Thousands of Catalans have protested against the detention of eight regional ministers sacked over Catalonia’s push for independence from Spain.

The officials – who appeared in Spain’s high court – are accused of rebellion, sedition and misuse of public funds.

Prosecutors are also seeking a European Arrest Warrant for ousted Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont, who did not show up in court and is now in Belgium.

The request also covers four other ex-ministers who ignored the summons.

Spain has been gripped by a constitutional crisis since a referendum on independence from Spain was held in Catalonia on 1 October in defiance of a constitutional court ruling that had declared it illegal.

Last week, Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy imposed direct rule on Catalonia, dissolving the regional parliament and calling local elections for 21 December.

This came after Catalan lawmakers voted to declare the independence of the affluent north-eastern region.

The Catalan government said that of the 43% of potential voters who took part in the referendum, 90% were in favour of independence.

• Catalonia sings for its exiled leaders
• Catalonia crisis in 300 words
• What next for Spain?

On Thursday, thousands of people gathered outside Catalonia’s regional parliament in Barcelona.

Many carried Catalan flags and slogans that read “Freedom for political prisoners”.

Similar protest rallies were held in other Catalan towns.

Political parties and civic groups in the affluent north-eastern region also condemned the judicial move,

What happened in Spain’s high court in Madrid?

Nine out of 14 summoned Catalan ex-ministers appeared before Judge Carmen Lamela.

She said they had to be detained because they might otherwise leave the country or destroy evidence.

Those who were held are:

• Former Deputy Vice-President Oriol Junqueras
• Former Interior Minister Joaquim Forn
• Former Foreign Affairs Minister Raül Romeva
• Former Justice Minister Carles Mundó
• Former Labour Minister Dolors Bassa
• Former Government Presidency Councillor Jordi Turull
• Former Sustainable Development Minister Josep Rull
• Former Culture Minister Meritxell Borras

The ninth official, ex-Business Minister Santi Vila, was granted bail at the request of prosecutors. He quit before the Catalan parliament voted for independence last Friday.

In addition to Mr Puigdemont, prosecutors have asked Spain’s high court judge to issue European arrest warrants for the following Catalan officials:

• Meritxell Serret, former agriculture minister
• Antoni Comín, former health minister
• Lluís Puig, former culture minister
• Clara Ponsatí, former education minister

Five other senior members of the Catalan parliament, as well as Speaker Carme Forcadell, are facing the same charges but, because of their parliamentary immunity, their cases are being handled by the Supreme Court.

Their hearings have been postponed until 9 November.

How did Carles Puigdemont react?

In a statement broadcast on Catalan TV from an undisclosed location in Belgium, he described the detentions as “an act that breaks with the basic principles of democracy”.

“I demand the release of the ministers and the vice-president,” he added.

Mr Puigdemont, who was spotted in a Brussels cafe on Thursday, has said he will not return to Spain unless he receives guarantees of a fair trial. He did not specify his exact demands.

Belgium’s federal prosecutor has said the law will be applied once an arrest warrant is received, according to Efe news agency.

Mr Puigdemont’s lawyer said the climate was “not good” for him to appear in court, but he also said his client would co-operate with the authorities in Spain and Belgium.

• The man who wants to break up Spain

Mr Puigdemont’s handling of the crisis has drawn criticism among some other Catalan politicians, with left-wing parliamentary deputy Joan Josep Nuet criticising him for creating “yet more bewilderment”.

Spain’s central bank warned on Thursday of the “significant risks and economic costs” resulting from the crisis, and that Catalonia’s economy could fall into recession.

Early numbers suggest that the vital tourism sector of the region has already been affected by the ongoing uncertainty.

EU arrest warrant: What happens next?

If Spain’s high court judge issues a warrant, a European Arrest Warrant (EAW) will be sent to Belgian prosecutors, who have 24 hours to decide whether the paperwork is correct. If they do, they then have 15 days to arrest Mr Puigdemont and the four others. If one or all of them appeals against it, that process could last another 15 days.

Belgium has a maximum of 60 days to return the suspects to Spain after arrest. But if the suspects do not raise legal objections, a transfer could happen within a few days.

A country can reject an EU arrest warrant if it fears that extradition would violate the suspect’s human rights. Discrimination based on politics, religion or race is grounds for refusal. So are fears that the suspect would not get a fair trial.

There is an agreed EU list of 32 offences – in Article Two of the EAW law – for which there is no requirement for the offence to be a crime in both countries. In other words, any of those offences can be a justification for extradition, provided the penalty is at least three years in jail.

However, neither “sedition” nor “rebellion” – two of the Spanish accusations against the Catalan leaders – are on that list.

Americans will still be able to make “both traditional, pretax contributions and ‘Roth’ contributions in the way that works best for them,” Republican lawmakers said in their talking points.

But the legislation includes several land mines that could complicate its passage, including limits on the popular mortgage interest deduction and caps on the state and local tax deduction, as well as its overall cost. Several Republicans from the high-tax states of New York and New Jersey said the bill would need to change to gain their support, while powerful trade groups representing the real estate industry and small businesses blasted the bill as ineffective and harmful to Americans.

“Contrary to their assertions, the Republicans are picking winners and losers,” Jerry Howard, the chief executive of the National Association of Homebuilders, said in an interview. “They are picking rich Americans and corporations over small businesses and the middle class.”

Meanwhile, Senate Republicans are working on their own tax bill, and on Thursday, Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, lobbed a grenade into the House plan over its cost.

“As I have made clear from the beginning of this debate, it is my hope that the final legislation — while allowing for current policy assumptions and reasonable dynamic scoring — will not add to the deficit, sets rates that are permanent in nature and closes a minimum of $4 trillion in loopholes and special interest deductions,” Mr. Corker said.

Representative Kevin Brady, Republican of Texas and the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said that the House plan had the “full support” of Mr. Trump and predicted that it would be on the president’s desk this year. Anticipating the resistance from industry groups, Mr. Brady said, “We’re going to prove them wrong once and for all.”

Representative Peter Roskam, Republican of Illinois and a member of the Ways and Means Committee, said he was bracing for the lobbyist onslaught but would not be deterred.

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“We’ve just finished the opening ceremonies of the lobbyist Olympics. My phone has all kinds of messages and there are all kinds of criticisms,” he said. “The notion of just defending the status quo is insufferable, and we’re not going to do it.”

The bill is estimated to cost $1.5 trillion over a decade, and lawmakers must keep it at that amount if they are to pass it along party lines and avoid a filibuster by Democrats. Lawmakers have been scrambling for days to find revenue to offset tax cuts that will cost trillions of dollars. That has prompted a host of changes on the individual side, including repealing tax breaks for things like medical expenses, moving expenses, student loan interest and adoption, as well as making some business tax breaks temporary.

The benefits for individual taxpayers will be mixed and depend largely on where they fall on the income scale, where they live and the types of tax breaks they tend to claim.

Those making up to $24,000 will pay no income tax. For married taxpayers filing jointly, earnings up to $90,000 would be taxed in the 12 percent bracket; earnings up to $260,000 would fall in the 25 percent bracket; and earnings up to $1 million would be taxed at the 35 percent rate. For unmarried individuals and those filing separately, the bracket thresholds would be half of these amounts, other than the 35 percent bracket, which would be $200,000 for unmarried individuals.

The proposal roughly doubles the standard deduction for middle-class families, expanding it to $24,000 for married couples, from $12,700, and setting it at $12,000 for individuals, from $6,530 today. Republicans also plan to expand the child tax credit to $1,600 from $1,000 and add a $300 credit for each parent and nonchild dependent, such as older family members, though that credit would expire after five years.

But it also tightens rules for claiming the child tax credit, a change that would hit immigrant parents whose children were born in the United States. Filers would need to provide a “work-eligible Social Security number” rather than just a taxpayer identification number in order to claim the credit. The left-leaning Center on Budget Policy and Priorities said the bill would roll back eligibility for about three million children in working families, including about 80 percent of whom were born in the United States.

The bill includes a host of other changes that will affect taxpayers in different ways. For instance, it repeals certain tax credits, including a 15 percent credit for individuals aged 65 or over or who are retired on disability. Right now, those individuals can claim up to $7,500 for a joint return, $5,000 for a single individual, or $3,750 for a married individual filing a joint return.

The House bill would entirely repeal that tax credit. It would also repeal the adoption tax credit, no longer allow deductions for tax preparation and repeal credits for alimony payments. And deductions for moving expenses would no longer be allowed.

One of the biggest flash points is a proposed change to the popular mortgage interest deduction. Under the Republican plan, existing homeowners can keep the deduction, but future purchases will be capped at $500,000, down from the current $1 million limit.

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The National Association of Realtors came out swinging against the bill, suggesting a huge fight awaits over how real estate is treated.

“Eliminating or nullifying the tax incentives for homeownership puts home values and middle-class homeowners at risk, and from a cursory examination this legislation appears to do just that,” said William E. Brown, the president of the association. “We will have additional details upon a more thorough reading of the bill.”

Mr. Howard of the homebuilders group said the bill was a broken promise.

“It puts such severe limitations on homebuyers’ ability to use the mortgage interest deduction that home values will fall,” he said.

Another area of contention is the bill’s treatment of the state and local tax deduction, which is popular among many middle- and upper-middle-class taxpayers in high-cost states like New Jersey, New York and California. The House bill would limit the deduction to just property taxes, rather than state and local income taxes and general sales taxes, and cap the benefit at $10,000.

Several Republican lawmakers said they would oppose the bill in its current form, including Representatives Leonard Lance and Frank A. LoBiondo of New Jersey.

The proposal will double the estate tax exemption to roughly $11 million, from $5.49 million, meaning families can avoid paying taxes on large inheritance. And it eventually repeals the estate tax altogether, phasing it out entirely in six years.

Business groups that include large multinationals praised the bill effusively for lowering corporate rates permanently and sharply, and for overhauling the international tax system.

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For the first time, the United States is proposing to effectively levy a global minimum tax of 10 percent, which would apply to income that high-profit subsidiaries of American companies earn anywhere in the world. The effort is aimed at preventing companies from shifting profits abroad and grabbing back some of the tax revenue on income earned overseas. Those profits are currently not taxed until they are returned to the United States, giving companies an incentive to keep that money offshore since they are taxed at the current corporate tax rate of 35 percent.

The White House has said more than $2.5 trillion in American profits are held offshore.

The bill would force companies to pay a one-time 12 percent tax on liquid assets held overseas, like cash. The tax, which is reduced from the current 35 percent tax rate, would be payable over eight years. For illiquid assets, like equipment or property, the tax rate would be 5 percent.

It would also force American subsidiaries of foreign-owned companies to pay a 20 percent excise tax on any payments sent back to foreign affiliates.

Neil Bradley, the chief policy officer at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, called the bill a “home run” for economic growth and warned other groups against blocking it. “Everyone’s going to look at this and find something they don’t like,” Mr. Bradley said. “So they are going to have to decide? Am I going to help get this done?”

Among those less sanguine about the bill are small businesses, which said the bill does not go far enough to help them reduce their tax burden. Republicans stuck to their promise of lowering the tax rate for “pass through” businesses to 25 percent. But to prevent the rate from becoming a loophole for all sorts of individuals, tax writers have created a formula they say will ensure that business owners will pay a higher individual tax rate on income that they receive as wages. The formula would be applied based on the circumstances of the business.

That provision is not enough to satisfy the National Federation of Independent Business, which said in a statement it is “unable to support the House tax reform plan in its current form.”

Placing even more pressure on lawmakers, the Peter G. Peterson Foundation is planning to spend $6 million on a nationwide ad campaign, including a TV commercial, that warns against a tax plan that adds to the national debt.

The message of the campaign is that overhauling the tax code “should grow the economy, not the debt,” said Michael A. Peterson, the president and chief executive of the foundation, which advocates reining in federal budget deficits.

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THORNTON, Colo. (Reuters) – At least three people were killed in a shooting inside a Walmart store on Wednesday in suburban Denver, where police said they had not yet taken anyone into custody.

Police in Thornton, Colorado, did not immediately release any information about the circumstances of the shooting or who was responsible for the gunfire.

Two men were killed in the shooting. A women, who was injured in the shooting, was taken to a hospital where she later died, Thornton Police Department said on Twitter.

“Detectives currently reviewing security footage witnesses being interviewed for assistance with suspect(s),” police said on Twitter.

No one had been taken into custody, police said.

The situation appeared potentially ominous from authorities’ initial reports.

“We’ve got multiple parties down, we’re still trying to ascertain what their conditions are,” Officer Victor Avila of the Thornton Police Department told Reuters by telephone not long after police arrived on the scene.

About an hour after the initial alert, police said on Twitter that the threat of gunfire had ended at the store, which was surrounded by police and fire crews.

“At this time this is NOT an active shooter. Active crime scene. We will update as info becomes available,” the police department said in that tweet. Confirmation of the two fatalities came about 20 minutes later.

Thornton is city of about 120,000 people roughly 10 miles (16 km) northeast of downtown Denver.

Avila said police were called to the store at about 6:30 p.m. Mountain time (8:30 p.m. ET) and that the gunshots had ceased by the time the first officers arrived at the scene.

A Walmart customer, Aaron Stephens, 44, of Thorton, told Reuters he was inside paying for groceries at a self-checkout stand when he heard gunshots and the sound of ricocheting bullets.

“The employees started screaming and the customers started screaming” as people began to flee the store, he recounted. “I ran out, too, because I didn’t want to get shot.”

Stephens said he did not see where the shooting had come from and did not see anyone struck by bullets.

Local NBC television affiliate 9NEWS reported that a woman whose son was in the Walmart had told her that he had heard about 30 gunshots and was still inside.

A video posted on Twitter showed the Walmart, which is situated in a large complex of big-box stores and other retail outlets adjacent to U.S. Interstate 25, apparently empty except for police officers with guns drawn.

Reporting by Keith Coffman in Thornton and Dan Whitcomb and Steve Gorman in Los Angeles; Writing by Dan Whitcomb; Editing by Sandra Maler and Michael Perry