New Rules for Secret Service Agents

No more exotic strip clubs and nights of heavy drinking for Secret Service personnel on foreign trips. And inviting foreign nationals back to the hotel room is now definitely off-limits.

In the wake of a scandal involving prostitutes on a presidential trip to Colombia, Secret Service management this afternoon issued new regulations for agents on a foreign assignment.

The new rules say:

"Patronization of non-reputable establishments is prohibited.

"Alcohol may not be consumed at the protectee hotel once the protective visit has begun.

"Foreign nationals, excluding hotel staff and official counterparts, are prohibited in your hotel room."

"Alcohol may only be consumed in moderate amounts while off-duty on ... assignment and alcohol use is prohibited within 10 hours of reporting for duty."

Several Secret Service agents on a presidential trip to Colombia have lost their security clearances or their jobs over alleged misbehavior said to include heavy drinking at a sex club and hotel, and the use of prostitutes.

The behavior raised ethical and security questions about the agency charged with protecting the president.

House Homeland Security Chairman Peter King, R-N.Y., told ABC News the Secret Service is making it clear to agents that, "if you have any doubt, don't do it."

"They are putting regulations into writing that they thought agents should have known all along," King said.

King praised Secret Service director Mark Sullivan for his "swift and certain" action, and expressed confidence in the ongoing investigation into the scandal.

The new regulations also will require all agents to complete ethics training before being eligible for travel assignments.

In addition, agents will be briefed on standards of conduct before departing on a trip, and a supervisor from the Secret Service's Office of Responsibility will travel with all agency teams to make sure standards are observed.

Finally, the new regulations say that the laws of the United States shall apply to Secret Service personnel while abroad.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, has been pushing for an independent investigation of the Colombia misbehavior, and suggested the new rules aren't a substitute for such an investigation.

"New conduct rules are necessary to preventing more shenanigans from happening in the future, and whether these are the best, and most cost effective, rules to stop future misconduct remains to be seen," he said in a written statement. "That's why a sheet of paper with new rules doesn't negate the previous actions, and why it remains necessary to hold the agency and the agents accountable, following a complete and independent investigation."

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Swiss central bank to revise transaction rules

  Eyewitness NewsGENEVA -- Switzerland's central bank said Saturday that it will revise regulations on transactions by its top officials amid controversy over the role of its president in private currency deals conducted as he led efforts to soften the Swiss franc.

The Swiss National Bank said its supervisory body, the bank council, decided to embark on a "comprehensive revision" of regulations concerning "own-account transactions involving financial instruments" by members of its six-member enlarged governing board.

That review will be conducted with help from external specialists, a bank statement said, calling for draft regulations to be submitted "as soon as possible."

It added that outside auditors will review all bank transactions undertaken by members of the enlarged governing board between Jan.

1, 2009 and the end of 2011.

Until the bank's regulations have been revised, board members and other staff members with access to privileged information will be required to get approval from the SNB's chief compliance officer for any foreign exchange transactions of more than 20,000 francs ($20,970), the bank said.

Bank chief Philipp Hildebrand says he followed the bank's internal rules when he and his wife ordered U.S. dollar swaps while he was spearheading efforts to lower the value of the franc.

On Thursday, he dismissed suggestions that he should resign over the profitable private currency deals, saying his only mistake was to let his American wife conduct a particularly sensitive transaction from their joint account.

Hildebrand acknowledged that three dollar deals totaling more than $2 million - the most sensitive of which he said was conducted by his wife, Kashya - could be misinterpreted and damage his reputation. But he insisted that he would stay on as long as he had the support of the SNB's board and Swiss authorities.

Both the central bank and the Swiss government have publicly backed Hildebrand, stating that an external audit in December cleared him of wrongdoing.

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Fed proposes new, tougher rules for big banks

  By PALLAVI GOGOINEW YORK -- The Federal Reserve says the largest U.S. banks and financial companies should hold extra cash on their balance sheets to cushion themselves against financial crises.

The proposal by the chief U.S. banking regulator, made Tuesday, will affect banks with assets over $50 billion in assets. There are even stricter rules for companies with over $500 billion in assets such as JPMorgan Chase & Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Citigroup Inc.

U.S. banks opposed the rules. Banks said they would be forced to hold too much extra cash, hampering their ability to make loans.

The rules were first spelled out by international regulators in Basel, Switzerland and were specifically targeted at large interconnected global financial institutions.

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US, Russia agree on rules for safer adoptions

  By BRADLEY KLAPPERWASHINGTON -- The United States and Russia ended an ugly dispute over the abuse of adopted Russian children on Wednesday, with Washington agreeing to investigate reports of maltreatment and increase oversight of adopting families.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov signed the accord in a ceremony in Washington. It is a response to the furor created last year when an adoptive mother from Tennessee sent her 7-year-old boy unaccompanied on a plane back to Moscow because she didn't want to be his mother anymore.

"We take very seriously the safety and security of children that are adopted by American parents," Clinton told reporters. "This agreement provides new important safeguards to protect them. It also increases transparency for all parties involved in the adoption process."

The deal stipulates that agencies can operate in Russia only with the authorization of the country's government, except in cases where a child is being adopted by relatives. Better information will also be provided to prospective parents about the social and medical histories of children.

Russia demanded the agreement after the uproar sparked when Artyom Savelyev was sent back from his adoptive home in Tennessee in April 2010. Savelyev's adoptive mother refused to allow a social worker into the house less than a month before the boy was returned with a note saying she no longer wanted to be his mother because the child had psychological problems, according to authorities.

The incident outraged Russia, for years one of the biggest sources of adopted children for Americans. But adoptions have fallen steadily from Russia after a string of abuse cases prompted Russian officials to demand tighter control or warn of a complete suspension. They dropped by more than 500 last year to 1,082, leaving Russians behind Chinese and Ethiopian kids as third most adopted.

Some international adoption proceedings in Russia were slowed in response, but there was no complete halt to adoptions by Americans.

That caused some concern the tighter regulations might cause potential adoptive parents to look toward other countries and leave more Russian children at the mercy of underfunded and overcrowded orphanages.

"We want all children, whether they be Russian children or American children, to be able to have loving homes with families that will take good care of them," Clinton said.

Lavrov said the agreement would help counter growing public anger over the fate of Russian children in the United States.

Speaking through an interpreter, he thanked the U.S. for its work toward finding a solution.

Russian officials have claimed that at least 17 adopted Russian children have died in domestic violence in American families.

Earlier this month, local media reported that a central Pennsylvania couple accused of killing their adopted Russian son won't face the death penalty if convicted. Police say the child had a traumatic brain injury, about 80 external injuries and was malnourished when he died in 2009, but the parents say the boy repeatedly hurt himself and that they provided him with sufficient medical care.

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Gov't eases foreclosure rules for unemployed

An auction sign is posted at a house under foreclosure in East Palo Alto, Calif., Thursday, June 5, 2008. Home foreclosures and late payments set records over the first three months of the year and are expected to keep rising, stark signs of the housing crisis' mounting damage to homeowners and the economy. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

  By DEREK KRAVITZWASHINGTON -- The Obama administration is making it easier for out-of-work homeowners to stay in their homes, as it tries to revamp its troubled foreclosure-prevention program.

Starting Aug. 1, the Federal Housing Administration will extend the period for unemployed homeowners to miss mortgage payments to a full year from three or four months. That will allow qualified homeowners to go without making a monthly payment for 12 months before the foreclosure process begins.

The extended grace period only applies to FHA-backed loans, which are usually given to low- and middle-income borrowers and represent about 14 percent of all active mortgages and roughly 25 percent of new mortgages. The grace period also applies to homeowners in the government's Home Affordable Modification Program.

But the change will likely only help "tens of thousands" of homeowners, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan said Thursday.

Last year, roughly 17,000 homeowners received a government-supported delay on their mortgage payments. About 3,500 borrowers with FHA-insured loans fall behind on their mortgages each month due to unemployment, officials said, and another 10,000 unemployed homeowners have taken advantage of a three-month delay in mortgage payments in the past year.

Donovan said administration officials hope private lenders and government-controlled mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which back 90 percent of all new mortgages, will adopt a similar policy.

"Our hope is that this will have broader effects," Donovan said during a conference call.

But Fannie and Freddie signaled they would not be adding a broader, industrywide rule, saying they were confident in their existing policies for homeowners.

New rules already going into effect Oct. 1 for the mortgage giants allow for long-term forbearance when a home or a place of employment has been destroyed; if the homeowner or a dependent has a long-term disability or illness; or if the borrower has died and the property is in probate.

Mortgage payments can be put off for up to a year in those cases.

"We think these guidelines provide the appropriate tools to prevent foreclosure whenever possible for unemployed homeowners," said Andrew Wilson, a Fannie Mae spokesman.

The government launched its chief foreclosure program in 2009 by lowering monthly payments of homeowners at risk of foreclosure.

Borrowers start with lower payments on a trial basis. But the program has struggled to convert them into permanent loan modifications.

More than 1.6 million troubled homeowners received trial modifications over the past two years. But a majority of the applicants, about 854,000 homeowners, have dropped out of the program entirely.

In recent weeks, administration officials have acknowledged that housing has become a significant drag on the economy. President Barack Obama said the housing market has "been most stubborn to us trying to solve the problem," during a town-hall-style meeting Wednesday on Twitter.

He acknowledged that the government's programs to help homeowners were "not enough" and said the administration was "going back to the drawing board."

Homeowners accepted into the foreclosure assistance program receive interest rates as low as 2 percent for five years. They can repay their loans over a longer period. The median savings for those who remain in the program is about $526 per month.

Those who have their payments delayed must repay them, with interest.

But many homeowners have complained that the program has been a bureaucratic mess. Some have said they were disqualified after banks lost their documents and failed to return their phone calls.

Banks have blamed homeowners for failing to submit needed paperwork.

Last month, the Obama administration blamed the three largest U.S. mortgage lenders for the failures of the foreclosure program, saying they hadn't done enough to help people at risk of losing their homes. The Treasury Department said it was withholding financial incentives that amounted to up to $1,000 per permanent loan modification, arguing the three lenders had incorrectly determined that many people were ineligible for assistance.

The lenders, Wells Fargo & Co., Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase & Co., disputed the data, saying they were based on old reports, not audits from the first quarter of the year as the government claimed.

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