the legal disclosure, you’ve asked me the question, and I am not promoting any product,” he said, before delivering the punchline: “But you should send all your kids to ‘Lego Batman.’”

In a statement to NBC News, a Treasury Department spokesman said Mnuchin’s plug for his movie was “made in jest and not intended to be a product endorsement of the Lego Batman movie. We think that’s clear in context.”

And that is indeed a fair description of what Mnuchin was doing. As the president uses the highest public office to enrich his family business and a top aide is allowed by the White House counsel to promote the family’s products without consequence, it’s also refreshingly honest to hear the Trump administration say that ethics rules are officially a joke.

The Office of Government Ethics did not immediately return a HuffPost request for comment.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

WASHINGTON ― President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, Neil Gorsuch, has refused to meet with at least two Democratic senators, Tammy Duckworth (Ill.) and Catherine Cortez Masto (Nev.), in the weeks leading up to his confirmation vote.

Both senators noted this detail in statements announcing they plan to vote against him.

“Unfortunately, Judge Gorsuch has not made the effort to meet with me in person to answer the serious questions I have about his record and he in fact cancelled a meeting we had previously scheduled,” Duckworth said. “I refuse to vote to end debate on a nominee who refuses to provide any answers to my questions.”

“Unfortunately, after requesting a meeting with the Judge for several weeks, he has refused to honor this request,” Cortez Masto said. “The U.S. Constitution has entrusted the Senate with the role of advising the President on the highest court of the land and in refusing to meet with me, he has disrespected our nation’s founding principles and pillars core to our democratic institutions.”

In Duckworth’s case, the two had a meeting scheduled on a Wednesday, but Gorsuch canceled and did not provide any dates or times that worked for him to reschedule. Duckworth’s office “made multiple efforts and offered multiple times/dates for both the first meeting and for rescheduling after the cancellation,” according to her office, but Gorsuch didn’t follow up.

“If Judge Gorsuch had wanted to meet with the Senator, he shouldn’t have cancelled their meeting without offering any additional times that worked for him,” Duckworth spokesman Ben Garmisa said via email.

Cortez Masto spokesman Rey Benitez said Gorsuch’s team told her office it had to justify why the Supreme Court nominee should meet with the senator.

“They said, ‘Give us a good reason why the judge should sit down with the senator,’” Benitez said. “That’s ridiculous that they’re asking us to do that. She’s a U.S. senator and she’s trying to do her job.”

Another Democratic senator, Kamala Harris (Calif.), did not meet with Gorsuch either. She never got an offer to meet with him, per her office.

A White House spokesman, who spoke only on background, said Gorsuch has met with most senators and is still open to meeting with Cortez Masto.

“Judge Gorsuch has met with nearly 80 Senators,” the spokesman said in an email. “In early February, the White House nominations team reached out to Senator Cortez Masto requesting a meeting be scheduled. The Judge was more than willing to meet with the Senator and both sides have been trying to find a mutually agreeable date that would work.”

Christopher Kang, a former White House staffer who led Senate outreach for the confirmations of Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, said his team offered a courtesy meeting to all 100 senators.

“These meetings are about more than just trying to win votes,” Kang wrote in a Thursday blog post on HuffPost. “They are about respect for the Senate as an institution ― a co-equal branch of government that is constitutionally responsible for providing advice and consent on Supreme Court nominations. If you don’t understand this, that raises serious questions about your judgment and independence.”

Latino advocacy groups are outraged by the perceived slights to Cortez Masto, who is the first Latina senator, and to Duckworth, a decorated veteran.

“Sen. Cortez Masto represents the growing diversity of our nation. She has a right to ask questions of the nominee to the highest court in the land,” said Ben Monterroso of Mi Familia Vota, a nonprofit focused on civic engagement in Latino and immigrant communities. “Why won’t he meet with two senators who represent the diversity of our country? Is he afraid he will be asked about women’s rights?”

“The refusal to meet with Senator Cortez Masto seems to demonstrate unwarranted hostility, extreme obtuseness, or acquiescence in a political strategy marked by disrespect for the Latino community,” MALDEF President Thomas Saenz said. “While we hope that mere oversight may explain Gorsuch’s refusal to meet with the two senators, the record to date suggests otherwise.”

Gorsuch’s confirmation vote is set for April 7, and it could be dramatic. Democrats are vowing to deny him the 60 votes he needs to move forward, and Republicans are threatening to blow up Senate rules to force through his confirmation on 51 votes. The partisan nastiness of it all is making senators sad.

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

René Pérez definitely has the hook-up for “Hamilton” tickets. 

The former vocalist for Calle 13, best known as Residente, hasn’t shied away from showing his love for his third cousin Lin-Manuel Miranda on Instagram. But there was a time when Pérez didn’t know he was related to the creator of “Hamilton” at all. 

The Puerto Rican artist appeared on “The Daily Show” Wednesday night to discuss his new album with host Trevor Noah. Towards the end of the interview, the host said he was shocked to find out Pérez and Miranda were cousins. 

Pérez then explained how he found out he was related to Miranda long after meeting him.

“I met him way before ‘Hamilton,’ when he was doing ‘In The Heights’ like nine years ago,” he said. “My grandma, she use to tell me all the time ‘Oh, you have your cousin in New York and you don’t know about him.’ And then when he started to write ‘In The Heights’ we met in Puerto Rico.”

That’s when Pérez says his mother saw Miranda’s face and revealed the two artists were actually family. Both of the artists were equally surprised. 

“It’s not every day you find out you’re related to one of the most famous rappers in the world,” Miranda told the New York Times in January. 

During his interview with Noah, the former Calle 13 frontman also recalled the moment Miranda first told him the idea of creating a musical based on the life of Alexander Hamilton.

And Pérez is certainly a fan of his third cousin, in the past he’s raved about Miranda’s rapping skills on Instagram.

“Here with my cousin Lin Manuel, the best rapper in the family,” he wrote in a caption on July 2016.

Greatness definitely runs in the family. 

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Japan’s unique Final Fantasy XIV-based drama is making its way to the rest of the world thanks to Netflix. Daddy of Light isn’t really an adaptation of the hit MMO — it’s a live-action show that focuses on a father and son who play the game together…