{"question_id": "20230224_0", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:38", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/21/politics/zelensky-biden-washington-visit-ukraine-russia-war/index.html", "title": "Zelensky delivers impassioned plea for more help fighting Russia on ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nUkrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered a historic speech from the United States Capitol Wednesday night, expressing gratitude for American support in fighting Russian aggression since the war began – and asking for more.\n\n“I hope my words of respect and gratitude resonate in each American heart,” Zelensky said during the joint meeting of Congress, later adding, “Against all odds, and doom and gloom scenarios, Ukraine didn’t fall. Ukraine is alive and kicking.”\n\nBut alongside Zelensky’s gratitude was a plea, emphasizing that his armed forces are outnumbered and outgunned by the Russian military even as they fight on. At one point, Zelensky drew laughs from the chamber when he said, “We have artillery, yes. Thank you. We have it. Is it enough? Honestly, not really.”\n\nZelensky’s visit to Washington marks his first trip outside his homeland since it was invaded 300 days ago, arriving Wednesday afternoon to set a course for the future of the war alongside a key Western ally.\n\nOn “the frontline of tyranny,” Zelensky argued during his speech to Congress, American support “is crucial not just to stand in such (a) fight but to get to the turning point to win on the battlefield.”\n\n“The world is too interconnected and too interdependent to allow someone to stay aside and at the same time to feel safe when such a battle continues,” he added. “Our two nations are allies in this battle and next year will be a turning point, I know it – the point where Ukrainian courage and American resolve must guarantee the future of our common freedom, the freedom of people who stand for their values.”\n\n“Your money is not charity,” he asserted to Congress. “It’s an investment in the global security and democracy that we handle in the most responsible way.” Zelensky also called on lawmakers to strengthen sanctions against Russia.\n\nStill, despite that disparity in resources, Zelensky said, “Ukraine holds its line and will never surrender.”\n\nIn his speech, Zelensky harkened back to American history, referencing the Battle of the Bulge, President Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Battle of Saratoga. Just like “brave American soldiers which held their lines” and fought against Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany in 1944, Ukrainian soldiers “are doing the same to Putin’s forces this Christmas,” Zelensky said.\n\nHe also briefly discussed a 10-point peace formula and summit that he told US President Joe Biden about during an earlier meeting at the White House. Zelensky claimed Biden supported the peace initiatives.\n\nZelensky also recalled his recent visit to the frontlines – Bakhmut in Donbas – which has been under siege since May. There, he said, “every inch of that land is soaked in blood, roaring guns sound every hour.” In the climatic moment of the speech, he unveiled a Ukrainian flag signed by soldiers fighting in Bakhmut that he gave as a gift to the Congress.\n\n“The occupiers have a significant advantage in artillery. They have an advantage in ammunition. They have much more missiles and planes than we ever have. It’s true, but our defense forces stand,” he added.\n\nRussia, Zelensky argued in strong terms, has “found an ally” in Iran.\n\n“Iran’s deadly drones sent to Russia in hundreds became a threat to our critical infrastructure. That is how one terrorist has found the other,” he said. “It is just a matter of time when they will strike against your other allies if we do not stop them now.”\n\nZelensky’s White House visit\n\nEarlier Wednesday the Ukrainian leader visited the White House, where he met with Biden and held a joint news conference, during which the duo displayed a united front on their approach to the war.\n\n“I think … we share the exact same vision, and that a free, independent, prosperous and secure Ukraine is the vision – we both want this war to end,” Biden told reporters in the White House East Room.\n\nAt the start of the news conference, Biden relayed that he felt it was “particularly meaningful” to speak to Zelensky in person and “look each other in the eye.” The Ukrainian president’s leadership, Biden said, has inspired the world.\n\n“We understand in our bones that Ukraine’s fight is part of something much bigger,” Biden continued.\n\nBiden said Zelensky has shown his “strong stand against aggression in the face of the imperial appetites of autocrats,” and said the US was standing alongside Ukraine in maintaining “core principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity.”\n\nBoth Biden and Zelensky addressed the Russians during the news conference, with the Ukranian president repeatedly calling Russian forces “terrorists” and Biden underscoring the importance of being “clear” about Russia’s actions.\n\n“It is purposely attacking Ukraine critical infrastructure, destroying the system to provide heat and light (to) Ukrainian people during the coldest, darkest part of the year. Russia is using winter as a weapon, freezing people, starving people, cutting them off from one another,” Biden said. The war, Biden later argued, “could end today if Putin had any dignity at all and did the right thing and just … pulled out. But that’s not gonna happen.”\n\nBut the two leaders, it seems, still have different perspectives on their approach to pursuing peace with Russia.\n\nEarly in the news conference, Biden said Zelensky was open to pursuing a “just peace.” Later, when asked by a reporter to share his idea of a fair way to end the war, the Ukrainian leader responded, “For me, as a president, just peace is no compromises as to the sovereignty, freedom and territorial integrity of my country, the payback for all the damages inflicted by Russian aggression.”\n\n“There can’t be any just peace in the war that was imposed on us by these … inhumans, I would say,” he added.\n\nMeeting comes at a critical moment\n\nPresident Volodymyr Zelensky addresses Congress as Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Kamala Harris hold up a Ukrainian national flag signed by Ukrainian soldiers at the Capitol in Washington on Wednesday, December 21. Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images Zelensky addresses the joint meeting of Congress. Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters Zelensky holds an American flag that was gifted to him by Pelosi. The flag was flown over the Capitol earlier in the day. J. Scott Applewhite/AP Zelensky addresses Congress. Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images Zelensky addresses the joint meeting. Jonathan Ernst/Reuters Guests of the the Ukrainian delegation wave as Zelensky acknowledges them during his address. Carolyn Kaster/AP Zelensky is greeted as he arrives to address Congress. Nathan Howard/Bloomberg via Getty Images Zelensky speaks during a news conference with Biden in the East Room of the White House. Ting Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images Biden speaks during the news conference. Andrew Harnik/AP Members of the media listen during the news conference in the East Room of the White House. Andrew Harnik/AP Biden speaks during the news conference. Andrew Harnik/AP Zelensky meets with Biden in the Oval Office of the White House. Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images Zelensky speaks after giving Biden a gift. He presented Biden with a Cross of Combat Merit. Zelensky explained that a captain in the Ukrainian military fighting in the Donbas region asked that his award be given to Biden. Patrick Semansky/AP Biden holds the Cross of Combat Merit. \"He's very brave,\" Zelensky said of the soldier. \"And he said give it to very brave President, and I want to give you, that is a cross for military merit.\" Patrick Semansky/AP Zelensky sits with Biden and first lady Jill Biden inside the White House. from President Volodymyr Zelensky/Instagram Biden and Zelensky walk down the Colonnade of the White House as they make their way to the Oval Office. Alex Wong/Getty Images Biden and Zelensky walk into the White House after Zelensky's arrival. Olivier Douliery/AFP/Getty Images Biden and first lady Jill Biden welcome Zelensky at the White House on Wednesday. Andrew Harnik/AP Biden shakes hands with Zelensky as he arrives at the White House. Patrick Semansky/AP Zelensky, left, is greeted by Rufus Gifford, chief of protocol for the state department, after landing in the United States on Wednesday. NA/Ukrainian Presidency In pictures: Zelensky's wartime visit to US Prev Next\n\nZelensky arrived to the South Lawn just after 2 p.m. ET, eschewing a suit for his now-familiar military green shirt. A military honor guard lined the White House driveway as his black vehicle pulled toward the building.\n\n“I understand that we have very important topics and we’ll discuss them, everything, so many challenges in Ukraine, in Europe, in the world, from energy to the situation on the battlefield,” Zelensky said in the Oval Office. “But first of all, really, all my appreciations from my heart, from the heart of Ukrainians, all Ukrainians, from our nation.”\n\nThe wartime visit was meant to demonstrate in stirring fashion the continued American commitment to Ukraine at a moment when Biden’s ability to maintain that support at home and abroad is being tested.\n\nIt has also been an opportunity for Biden and top American officials to sound out Zelensky on how he views the trajectory of the conflict, and to offer their thoughts on what it would take to bring the war to an end.\n\n“Together with our partners, we’re also going to impose costs on the Kremlin and will support Ukraine in pursuing a just peace,” Biden said in the Oval Office, a reference to how Zelensky has said he hopes to see the war end. “President Zelensky, the United States stands with the brave people in Ukraine.”\n\nSitting before a roaring fireplace, Zelensky offered Biden a military cross medal from a Ukrainian soldier serving on the front lines.\n\n“He said, ‘Give it to a very brave president,’” Zelensky said.\n\n“Undeserved but much appreciated,” Biden replied as he accepted the medal, asking if it would be possible to contact the Ukrainian soldier.\n\nA surprise visit\n\nThe trip, which US and Ukrainian officials arranged in secret over the past week, came with heavy risks. After arriving in Poland by train, Zelensky flew to Washington aboard an American military aircraft, US officials said. He arrived in the US shortly after midday at Joint Base Andrews, just outside the nation’s capital.\n\nUS President Joe Biden and Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky meet in the Oval Office of the White House, in Washington, DC on December 21, 2022. - Zelensky is in Washington to meet with US President Joe Biden and address Congress -- his first trip abroad since Russia invaded in February. (Photo by Brendan SMIALOWSKI / AFP) (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images) Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images\n\nBiden first discussed the prospect of Zelensky visiting Washington during a telephone call with the Ukrainian leader on December 11, an administration official said. A formal invitation was extended a week ago that Zelensky accepted, launching joint consultations on the security parameters of the risky, highly secretive trip.\n\nZelensky, who the official said was “very keen” to visit the US, determined those parameters met his needs, and the US set to work executing them. The trip was finally confirmed on Sunday.\n\nTight security was enforced around Zelensky’s visit amid concerns that Russia wants to incapacitate the Ukrainian president, a source close to the Ukrainian leader told CNN on Wednesday. Because of this ongoing threat, senior top government officials – as well as embassy staff in the US – were not informed about the schedule of the visit.\n\nAccording to the source, the military risk had to be calculated allowing the Ukrainian president to make the short overseas trip without jeopardizing the military situation. Scheduling also had to be worked with the White House to assess availability for this to happen.\n\nIn weighing a visit, Zelensky suggested he did not want to travel had there not been a significant development in the bilateral relationship between Ukraine and the US. Zelensky viewed the US decision to send Patriot missile defense systems to Ukraine as a major shift in the relationship between the two allies.\n\nThe new, $1.8 billion package Biden unveiled includes a Patriot surface-to-air missile system, which has been a longstanding request of Ukraine’s to fend of Russian air attacks. CNN was first to report the US was expected to send the Patriot systems to Ukraine.\n\nUnlike smaller air defense systems, Patriot missile batteries need much larger crews, requiring dozens of personnel to properly operate them. The training for Patriot missile batteries normally takes multiple months, a process the United States will now carry out under the pressure of near-daily aerial attacks from Russia.\n\nThe system is widely considered one of the most capable long-range weapons to defend airspace against incoming ballistic and cruise missiles, as well as some aircraft. Because of its long-range and high-altitude capability, it can potentially shoot down Russian missiles and aircraft far from their intended targets inside Ukraine.\n\nDuring the news conference, Biden told CNN’s Phil Mattingly that the missile system is defensive, not escalatory. Zelensky said the system is “something that will strengthen our air defense significantly.”\n\n“Every dollar of this investment for the United States is going to be a strengthening of global security and I know that the American leadership will be strong and will play important role in global scope,” Zelensky added.\n\nHe also suggested Ukraine would want more of the systems.", "authors": ["Kevin Liptak Maegan Vazquez", "Kevin Liptak", "Maegan Vazquez"], "publish_date": "2022/12/21"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/20/biden-trip-ukraine-kyiv-russia-war-secret-zelenskyy/11303643002/", "title": "How President Biden pulled off a secret trip to Ukraine one year into ...", "text": "While most of Washington slept, President Joe Biden arrived in Kyiv around 8 a.m. local time Monday aboard a train that traveled overnight from neighboring Poland.\n\nThe dramatic display of solidarity with Ukraine was the culmination of months of planning by a small team of administration officials. A final decision came in an Oval Office meeting Friday to move forward with a secret trip to war-torn Ukraine ahead of the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion.\n\nThe historic mission posed extraordinary risks. Although presidents Donald Trump and Barack Obama made surprise visits to Afghanistan and Iraq, this was the first presidential trip to a war zone in which the U.S. did not have a military presence.\n\n\"I thought it was critical that there not be any doubt, none whatsoever, about U.S. support for Ukraine in the war,\" Biden said at 9 a.m. local time alongside Ukranian President Volodymr Zelenskyy, who had greeted him 30 minutes earlier at Mariinksy Palace, the president's official residence.\n\nDonning Ukraine's colors with a blue and yellow striped tie, Biden spent about five hours in Kyiv before departing for Poland, which White House officials insisted last week would be Biden's only destination during his three-day swing to Europe.\n\nMore:Joe Biden walks streets of Kyiv in surprise visit: 'Americans stand with you'\n\nWhen did Biden leave for Kyiv?\n\nThe secret journey began nearly 20 hours earlier when – in a deviation from Biden's public schedule – the president arrived at Andrews Air Force base at about 4 a.m. EST Sunday. He boarded Air Force One with two reporters and a small group of White House officials including national security adviser Jake Sullivan and deputy chief of staff Jen O’Malley Dillon.\n\n“The trip from Washington was a trip filled with real anticipation that this was an important moment, and that the president was rising to the moment and felt he had an important mission to undertake, and he was eager to do it,” Sullivan said.\n\nAir Force One landed first at Ramstein Air Base in Germany at 5:13 p.m. local time Sunday night and stayed grounded a little over an hour before taking off to Poland. Biden arrived at the Rzeszów-Jasionka Airport in southeastern Poland at 7:57 p.m. local time Sunday.\n\nBiden's motorcade then departed for the Przemyśl Główny train station, where he boarded one of eight train cars that – painted blue with a yellow stripe down the middle – resembled the type of trains that have carried Ukrainian refugees into Poland.\n\nBiden takes 10-hour train ride into Ukraine\n\nBiden, a well-known lover of trains, then embarked on likely the most momentous ride of his life: a 10-hour trip in the dead of night into a country ravaged by war, arriving at the Kyiv-Pasazhyrsky station about 8 a.m. local time. Bridget Brink, U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, was there to greet the president.\n\n\"It's good to be back in Kyiv,\" Biden said after exiting the train, making his first trip to Ukraine since six visits he made there as vice president, the last in 2017.\n\nMore:Biden in Ukraine: See photos of president in Kyiv nearly one year after Russia's invasion\n\nFor security reasons, the two reporters who traveled with Biden – a pool reporter from the Wall Street Journal and a reporter from The Associated Press – agreed not to provide real-time updates on Biden's movements. The White House has declined to discuss the full logistics of Biden's trip until it concludes.\n\nEven in its official guidance, the White House maintained Biden would be leaving for Poland on Monday evening.\n\nAs Biden flew across the Atlantic Ocean, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby made the rounds on the Sunday morning TV talk shows, making no mention that Biden would be landing in Ukraine the next morning.\n\nUS alerted Russia about trip for 'deconfliction purposes'\n\n“Thank you for coming,” Zelenskyy said, greeting Biden outside the palace. “This conversation brings us closer to the victory.\"\n\nIn joint remarks with Zelenskyy, Biden committed an additional $460 million in security assistance to Ukraine. It followed a meeting in which the two leaders discussed the next steps of the war, which Russian President Vladimir Putin has shown no signs of ending.\n\nBiden and Zelenskky later visited St. Michael’s Gold-Domed Cathedral, spending about 10 minutes inside, as air raid sirens blasted outside. They then laid a wreath at the Wall of Remembrance to honor the country's fallen soldiers.\n\n“One year later, Kyiv stands. And Ukraine stands. Democracy stands,” Biden said.\n\nMore:Biden in Kyiv, Japan rolls out aid and Putin faces 'people's court': Live Ukraine updates\n\nAfter visiting the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv at noon local time, Biden entered the motorcade and started rolling roughly 45 minutes later to an undisclosed location. He departed Kyiv, returning to Poland at 10:04 p.m. local time on the same train that he rode into Ukraine.\n\nBiden then took a short flight to Warsaw, where he will meet with Polish President Andrzej Duda and deliver a speech Tuesday night on the one-year anniversary of Russia's war in Ukraine\n\nBiden Kyiv trip 'meticulously planned' for months\n\nSullivan said Russia was notified that Biden would be traveling to Kyiv “some hours before his departure for deconfliction purposes.” Sullivan did not offer details on the message nor the response from Russia because of “the sensitive nature of those communications.\"\n\nDeputy national security adviser Jon Finer said the visit was “meticulously planned over a period of months,” with involvement from the White House, NSC, the Pentagon, the Secret Service and the intelligence community.\n\nFiner said Biden was fully briefed on each stage of the plan and of any possible contingencies. He said the final decision to go to Kyiv was made in a huddle in the Oval Office on Friday.\n\n“Obviously, this was all worked very closely between the White House and the highest levels of the Ukrainian government, who have become quite adept at hosting high-level visitors, although not one quite like this.”\n\nContributing: The Associated Press\n\nReach Joey Garrison on Twitter @joeygarrison", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/20"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/17/politics/joe-biden-presidency-delaware-work-from-home/index.html", "title": "Biden has spent more than a fourth of his presidency working from ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nPresident Joe Biden spent the weekend at his home in Delaware, where he met up with his wife, other family members and – if they followed usual practice – Willow the cat and Commander the dog.\n\nIt’s a familiar weekly ritual. As of this point in his presidency, Biden has spent more than a quarter of his time working from his home state of Delaware, either at his house in Wilmington or his Rehoboth Beach property.\n\nSome 21 months into his term, Biden has made 55 visits to Delaware, totaling some or all of 174 days as of Sunday, according to a CNN analysis of presidential schedules and a tally kept by Mark Knoller, the longtime unofficial statistician of the White House press corps. In addition, Biden has made 19 visits, or all or part of 64 days, to the Camp David presidential retreat in rural Maryland.\n\nHe has now surpassed even the getaway time of former President Donald Trump, so often criticized by Democrats for his regular departures from the White House to stay at one of his personal homes. At this point in his tenure, Trump had spent about 135 days at either his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, or his home at his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey. Trump also had spent 23 days at Camp David.\n\n“President Biden is deeply proud of his roots and his family and it has been a staple of his time in public life to never lose touch with either,” White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates said to CNN. “Presidents of the United States are constantly on the job, regardless of their location – whether they’re on a state visit overseas or just 100 miles from the White House for a short trip to Wilmington, DE. And as all Americans can agree, it’s important for leaders to avoid becoming ensconced in Washington, DC.”\n\nThe comforts of home can be a salve for the commander in chief while carrying out one of the world’s most demanding jobs. The American president is never truly “off,” and – in fact – Biden, like all presidents, has a whole remote White House apparatus that travels with him to facilitate that round-the-clock enterprise, with the most state-of-the-art capabilities, resources and technology traveling with him wherever he goes.\n\nSome argue that Biden can now lean into the normalcy of working from home, which millions of Americans had to rely on when Covid-19 forced isolation from offices and public spaces. “WFH” is not just a shorthand for being productive at the home office, it’s become a professional way of life for many.\n\n“It is 2022, not 1922. If the rest of the country can work from home, so can the president of the United States,” said Michael LaRosa, a director at a DC-based public affairs firm and former press secretary to first lady Dr. Jill Biden.\n\n“He spent (practically) every weekend in Delaware during his 36 years in the Senate, and his eight years as vice president,” LaRosa said. “This is nothing new. The Bidens have never lived in Washington, DC.” When he was a senator, Biden commuted back to Delaware almost every night by train – earning the nickname “Amtrak Joe” – and the train station in Wilmington is named for him.\n\nThe physical presence of a president is, however, meaningful for some, at least in ritual.\n\nThe statistics – 236 days away from the White House in Delaware and Maryland in less than two years on the job – are significant for the modern presidency. The job has been set in the nation’s capital near the Congress and the Supreme Court, in part for its symbolic power, for more than 220 years. Being in that power center brings a higher level of transparency thanks to the proximity to the national media, along with White House rules about press access and public records about who comes and goes.\n\nWhenever the president is actually in the Oval Office, for example, that presence is honored by the solemn watch of a stone-faced US Marine posted outside the West Wing.\n\n“A special challenge that Biden faces, because of his age, is that people will assume the worst if he’s not always visible. That is something that comes with being the oldest president in office,” said Tim Naftali, a CNN presidential historian, who notes presidents have had a “moveable Oval Office” for decades. “Perception is important in American politics.”\n\nThe optics of WFH or WFWH\n\nA president of the United States who doesn’t consider the White House his primary home does not go unnoticed by the media, or critics. But the executive mansion’s primary residents have generally found it stifling.\n\n“I always say I don’t know whether it’s the finest public housing in America or the crown jewel of the prison system,” former President Bill Clinton famously mused during a 1993 interview.\n\nKnoller, who during his 32-year career with CBS News covered the personal habits of six presidents, concurs.\n\n“It may look luxurious, but it can be suffocating to live and work there day in and out,” Knoller said.\n\nTrump’s trips to Mar-a-Lago and Bedminster were fodder for op-eds and lent themselves to critics painting a portrait of a president unwilling to give up the trappings of a luxe off-duty lifestyle. And though many days were spent on the golf course – 125 or so at this point in Trump’s presidency, compared to Biden’s 19 on the links – Trump was still the leader of the free world. Biden’s former boss, Barack Obama, traveled home much less frequently while in office but was frequently dinged – by Trump, among others – for the amount of golf he played.\n\n“(Ronald) Reagan and (George W.) Bush both spent lots of time at their private ranch homes,” said Knoller of two other former presidents who escaped the White House with regularity.\n\nKnoller tabulated time away for presidents, he says, because the numbers “added color to my reporting and gave insight to the president’s needs and activities.”\n\nAccording to Knoller’s count, George W. Bush spent all or part of 490 days – more than a year – at his Texas ranch during his eight years in office. Reagan spent nearly a year, all or part of 349 days, at his California ranch during his two terms. If Biden were reelected and kept up his current pace of trips to Delaware until the end of a second term in office, he would far surpass both Reagan and Bush in time away from the White House.\n\nHowever, post-pandemic culture has blurred the boundaries of what defines a workplace.\n\n“Our concept of being ‘on the job’ has shifted, and that may actually change the way we think about where our president needs to be,” Naftali said.\n\nSome of Biden’s biggest political wins came this summer, after all, when he was isolating in the residence of the White House after testing positive for Covid-19. Photos showed him tie-less, often working in the second-floor Treaty Room or reading papers with his feet up on the Truman balcony, Commander by his side.\n\nIt was a view into what Biden’s work from home life may be like when he’s in Wilmington or Rehoboth.\n\n“It’s a bit antiquated to think that because he is not physically in the White House on the weekends, that he is not working,” LaRosa said. “He never stops being President and he never stops working. Just ask the first lady.”\n\nA weekly ritual\n\nBiden has the advantage of a more normalized routine in his trips away from Washington.\n\nThe White House residence staff has by now perfected the choreography of managing, packing and planning the departure of the President and first lady most Fridays, the day, statistically, the Bidens normally split town.\n\nThe ushers know which bags are to be brought downstairs – it’s a light-pack, most of the couples’ needed belongings are already in their Delaware homes, a person familiar tells CNN. While Biden occasionally plays golf at a local course when in Wilmington, his other activities – seeing his grandchildren, taking casual social visits, going to church – don’t require multiple outfit changes.\n\nIn Rehoboth, he rides his bike and he and the first lady like to set up a big, blue umbrella on the sandy beach in front of their house and sunbathe or read in reclining chairs. Outside of swimsuits, joggers and polo shirts, it’s not a multiple-suitcase situation.\n\n“The biggest issue is usually the pets,” said the person familiar with the weekend planning for a presidential getaway to Delaware.\n\nCommander, now one year old and no longer a small puppy, and Willow, the barn cat adopted by Jill Biden, are “almost always” on the Delaware visits. While many American families leave their pets at home with caretakers for the weekend, or book them at pet-sitting facilities, the Bidens take theirs with them.\n\nThey like to be around their pets at all times – when Joe Biden was isolating at the White House with Covid-19 this summer, he was kept company by Commander; likewise, when Jill Biden had her bout with Covid, she spent the her rebound case isolation period in Rehoboth, with Willow.\n\nThe animals frequently travel to Delaware via van, with support staff, but occasionally they are in vehicles solely dedicated to their transportation, says the person. Willow, in particular, is not a fan of noisy, whirring helicopter blades, said another person familiar with the feline’s habits. In June, there was a rare sighting by White House press members of Willow in her crate, being carried by a residence staffer to Marine One for a weekend at Rehoboth Beach.\n\nThe Biden’s Delaware visits, of course, no matter how quick, have a significant footprint beyond those of the paws of their pets.\n\nSecret Service coordinates with law enforcement on all movements – several highway exits must close for the presidential motorcade, locals in both Wilmington and Rehoboth must at times wait on traffic patterns or be swept by agents with handheld magnetometers just to walk down the beach if one of the Bidens is there, as one neighbor of the Bidens in Rehoboth Beach told CNN.\n\nThe large presidential apparatus helps ensure that the President is able to perform his duties with the full input of his advisers, even if they’re not with him in person.\n\n“Unless we discover his being away from Washington results in him bobbling the ball as JFK did on the eve of the Bay of Pigs operation, there shouldn’t be an issue,” says Naftali, referring to Kennedy’s canceling of an air strike on a Sunday, without full consultation and full consideration, a move the former President later regretted.\n\n“But if Biden is in touch virtually and telephonically, in this era, leadership doesn’t have to involve always being physically present in Washington, D.C.”", "authors": ["Kate Bennett"], "publish_date": "2022/10/17"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/15/politics/classified-information-what-matters/index.html", "title": "The number of people with Top Secret clearance will shock you ...", "text": "A version of this story appears in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.\n\nCNN —\n\nThe central question surrounding the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago last week is the one that remains most unanswered: What documents did former President Donald Trump have and why is the government so intent on getting them back?\n\nThe receipt for property that was seized during the execution of a search warrant by the FBI at former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla., is photographed Friday, Aug. 12, 2022. Jon Elswick/AP\n\nThere are other questions, of course. Did he take the material because he thought they were “cool,” like some kind of trophy? Or did he see some advantage in having them, The New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman wondered during an appearance on CNN’s “New Day” on Monday.\n\nWere the documents related to Roger Stone’s pardon by Trump somehow key evidence? What is behind the appearance of material on the “President of France” in the receipt for what was taken?\n\nThe imagination runs wild in the absence of facts.\n\nTrump has now demanded the documents be returned, even though presidential papers, under US law, are not his property.\n\nThe most tantalizing detail is that 11 sets of documents were classified.\n\nIt’s shining a light on the system of classification by which the government hides information from its people in the name of everyone’s national security.\n\nMore than a million people have Top Secret clearance\n\nIt’s actually a very large universe of people with access to Top Secret data.\n\nThe Director of National Intelligence publishes what is described as an annual report, “Security Clearance Determinations,” although the most recent one I could find was from 2017.\n\nIn it, more than 2.8 million people are described as having security clearance as of October 2017 – more than 1.6 million have access to either Confidential or Secret information and nearly 1.2 million are described as having access to Top Secret information.\n\nThere are additional people who have security clearance but don’t currently have access to information. This includes civilian employees, contractors and members of the military.\n\nAgencies control their own classified data. They are supposed to declassify it\n\nThat doesn’t mean more than 1 million people have access to whatever Top Secret documents were lying around Mar-a-Lago. Each agency that deals in classification has its own system and is supposed to be involved in declassifying its own documents.\n\nTrump’s defenders have argued he had put in place an order to declassify any documents he took from the Oval Office to the residence during his time in the White House, although professionals have said this claim can’t be true.\n\n“The idea that the president can declassify documents simply by moving them from one physical location to another is nonsense on so many levels,” said Shawn Turner, a CNN analyst and former director of communication for US National Intelligence, during a Monday appearance on “Inside Politics.”\n\nThere’s an official process\n\nTurner said the process for declassification must include signoff from the agency that classified the information in the first place in order to protect the intelligence-gathering process, its sources and methods.\n\nPresidents have periodically used executive orders to update the official system by which classified information is declassified.\n\nMost recently, then-President Barack Obama put in place Executive Order 13526 in 2009. That’s still the official policy since neither Trump nor President Joe Biden updated it.\n\nThe government might soon change the process\n\nBiden started a review of how classified data is handled earlier this summer. Here’s an exhaustive Congressional Research Service report on the declassification process.\n\nBiden’s review will reexamine the three general levels of classification.\n\nLevels of classification\n\nCNN’s Katie Lobosco wrote a very good primer on classified data last week. Here’s her description of the three levels of classification:\n\nTop Secret – This is the highest level of classification. Information is classified as Top Secret if it “reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security,” according to a 2009 executive order that describes the classification system.\n\nA subset of Top Secret documents known as SCI, or sensitive compartmented information, is reserved for certain information derived from intelligence sources. Access to an SCI document can be even further restricted to a smaller group of people with specific security clearances.\n\nSome of the materials recovered from Trump’s Florida home were marked as Top Secret SCI.\n\nSecret – Information is classified as Secret if the information is deemed to be able to cause “serious damage” to national security if revealed.\n\nConfidential – Confidential is the least sensitive level of classification, applied to information that is reasonably expected to cause “damage” to national security if disclosed.\n\nWhat kinds of things are Top Secret?\n\nThe former CIA officer David Priess, who is now publisher of the website Lawfare, said on “New Day” that no matter the specific classification, it’s information the government has an interest in not being made public.\n\nIt could be intelligence gathered on the North Korean nuclear program or Russian military operations, for example.\n\nLeaks can be disastrous or deadly\n\nThe government often gets this type of information by asking people to risk their lives or using technology it doesn’t want adversaries to know about.\n\nTalking about it on Monday morning, Priess became emotional.\n\n“Exposing this information put people’s lives at risk,” he said. “That’s not a joke. We know people who have died serving their country this way.”\n\nWhat took so long?\n\nThe larger question than what’s classified, Priess argued, is why, if the government knew the documents were at Mar-a-Lago, it took investigators so long to go get them.\n\nIn order for a president to declassify anything, he argued, there still needs to be a paper trail so everyone knows something is declassified.\n\n“If they’re not marked declassified and other documents with the same information aren’t also declassified, did it really happen? If there’s no record of it, how do you even know?”\n\nWe may not know more for a very long time\n\nThe problem now may be that imaginations will run wild about what is in the documents.\n\nIt could be a very long time before American voters have any idea what this was all really about.\n\n“Technically we won’t see any further action on this case on the legal docket unless and until DOJ brings criminal charges against any person,” said CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elie Honig, also on “New Day.”\n\nRELATED: DOJ opposes making public details in Mar-a-Lago search warrant’s probable cause affidavit\n\nAlready there is some speculation that rather than pursue charges, the government was simply trying to secure the data.\n\nClassified information can stay that way for years and years – between 10 and 25, according to the declassification guidelines signed by Obama.\n\nThe standard is that if something no longer needs to be classified, it should be declassified. And if it needs to be classified past that 25-year period, it can be.\n\nLook at the Top Secret documents of yore\n\nThe FBI, CIA and State Department all have online reading rooms of previously classified data released through the Freedom of Information Act. None of it is very recent stuff.\n\nThe case of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago documents seems special, however, and there are already bipartisan calls from Sens. Mark Warner and Marco Rubio – the top elected officials on the Senate Intelligence Committee – to Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines and Attorney General Merrick Garland asking for more information about what was taken by the FBI.\n\nExamples of prosecutions\n\nProsecutions for mishandling of classified data can involve high-profile figures.\n\nFor example, retired general and former CIA Director David Petraeus gave classified information to his mistress, who was writing a book about him. He ultimately pleaded guilty, paid a $100,000 fine and got two years of probation.\n\nWhat data did he mishandle? From CNN’s report at the time: During his time as commander in Afghanistan, Petraeus kept personal notes including classified information in eight 5-by-8 inch black notebooks. The classified information (included) identity of covert officers, war strategy, notes from diplomatic and national security meetings and security code words.\n\nOther figures are not as familiar – like Asia Janay Lavarello, a civilian Defense Department employee working in the US Embassy in Manila, who took classified documents to her hotel room and her house while she was working on a thesis project. She got three months in prison.", "authors": ["Zachary B. Wolf"], "publish_date": "2022/08/15"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/21/politics/takeaways-volodymyr-zelensky-visit-to-washington/index.html", "title": "Volodymyr Zelensky: 5 takeaways from Ukrainian President's ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThree-hundred days after his country was invaded by Russia, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky jetted to Washington, DC, for talks on what the next 300 days might bring.\n\nShrouded in secrecy until the last minute, the historic visit was heavy with symbolism, from Zelensky’s drab green sweatshirt to President Joe Biden’s blue-and-yellow striped tie to the Ukrainian battle flag unfurled on the House floor.\n\nBut the trip was about far more than symbols. Biden wouldn’t invite Zelensky to Washington – and endure a risky trip outside Ukraine for the first time since the war began – if he did not believe something real could be accomplished meeting face-to-face instead of over the phone.\n\nEmerging from their talks, both men made clear they see the war entering a new phase. As Russia sends more troops to the frontlines and wages a brutal air campaign against civilian targets, fears of a stalemate are growing.\n\nYet as Zelensky departed Washington for a lengthy and similarly risky return trip to Ukraine, it wasn’t clear that a pathway to ending the conflict was any clearer.\n\nPresident Volodymyr Zelensky addresses Congress as Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Vice President Kamala Harris hold up a Ukrainian national flag signed by Ukrainian soldiers at the Capitol in Washington on Wednesday, December 21. Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images Zelensky addresses the joint meeting of Congress. Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters Zelensky holds an American flag that was gifted to him by Pelosi. The flag was flown over the Capitol earlier in the day. J. Scott Applewhite/AP Zelensky addresses Congress. Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images Zelensky addresses the joint meeting. Jonathan Ernst/Reuters Guests of the the Ukrainian delegation wave as Zelensky acknowledges them during his address. Carolyn Kaster/AP Zelensky is greeted as he arrives to address Congress. Nathan Howard/Bloomberg via Getty Images Zelensky speaks during a news conference with Biden in the East Room of the White House. Ting Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images Biden speaks during the news conference. Andrew Harnik/AP Members of the media listen during the news conference in the East Room of the White House. Andrew Harnik/AP Biden speaks during the news conference. Andrew Harnik/AP Zelensky meets with Biden in the Oval Office of the White House. Brendan Smialowski/AFP/Getty Images Zelensky speaks after giving Biden a gift. He presented Biden with a Cross of Combat Merit. Zelensky explained that a captain in the Ukrainian military fighting in the Donbas region asked that his award be given to Biden. Patrick Semansky/AP Biden holds the Cross of Combat Merit. \"He's very brave,\" Zelensky said of the soldier. \"And he said give it to very brave President, and I want to give you, that is a cross for military merit.\" Patrick Semansky/AP Zelensky sits with Biden and first lady Jill Biden inside the White House. from President Volodymyr Zelensky/Instagram Biden and Zelensky walk down the Colonnade of the White House as they make their way to the Oval Office. Alex Wong/Getty Images Biden and Zelensky walk into the White House after Zelensky's arrival. Olivier Douliery/AFP/Getty Images Biden and first lady Jill Biden welcome Zelensky at the White House on Wednesday. Andrew Harnik/AP Biden shakes hands with Zelensky as he arrives at the White House. Patrick Semansky/AP Zelensky, left, is greeted by Rufus Gifford, chief of protocol for the state department, after landing in the United States on Wednesday. NA/Ukrainian Presidency In pictures: Zelensky's wartime visit to US Prev Next\n\nBiden and Zelensky try to figure out how the war ends\n\nGaining clarity on where Zelensky stands when it comes to ending the war was among the prerogatives in bringing him to the White House. The Ukrainian leader had previously expressed a desire for a “just peace” that would end the conflict – a point that US officials said would be at the center of their talks Wednesday.\n\nBut on Wednesday, Zelensky used bellicose rhetoric that suggested such a peace was not close, saying the road to ending the war would not involve making concessions to Russia.\n\n“For me as a president, ‘just peace’ is no compromises,” he said, indicating he doesn’t see any road to peace that involves Ukraine giving up territory or sovereignty.\n\nLater, in his address to Congress, Zelensky said he’d presented a 10-point peace formula to Biden – though US officials said afterward it was the same plan he offered to world leaders at the Group of 20 summit last month.\n\nAmong the Western nations that have rallied in support behind Zelensky, there have been lingering concerns about what Zelensky’s long-term plan might be.\n\nFor his part, Biden said it was up to Zelensky to “decide how he wants to the war to end,” a long-held view that leaves plenty of questions unanswered.\n\nVideo Ad Feedback Watch Zelensky's historic speech to Congress 26:43 - Source: CNN\n\nZelensky shows he knows his audience – and displays his showmanship\n\nZelensky peppered his address to lawmakers with references to American history, from the critical Battle of Saratoga during the American Revolutionary War to the Battle of the Bulge in World War II.\n\nHe delivered his address in English, a purposeful choice he telegraphed ahead of the speech. Even his attire – the now-familiar Army green shirt, cargo pants and boots – seemed designed to remind his audience they were in the presence of a wartime leader.\n\nOver the course of the conflict, Zelensky has demonstrated an acute ability to appeal to his audience, be they national legislatures or the audience of the Grammys.\n\nOn Wednesday, he sought to harness Americans’ emotional response to his country’s suffering, evoking dark winter nights as Russia seeks to interrupt Ukraine’s power supply.\n\n“In two days we will celebrate Christmas. Maybe candlelit. Not because it’s more romantic, no, but because there will not be – there will be no electricity,” he said.\n\nBut he also seemed aware that many Americans – including some Republicans in Congress – have wondered aloud why billions of US dollars are needed for a conflict thousands of miles away. He sought to make the cause about more than his own homeland.\n\n“The battle is not only for life, freedom, and security of Ukrainians or any other nation which Russia attempts to conquer,” he said. “The struggle will define in what world our children and grandchildren will live in.”\n\nHe added, “Your money is not charity. It’s an investment in the global security and democracy that we handle in the most responsible way.”\n\nVideo Ad Feedback Watch Zelensky unveil flag during historic speech to Congress 01:59 - Source: CNN\n\nZelensky finally accepts the ride he was offered – and gets the ammo too\n\nAt the start of Russia’s war in Ukraine, Zelensky turned down an American offer to evacuate him from Kyiv.\n\n“I need ammunition, not a ride,” Zelensky told the US.\n\nTen months later, he got both. When Zelensky touched down outside Washington in a US military plane Wednesday, his arrival capped a 10-day sprint by American and Ukrainian officials to arrange a risky wartime visit meant to rally support for Ukraine’s ongoing resistance to Russia’s invasion.\n\nJust ahead of Zelensky’s arrival, the Biden administration announced it is sending nearly $2 billion in additional security assistance to Ukraine – including a sophisticated new Patriot air defense system that Zelensky has been requesting for months.\n\nIn weighing a visit, Zelensky suggested to advisers he did not want to travel to Washington had there not been a significant development in the bilateral relationship with the United States, according to a source familiar with the matter. Zelensky viewed the US decision to send a Patriot missile defense system to Ukraine as a major shift in the relationship between the two allies.\n\nYet standing alongside Biden, he was frank that he did not view the single Patriot system as enough.\n\n“We would like to get more Patriots,” he said as Biden laughed. “I’m sorry but we are in war.”\n\nVideo Ad Feedback 'This is Vladimir Putin's worst nightmare': Tapper reacts to Zelensky's speech 01:19 - Source: CNN\n\nA united front in one of the world’s most complicated relationships\n\nSpeaking later to Congress, Zelensky was again up front that he did not believe the American support was sufficient.\n\n“Is it enough? Honestly, not really,” he said of the artillery that the US has so far provided.\n\nZelensky’s candid request for more Patriots – and Biden’s lighthearted response – amounted to a window into one of the world’s most complicated relationships.\n\nOn the surface, Biden and Zelensky have maintained a stalwart partnership. And Zelensky was effusive in his praise of Biden as he went from the Oval Office to the East Room to Capitol Hill.\n\nYet it doesn’t take much to see tensions just beneath the surface. Zelensky has consistently agitated for additional US support, despite the tens of billions of dollars in military assistance that Biden has directed to his country.\n\nThat hasn’t always sat well with Biden or his team. But as he has with a host of other foreign leaders, Biden appeared intent Wednesday on translating physical proximity into a better understanding of his counterpart.\n\n“It is all about looking someone in the eye. I mean it sincerely. I don’t think there is any substitute for sitting down face to face with a friend or a foe and looking them in the eye,” he said.\n\nVideo Ad Feedback Listen to Zelensky's message to Americans from Oval Office 06:00 - Source: CNN\n\nA visit that symbolizes a ‘new phase’ in the war\n\nBiden invited Zelensky to Washington this week because he believes the war in Ukraine is entering a “new phase,” officials said ahead of the visit. As winter sets in and Russia continues targeting civilian infrastructure, the moment seemed ripe for Zelensky to make a dramatic public appeal for continued international support.\n\nYet the new phase isn’t only on the battlefield. Around the world, leaders are confronting the bitter fallout of Russia’s invasion. Higher energy and food prices, in part generated by tough sanctions on Moscow, have caused trouble for politicians in Europe and the United States.\n\nIn Washington, Republicans poised to take control of Congress have made clear they won’t rubber stamp each of Biden’s requests for Ukraine assistance – though fears funding will dry up completely appear unfounded. Congress is on the verge of approving almost $50 billion in additional security and economic assistance.\n\nSpeaking to lawmakers, Zelensky repeatedly referred to members of “both parties,” seeking to frame his cause as a bipartisan one.\n\nStill, some Republicans refused to attend Zelensky’s address to Congress, a protest of what they claim are unrestrained dollars heading out of the US.\n\nIt was against that backdrop Biden insisted US support would continue for months.\n\nHe said it was “important for the American people, and for the world, to hear directly from you, Mr. President, about Ukraine’s fight, and the need to continue to stand together through 2023.”", "authors": ["Kevin Liptak"], "publish_date": "2022/12/21"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/30/politics/donald-trump-tax-returns-released/index.html", "title": "Donald Trump: Key takeaways from six years of former president's ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nSix years of Donald Trump’s federal tax returns released on Friday show the former president paid very little in federal income taxes the first and last year of his presidency, claiming huge losses that helped limit his tax bill, among other revelations.\n\nThe returns, long shrouded in secrecy, were released to the public on Friday by the House Ways and Means Committee, the culmination of a battle over their disclosure that went to the Supreme Court. They confirm a report issued from the Joint Committee on Taxation that Trump claimed large losses before and throughout his presidency that he carried forward to reduce or practically eliminate his tax burden. For example, his returns show that he carried forward a $105 million loss in 2015 and $73 million in 2016.\n\nThe thousands of pages of documents from the former president’s personal and business federal tax returns – which spanned the years 2015 through 2020 – provide a complex web of raw data about Trump’s finances, offering up many questions about his wealth and income that could be pursued both by auditors and Trump’s political opponents.\n\nHere are key takeaways from the documents reviewed by CNN:\n\nReturns shed light on questionable tax claims\n\nTrump’s returns also show the former president made several claims that auditors may question.\n\nThe Joint Committee on Taxation, which reviewed the returns, flagged that Trump claimed a large number of questionable items on his tax returns, including eyebrow-raising amounts of interest he claims to have received from loans to his children that the bipartisan committee said could indicate Trump was disguising gifts.\n\nThe JCT argued that an auditor should investigate the loan agreements Trump made with his children, including the interest rates. If the interest Trump claims to have charged his children was not at market rate, for example, it could be considered a gift for tax purposes, requiring him to pay a higher tax rate on the money.\n\nIn each year of his presidency, for example, Trump claimed he received exactly $18,000 in interest on a loan he said he gave his daughter Ivanka Trump and $8,715 in interest from his son Donald Trump, Jr.. In 2017 to 2019, Trump said he received exactly $24,000 from his son Eric Trump, and Eric paid him $19,605 in interest in 2020.\n\nThat raises the question of whether “the loans were bona fide arm’s length transactions, or whether the transfers were disguised gifts that could trigger gift tax and a disallowance of interest deductions by the related borrowers,” the JCT said in its report.\n\n“It’s unusual to have interest in round numbers – very rare,” said Martin Sheil, former supervisory special agent for IRS’ Criminal Investigation unit. “An auditor would want to see payments, loan agreements and interest rates.”\n\nThere are also questions about Trump’s returns listing an identical amount of company expenses and income.\n\nFor example, in 2017, Trump claimed his business DJT Aerospace LLC, which operates Trump’s personal helicopter, claimed $42,965 in income. It also claimed the exact same amount – $42,965 – in expenses. In other words, every single dollar – to the dollar – that the company earned was negated by the company’s expenses, such as payroll, fuel and other items. That left the company with zero income – and nothing to tax.\n\n“Total expenses equaling total income is a statistical impossibility,” said Shiel, who added that the figures are not evidence something illegal was done. “It just doesn’t happen.”\n\nThe JCT in its report raised several similar questions. For example, it noted IRS auditors were investigating multiple so-called large unusual questionable items on Trump’s tax returns for which the regulator wanted Trump to provide supporting evidence to back up his claims.\n\nRelease comes after years-long fight\n\nThe returns were obtained by the Democratic-run Ways and Means Committee only a few weeks ago after a protracted legal battle that lasted nearly four years. The committee voted last week to release the tax returns, but their release was delayed to redact sensitive personal information like Social Security numbers.\n\nThe release of the tax returns follows a pursuit for the documents that had typically been made public voluntarily by past US presidents. Trump and his legal team continuously sought to keep his returns secret, arguing that Congress had never wielded its legislative powers to demand a president’s tax returns, which Trump said could have far-reaching implications.\n\n“The Democrats should have never done it, the Supreme Court should have never approved it, and it’s going to lead to horrible things for so many people,” Trump said in a statement following the release.\n\n“The ‘Trump’ tax returns once again show how proudly successful I have been and how I have been able to use depreciation and various other tax deductions as an incentive for creating thousands of jobs and magnificent structures and enterprises.”\n\nOther Republicans also criticized Democrats’ efforts in pursuit of the tax returns as political, with Texas Rep. Kevin Brady – the committee’s top conservative – saying the release would amount to “a dangerous new political weapon that reaches far beyond the former president and overturns decades of privacy protections for average Americans that have existed since the Watergate reform.”\n\nDuring the committee’s closed-door meeting last week, Republicans warned that the release of Trump’s tax returns by Democrats could prompt retribution once Republicans control the House next year – like going after the taxes of President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden.\n\n“I had countless people tell me of things that they were concerned with President Biden’s family dealings and how they believed that him and his family is enriched because of his political power. And they are begging for oversight and accountability on that,” said Rep. Jason Smith, a Missouri Republican, according to excerpts the GOP released from the meeting. “Do we need to go down all that? Is that what you all are wishing to do?”\n\nReturns show he held foreign bank accounts while in office\n\nTrump reported having foreign bank accounts between 2015 and 2020, including a bank account in China between 2015 and 2017, his tax returns show.\n\nTrump was required to report the accounts to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN). The filings show that the former president maintained foreign bank accounts in countries such as the United Kingdom, Ireland and China.\n\nThe China bank account, which was reported by The New York Times in 2020, was tied to Trump International Hotels Management’s business push in the country, Trump Organization lawyer Alan Garten said at the time.\n\nThe 2020 disclosure of business dealings in China came as the Trump campaign sought to portray Biden as a “puppet” of China. Biden’s income tax returns and financial disclosures showed no business dealings or income from China.\n\nThe returns also show that Trump paid more in foreign taxes than in US federal income taxes in 2017, the first year of his presidency.\n\nIn 2017, Trump paid just $750 in US federal income taxes because of large carry-forward losses that he claimed in prior years, negating virtually all of his American tax liability. Yet Trump paid nearly $1 million in taxes to foreign countries that year.\n\nThe fact that Trump paid foreign taxes isn’t in itself surprising, but it shows how Trump’s companies and businesses interests span the globe, and how those businesses are subject to local tax laws and regulations.\n\nOn his tax return, Trump listed business income, taxes, expenses or other notable financial items in Azerbaijan, Panama, Canada, India, Qatar, South Korea, the United Kingdom, China, the Dominican Republic, United Arab Emirates, the Philippines, Grenada, US territory Puerto Rico, Georgia, Israel, Brazil, St. Maarten, Mexico, Indonesia, Ireland, Turkey, and St. Vincent.\n\nTrump claimed no charitable deductions in 2020\n\nDuring his presidency, Trump pledged he would donate the entirety of his $400,000 salary to charity each year. He frequently boasted about donating parts of his quarterly paycheck to various government agencies.\n\n“While the press doesn’t like writing about it, nor do I need them to, I donate my yearly Presidential salary of $400,000.00 to different agencies throughout the year,” Trump tweeted in March 2019.\n\nIf he donated his 2020 salary, he didn’t claim it on his taxes. Among the six years of tax returns the House Ways and Means Committee released, 2020 was the sole year in which Trump listed no donations to charity.\n\nTrump’s finances took a sizable hit in 2020, probably as a result of the pandemic and the lack of demand for vacations and lodging in his hotels. Trump reported large donations to charity in 2018 and 2019, helping reduce the amount he owed on millions of dollars in income he reported in those years.\n\nBut Trump posted a massive $4.8 million adjusted loss in 2020, a year, which alone wiped out his federal income tax obligation. Trump paid $0 in federal income taxes in 2020.\n\nThe Joint Committee on Taxation raised questions about the accuracy of some enormous charitable deductions Trump claimed in previous years’ tax returns, including large and unsubstantiated cash gifts. Trump also claimed a $21.1 million deduction in 2015 for donating 158 acres of his 212-acre property called Seven Springs in North Castle, New York. That donation, which was made to a land trust, is a focus of the Manhattan district attorney’s criminal investigation of the Trump Organization’s finances.\n\nTrump’s own 2017 tax law appears to have reduced the amount he was able to deduct from tax bill\n\nTrump claimed that the 2017 Republican tax plan he championed and signed would cost him and his family “a fortune.” It’s not clear that it did, but it does appear to have limited the amount that he could claim in one part of his complex tax return.\n\nThe 2017 tax law capped the state and local tax deduction, known as SALT, at $10,000 a year. In previous years, tax filers were allowed to deduct more of their SALT payments. Although the law was passed in 2017, it didn’t apply until the 2018 tax year.\n\nIn 2018, Trump listed $10.5 million in state and local taxes, but could deduct just $10,000 of that from his taxes. In 2019, Trump paid $8.4 million in SALT but was capped at $10,000. And in 2020, Trump said he paid $8.5 million in SALT but claimed the maximum allowable $10,000.\n\nBy comparison, in 2016 and 2017, Trump was able to deduct significantly more from state and local taxes. For example, in 2016 and 2017, he deducted $5.2 million each year in SALT payments.\n\nSome Democrats criticized the 2017 tax law’s SALT cap for taking aim at residents in the Northeast and the West who have some of the highest property taxes in the country. The Tax Foundation found that property tax deductions capped in 2017 had previously accounted for about a third of all state and local tax deductions. But Trump defended the provision, saying the cap was necessary even if it would hurt his own finances.\n\nIt’s not clear how much the SALT cap hurt Trump, however. Although that particular deduction was capped, Trump claimed many other deductions that limited the amount of federal income taxes he had to pay.\n\nPresidential audits\n\nThe Ways and Means Committee, which is responsible for overseeing the IRS and writing tax policy, requested the returns under the authority of section 6103 of the US tax code. Their report focused primarily on whether Trump’s tax returns during his time in office were properly audited under the IRS’ mandatory audit program for US presidents.\n\nThe committee found that the IRS opened only one “mandatory” audit during Trump’s term – for his 2016 tax return. And that didn’t take place until the fall of 2019, after Chairman Richard Neal, a Massachusetts Democrat, first sent a letter asking the IRS for Trump’s returns and tax information. The report characterizes the presidential audit program as “dormant.”\n\n“The research that was done as it relates to the mandatory audit program was nonexistent,” Neal said last week following the committee vote.\n\nRepublicans on the committee argued that Democrats acknowledged it was “not necessary to publicly release the private tax information to change requirements on the presidential audit program.”\n\nA Republican dissent issued Friday warned that, “Democrats’ dangerous precedent will lead the American public to demand other people’s tax returns to be released.”\n\nLast week, the House passed a bill that would reform the presidential audit process in a largely symbolic vote before Republicans take the majority in the new Congress. The legislation is not expected to be taken up by the Senate before the new Congress is sworn in.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional reporting.", "authors": ["David Goldman Jeremy Herb Jeanne Sahadi Maegan Vazquez", "David Goldman", "Jeremy Herb", "Jeanne Sahadi", "Maegan Vazquez"], "publish_date": "2022/12/30"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/23/washington-biden-news-live-updates/11324100002/", "title": "Recap: Beyond Biden, Trump and Pence, how others took ...", "text": "Federal court records portray a sloppy system for tracking the country's most important secrets, amid a controversy over classified documents involving President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence.\n\nStashes of secret documents have been scattered through homes, sheds and cars of intelligence agency staffers and contractors. Yet, penalties for mishandling documents vary greatly.\n\nHere's what else is happening in politics:\n\nThe blame game: The White House is blaming the Trump administration and the GOP for undoing Obama-era rail safety measures designed to avert disasters like the toxic East Palestine, Ohio train derailment.\n\nThe White House is blaming the Trump administration and the GOP for undoing Obama-era rail safety measures designed to avert disasters like the toxic East Palestine, Ohio train derailment. Debt limit standoff: Former Vice President Mike Pence said cuts to Social Security and Medicare may need to be considered at some point amid debt ceiling talks.\n\nFormer Vice President Mike Pence said cuts to Social Security and Medicare may need to be considered at some point amid debt ceiling talks. Ideological tilt at stake: Wisconsin voters decided on two candidates to advance to a general election for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, a key race that could decide the future of policies in the battleground state.\n\nWisconsin voters decided on two candidates to advance to a general election for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, a key race that could decide the future of policies in the battleground state. \"The revolution had failed\": Prosecutors allege that the Proud Boys, fueled by desperation to keep Donald Trump in the White House, conspired to stop the certification of the 2020 election.\n\nStay in the conversation: Sign up for the OnPolitics newsletter\n\nBiden administration seeks semiconductor ‘clusters’ with $52M chips program\n\nCommerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said Thursday the Biden administration wants to create at least two major semiconductor “clusters” in the U.S. with federal funding approved last year in the $52 billion CHIPS and Science Act.\n\nRaimondo outlined a vision for a “generation of innovators” in a speech at Georgetown University in Washington before semiconductor companies next Tuesday can start applying for $39 billion in incentives and other government backing.\n\nRaimondo said the hope is for each cluster – which would employ about 10,000 workers – to consist of a leading-edge microchip fabrication plant, research and development facilities, a robust suppler ecosystem and specialized infrastructure. She did not say where the clusters would be located, but the push comes amid significant microchip investments from companies in Ohio, Texas and Arizona.\n\n– Joey Garrison\n\nWhite House decries ‘bad faith attacks’ against Buttigieg\n\nWhite House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre pushed back Thursday at “bad faith attacks” targeting Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who has been roundly criticized by Republicans for his handling of the toxic train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.\n\n“It is pure politics. It is pure political stunts,” Jean-Pierre said, arguing there weren’t the same outcries during chemical spills while Elaine Chao, transportation secretary under former President Donald Trump, held the post. “Nobody was calling for her to be fired.”\n\nButtigieg, who Republicans have accused of being too slow to respond to the derailment and toxic spill, made his first visit to East Palestine, Ohio on Thursday. Trump visited Wednesday. There are no current plans for Biden to do the same.\n\n– Joey Garrison\n\nOhio rail disaster:Just how dangerous is the Ohio derailment disaster? Why it's confusing.\n\nBiden nominates Ajay Banga, former Mastercard CEO, to lead World Bank\n\nPresident Joe Biden has tapped Ajay Banga, former president and CEO of Mastercard and current vice chairman of the private equity firm General Atlantic, as president of the World Bank.\n\nThe nomination of Banga – a native of India and former chairman of the International Chamber of commerce – comes after the bank’s current leader, David Malpass, announced his resignation last week amid a backlash over statements he made skeptical of climate change.\n\nBiden called Banga “uniquely equipped” to lead the World Bank, a global development institution that provides grants and loans to low-income countries. Biden pointed to Banga’s work to bring investment to developing economies and record of enlisting the public and private sectors to \"tackle the most urgent challenges of our time, including climate change.”.\n\nBanga still needs confirmation by the bank’s board before he becomes president. It’s unclear whether there will be additional nominees from other nations.\n\n– Joey Garrison\n\n‘The revolution had failed,’ ex-Proud Boy and DOJ star witness testifies\n\nAs efforts to prove the 2020 election was stolen repeatedly failed and it became more and more apparent that Donald Trump would not remain president, the Proud Boys were overcome with a sense of desperation.\n\nProsecutors allege that the members of the right-wing extremist group on trial, fueled by that desperation to keep Trump in office, conspired to stop the certification of the 2020 election by weaponizing an already-inflamed pro-Trump mob on Jan. 6, 2021 against the Capitol.\n\nWhen rioters began to clear out of the Capitol on Jan. 6 and House members planned to reconvene, the Proud Boys expressed disappointment in private chats. In testimony Thursday, ex-Proud Boy Jeremy Bertino – the only member of the group to plead guilty to sedition – expanded on those messages: \"The revolution had failed,\" Bertino testified.\n\n– Ella Lee\n\nTim Scott inches toward 2024 run\n\nAs Sen. Tim Scott inches closer to an expected 2024 presidential run, he called for a revival of American hope through conservative ideals in a pair of Iowa speeches Wednesday.\n\nScott called for “trusting each other, overcoming our differences and then creating converts to conservatism” – a subtle nod to the fact that Republican presidential candidates have not won the popular vote since 2004, even as Donald Trump carried the Electoral College in 2016.\n\nIt comes on the heels of a midterm election that left Republicans across the country disappointed in their performance, with many blaming the former president for elevating fringe candidates who alienated some Republican and independent voters.\n\n– Brianne Pfannenstiel, Francesca Block; Des Moines Register\n\nEx-Arizona AG withheld reports that debunked 2020 election fraud claims\n\nThe Arizona Attorney General's Office concluded months ago there was no widespread fraud in the 2020 election results in Maricopa County ― but the state's top prosecutor sat on the information and suppressed mitigating details, newly released records show.\n\nAn investigative report and two internal memos from 2022 indicate then-Attorney General Mark Brnovich was aware his investigators \"did not uncover any criminality or fraud\" in the 2020 election weeks before Brnovich reported the county's election system was vulnerable and the process for verification and handling of early ballots was broken.\n\nThe three documents were made public Wednesday by newly elected Attorney General Kris Mayes, a Democrat, who described them as \"deeply unsettling and unacceptable.\" Brnovich, a Republican, did not respond to requests for comment on Wednesday.\n\n– Robert Anglen, Arizona Republic\n\nHow federal workers got away with taking classified documents home\n\nA software developer for the National Security Agency took home secret documents in a misguided effort to work more for a promotion. A civilian Defense Department worker who was studying at National Intelligence University copied and removed classified records for her thesis. A military contractor mailed home to Texas from Afghanistan entire laptops and hard drives filled with secrets.\n\nThese were federal criminal cases of federal workers or contractors convicted of mishandling classified documents before caches were found at the homes of President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence. In some cases, workers just hoarded documents.\n\nSloppy handling in some cases went on for decades, despite the secrets at stake being among the country’s most important. The names of undercover intelligence agents and descriptions of how the country gathers its information were included. Adm. Mike Rogers, then head of the National Security Agency, cited “very significant and long-lasting harm” because of uncertainty over whether secrets had been revealed to adversaries.\n\n– Bart Jansen\n\nGeorgia Trump investigation: Foreperson media comments highly unusual\n\nPublic remarks by Georgia grand jury foreperson Emily Kohrs pierced a veil of secrecy into the investigation of 2020 election interference by Donald Trump.\n\nKohrs, in a series of media interviews, offered up provocative details about key witnesses and charging recommendations potentially involving a dozen or so people.\n\nLegal analysts said Kohrs’ public comments were at a minimum highly unusual for any grand jury inquiry and, at most, not particularly helpful to any potential case the district attorney may bring.\n\n“I’m not aware of any other case in Georgia in which a grand juror has spoken with the media about witnesses appearing before the grand jury,” said Clark Cunningham, a Georgia State University law professor who has closely followed the investigation.\n\n– Kevin Johnson\n\nMore:Georgia grand jury foreperson's public comments add unusual wrinkle\n\nBiden calls Putin’s suspension of nuclear arms treaty a 'big mistake’\n\nRussia’s suspension of a nuclear arms treaty is a “big mistake,” President Joe Biden said Wednesday, as the one-year anniversary of the Russian invasion approaches.\n\nBiden made the brief comment to reporters as he entered the presidential palace in Warsaw where he is meeting with leaders from nations on the eastern edge of the NATO alliance.\n\nRussian President Vladimir Putin announced Tuesday he is suspending Moscow’s participation in New START, a strategic nuclear arms reduction treaty, the last remaining nuclear arms reduction deal between the U.S. and Russia. It limits each side to 1,550 long-range nuclear warheads.\n\n– Maureen Groppe\n\nMore:What is the nuclear arms treaty?\n\nA new record of women will serve in Congress\n\nA historic number of women will serve in the 118th Congress once congresswoman-elect Jennifer McClellan, D-Va., is sworn in to office.\n\nA total of 150 women will serve in Congress, surpassing the previous record set at the swearing-in of the 118th Congress last month, according to Rutgers University’s Center for American Women and Politics. Additionally, 125 women, 92 Democratic women and 28 Black women will serve in the House – new records for each category.\n\nMcClellan’s special election victory Tuesday also made her Virginia’s first Black female member of Congress.\n\n– Mabinty Quarshie\n\nMore:McClellan just won election to Congress. Black women say it's not enough", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/23"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/11/politics/biden-administration-russia-intelligence/index.html", "title": "How the Biden administration is aggressively releasing intelligence ..."}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/12/politics/government-classified-documents-secrets-scif/index.html", "title": "What to know about government-classified documents and secrets ...", "text": "Editor’s Note: This story was originally published on August 12, 2022.\n\nWashington CNN —\n\nUS classified documents have been turning up in places they shouldn’t be in recent months.\n\nThe Justice Department removed some classified documents from former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence on August 8, 2022, while executing a search warrant for possible violations of the Espionage Act and other crimes.\n\nSince then, classified documents have also been discovered at President Joe Biden’s private office and home, first by personal attorneys and later during a voluntary search by the FBI. The materials were from his time in the Senate and as vice president.\n\nClassified material was also found at former Vice President Mike Pence’s home by his lawyer.\n\nHere are key things to know about how the classification system works.\n\nWhat are classified documents?\n\nThe US government has a formal system of protecting information that, if disclosed, could hurt national security.\n\nThe system can apply to documents regarding intelligence activities, foreign relations, military plans and programs for safeguarding nuclear materials, for example. By classifying information, the government restricts who can see the documents and where he or she can see them.\n\nWhat are the levels of classification?\n\nThere are three basic levels of classification, based on the damage that could be done to national security if the information was leaked.\n\nTop Secret\n\nThis is the highest level of classification. Information is classified as Top Secret if it “reasonably could be expected to cause exceptionally grave damage to the national security,” according to a 2009 executive order that describes the classification system.\n\nA subset of Top Secret documents known as SCI, or sensitive compartmented information, is reserved for certain information derived from intelligence sources. Access to an SCI document can be even further restricted to a smaller group of people with specific security clearances.\n\nSecret\n\nInformation is classified as Secret if the information is deemed to be able to cause “serious damage” to national security if revealed.\n\nConfidential\n\nConfidential is the least sensitive level of classification, applied to information that is reasonably expected to cause “damage” to national security if disclosed.\n\nWhat might be classified as a Top Secret document?\n\n“The difference between Secret and Top Secret is quite significant,” said Philip Mudd, a CNN counterterrorism analyst and former CIA analyst.\n\nNuclear codes could be classified as Top Secret, for example, as well as information from an especially sensitive human source.\n\nBut there are even more narrow classifications within the Top Secret designation. For example, intercepted communications may be classified as Top Secret SCI.\n\nAnother category of sensitive information within either Top Secret or Secret documents is known as an SAP, or special access program. Not everyone with a Top Secret security clearance may be privy to the information in an SAP.\n\nThese higher level designations further restrict who can see the information and where it can be viewed.\n\nHow is information classified?\n\nCertain people within the government have classification authority. For less sensitive classified material, he or she may make a judgment call about the impact the information could have on national security if disclosed.\n\nBut a classification of Top Secret SCI would be automatic, said Mudd.\n\nThat may be because the information would reveal a source the United States uses or a certain method of obtaining intelligence information.\n\nWho can see a Top Secret document and where?\n\nPeople within the government must receive security clearance to have access to certain classified documents. To receive Top Secret clearance, one must generally pass an extensive background check that digs into financial history and may include interviews of friends and family.\n\nThen, there may be extra security protocols involved in viewing Top Secret information. Some documents must be viewed in what’s known as a SCIF, or a sensitive compartmented information facility.\n\nThere are technical standards that need to be met before a room or building can be designated as a SCIF, said Mudd. Multiple locks may be required, for example, and access to the room is restricted to people with specific security clearances.", "authors": ["Katie Lobosco"], "publish_date": "2022/08/12"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/02/politics/roe-v-wade-supreme-court/index.html", "title": "Roe v. Wade: Supreme Court draft opinion that would overturn ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nIn a stunning breach of Supreme Court confidentiality and secrecy, Politico has obtained what it calls a draft of a majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito that would strike down Roe v. Wade.\n\nThe draft was circulated in early February, according to Politico. The final opinion has not been released and votes and language can change before opinions are formally released. The opinion in this case is not expected to be published until late June.\n\nThe court confirmed the authenticity of the document Tuesday. It also stressed it was not the final decision.\n\nRELATED: Breaking down Samuel Alito’s draft opinion\n\nAccording to the draft, the court would overturn Roe v. Wade’s holding of a federal constitutional right to an abortion. The opinion would be the most consequential abortion decision in decades and transform the landscape of women’s reproductive health in America.\n\nIt appears that five justices would be voting to overturn Roe. Chief Justice John Roberts did not want to completely overturn Roe v. Wade, meaning he would have dissented from part of Alito’s draft opinion, sources tell CNN, likely with the court’s three liberals.\n\nThat would mean that the five conservative justices that would make up the majority overturning Roe are Alito and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.\n\nRoberts is willing, however, to uphold the Mississippi law that would ban abortion at 15 weeks of pregnancy, CNN has learned. Under current law, government cannot interfere with a women’s choice to terminate a pregnancy before about 23 weeks, when a fetus could live outside the womb.\n\nIn a statement on Tuesday, Roberts said he has ordered an investigation.\n\n“This was a singular and egregious breach of that trust that is an affront to the Court and the community of public servants who work here,” Roberts said. I have directed the Marshal of the Court to launch an investigation into the source of the leak.”\n\n“To the extent this betrayal of the confidences of the Court was intended to undermine the integrity of our operations, it will not succeed,” Roberts said. “The work of the Court will not be affected in any way. We at the Court are blessed to have a workforce – permanent employees and law clerks alike – intensely loyal to the institution and dedicated to the rule of law. Court employees have an exemplary and important tradition of respecting the confidentiality of the judicial process and upholding the trust of the Court.”\n\nAfter the draft was published, a crowd gathered outside the Supreme Court building Monday evening, as people came together to console one another and question what to do next.\n\nAt one point, the crowd began to chant, “Hey, hey, ho, ho, Samuel Alito’s gotta go.” “We will not go back.” “Abortion rights are under attack, what do we do, stand up fight back.” “Pack the courts.”\n\nPolitico’s publishing of the draft is unprecedented by the high court’s standards of secrecy. The inner deliberations among the justices while opinions are being drafted and votes are being settled are among the most closely held details in Washington.\n\n“This news is simply stunning for the Supreme Court as an institution,” said Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at the University of Texas School of Law. “Not only is the result it portends – the overruling of Roe and Casey – a shockwave to our constitutional politics, but we have never seen a leak remotely like this from inside the Court, where we’re not just hearing what the result is going to be, but we’re seeing the draft majority opinion in advance. It’s hard to believe that the former doesn’t help to explain the latter, but it’s an earthquake in both respects.”\n\nThe case in question is Dobbs v. Jackson. It concerns a challenge to Mississippi’s 15-week ban on abortion and oral arguments were heard on December 1. The release of a final opinion in the case is expected later this Spring or early summer.\n\nIn the draft opinion, Alito writes that Roe “must be overruled.”\n\n“The Constitution makes no reference to abortion and no such right is implicitly protected by any constitutional provision,” Alito wrote. He said that Roe was “egregiously wrong from the start” and that its reasoning was “exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences.”\n\nHe added, “It is time to heed the Constitution and return the issue of abortion to the people’s representatives.”\n\n“That is what the Constitution and the rule of law demand,” he said, according to the draft.\n\nAlready nearly half of the states have or will pass laws that ban abortion, while others have enacted strict measures regulating the procedure.\n\nProcess of voting\n\nOral arguments in the case were held on December 1.\n\nUnder normal procedure, by the end of that week the justices would have met in their private conference to take a preliminary vote on the issue. They would have gone around the table in order of seniority discussing their take on the case. Roberts would have gone first, with Barrett last.\n\nAfter that initial tally, if Roberts was in the majority he would assign the majority opinion. Otherwise the most senior justice would have taken that responsibility. After that, draft opinions would go between chambers. In the past, justices have changed their votes and sometimes a majority opinion ultimately becomes a dissent.\n\nA reversal of Roe would leave abortion policy up to individual states and would likely produce a patchwork system where the procedure would remain largely available in Democratic-led states, while Republican-led states would pass extreme limits or outright bans on it.\n\nThe Dobbs case was perhaps the most anticipated case of the court’s term, and most court observers expected that the conservative majority was likely to scale back or outright overturn Roe’s holding. At oral arguments, Roberts was the only one of the six Republican appointees who signaled interest in exploring a narrower opinion that would have upheld Mississippi’s law but preserved some protections for abortion rights.\n\nBecause it is one of the court’s most high-stakes and contentious decisions, the anticipation was that the opinion would be among the final ones the court released at the end of its term in late June.\n\nRoe is the law of the land until the court formally issues its opinion.\n\n“Let’s be clear: This is a draft opinion. It’s outrageous, it’s unprecedented, but it’s not final. Abortion is your right – and it is STILL LEGAL,” Planned Parenthood said in a tweet following Politico’s reporting.\n\nDecades-long project of conservative legal moment\n\nOverturning Roe would be the culmination of a decades-long project of the conservative legal moment.\n\nFormer President Donald Trump, when running for the White House in 2016, promised to appoint Supreme Court justices who would overturn Roe “automatically.” His nominee Kavanaugh replaced Justice Anthony Kennedy, who sided with the liberal justices in past abortion rights cases. Barrett replaced the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a Democratic appointee and abortion rights champion who died weeks before the 2020 election.\n\nCelebrated by supporters of abortion right and long reviled by critics, Roe v. Wade was decided in 1973 establishing a constitutional right to abortion before fetal viability, which most experts say occurs now at around 23-24 weeks of pregnancy. The decision was reaffirmed in 1992, in Planned Parenthood v. Casey. A majority of the court in that case replaced Roe’s framework with a new standard to determine the validity of laws restricting abortions. The court said that a regulation cannot place an “undue burden” on the right to abortion, which is defined as a “substantial obstacle in the path of a woman seeking an abortion before the fetus attains viability.”\n\nAccording to a CNN Poll conducted by SSRS in January, most Americans oppose overturning Roe, with a majority saying that if the decision was vacated, they’d want to see their own state move toward more permissive abortion laws.\n\nJust 30% of Americans say they’d like to see the Supreme Court completely overturn its Roe vs. Wade decision, with 69% opposed – a finding that’s largely consistent both with other recent polling and with historical trends.\n\nStare decisis and overturning precedent\n\nIn the opinion, Alito also addresses the fact that Roe has been on the books for some 50 years. Although the court is loath to overturn precedent, Alito says it must do so. He said that the notion of “stare decisis” does not “compel unending adherence to Roe’s abuse of judicial authority.”\n\nHe said that instead of “bringing about a national settlement of the abortion issue” Roe and a follow-on decision “have enflamed debate and deepened division.”\n\n“The inescapable conclusion,” Alito wrote, according to the draft, “is that a right to an abortion is not deeply rooted in the Nation’s history and traditions.”\n\nHe also said the decision was on a “collision course” with the Constitution “from the day it was decided.”\n\nAlito also pushed back on the notion that if the court were to overturn Roe it could lead the court to overturn other cases like Obergefell v. Hodges, that upheld the right to same-sex marriage. He said that what “sharply distinguishes” Roe from other cases is that “abortion destroys” potential life.\n\nThe court, Alito added, was not able to end the debate on abortion nearly a half century ago when Roe came down, so it should leave the issue to states.\n\n“This court cannot bring about the permanent resolution of a rancorous national controversy simply by dictating a settlement and telling the people to move on,” he wrote.\n\nIf Roe were overturned or fundamentally weakened, 21 states have laws or constitutional amendments already in place that would make them certain to attempt to ban abortion as quickly as possible, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which favors abortion rights.\n\nAn additional five states are likely to ban abortion as soon as possible without federal protections. As of April 2022, 536 abortion restrictions have been introduced in 42 states.\n\nDemocrats outraged, call to end filibuster\n\nPresident Joe Biden said a woman’s right to have an abortion is “fundamental” in his first statement on the issue Tuesday morning.\n\n“Roe has been the law of the land for almost fifty years, and basic fairness and the stability of our law demand that it not be overturned,” Biden said in a statement.\n\nSeveral Senate Democratic candidates immediately called for the elimination of the filibuster and passing legislation to protect abortion rights.\n\n“Democrats need to act NOW—end the filibuster, codify Roe, and defend reproductive freedom,” tweeted Wisconsin state Treasurer Sarah Godlewski, who’s running for her party’s nomination for Senate.”This fight is too urgent.”\n\n“Control of the Senate has never been more important: it’s time to end the filibuster, pass the Women’s Health Protection Act, and fight like hell to make sure all Ohio families are free to make these critical decisions without interference from politicians in Columbus or Washington,” added Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, who’s favored to win his Democratic primary on Tuesday.\n\nThe push from the Democratic candidates and others is likely to fail, unless some incumbent senators change their minds. In the 50-50 Senate, Democrats need every vote to eliminate the chamber’s rules requiring 60 votes to advance most legislation. And Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have repeatedly committed to protecting the filibuster, which sets up a 60-vote threshold that requires bipartisan cooperation to pass most legislation.\n\nIn February, Manchin also joined Senate Republicans in blocking the House-passed Women’s Health Protection Act that aimed to preserve access to abortion.\n\nIn a statement, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said overturning Roe would be “the greatest restriction of rights in the past fifty years – not just on women but on all Americans.”\n\n“Several of these conservative Justices, who are in no way accountable to the American people, have lied to the U.S. Senate, ripped up the Constitution and defiled both precedent and the Supreme Court’s reputation,” the leaders said.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional details.", "authors": ["Tierney Sneed Ariane De Vogue Joan Biskupic", "Tierney Sneed", "Ariane De Vogue", "Joan Biskupic"], "publish_date": "2022/05/02"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_1", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:38", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2019/03/05/mardi-gras-how-and-where-do-people-celebrate-every-year/3065010002/", "title": "Mardi Gras: How and where do people celebrate every year", "text": "Break out your beads, Mardi Gras is upon us.\n\nMardi Gras is French for \"Fat Tuesday,\" also called Shrove Tuesday. It is the day before Ash Wednesday, which marks the start of Christian Lent season leading up to Easter.\n\nDuring Lent, many Christians fast, and the name Fat Tuesday refers to the last day of eating richer foods before the leaner days of Lent begin. In 2019, Mardi Gras falls on March 5.\n\nOn Tuesday, the streets of New Orleans will fill up with people dressed in costume tossing beads in honor of Mardi Gras.\n\nHere's everything you need to know about the celebration:\n\nWhere is it celebrated?\n\nIn America, celebrations for Mardi Gras are most famous in New Orleans, where it is the conclusion of weeks of parades that begin in January. Other Southern cities, especially with French heritage, such as Mobile, Ala., also mark Mardi Gras. The day is the culmination of the Carnival season, which begins on or after the Christian Feast of the Epiphany in January. Carnival season also is celebrated in many Catholic-majority countries, most well-known in Brazil, where elaborate parades fill the streets.\n\nMore:Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen celebrating Mardi Gras with beads that hold a chicken meal\n\nMore:Got hundreds? That's how much Mardi Gras beads can set you back\n\nWhat is its history in the United States?\n\nAccording to the official Mardi Gras New Orleans website, the first U.S. Mardi Gras occurred in Mobile in 1703 with a secret society, the Masque de Mobile, formed to organize the celebrations. This society is similar to the “krewes” in New Orleans who sponsor the elaborate floats used in the parades before and during Mardi Gras. The celebration arrived in New Orleans soon after its founding in 1718.\n\nAbout a century later, according to Mardi Gras New Orleans, street parades had become established in the city and many krewes had formed, their members remaining anonymous and their faces hidden by masks. In 1872, a “King of Carnival,” Rex, was introduced to preside over the parades. The tradition of float riders throwing trinkets to the crowds also began in the 1870s. Typical “throws” include beads, cups, coins and stuffed animals.\n\nWho organizes and pays for Mardi Gras?\n\nKrewes are private, non-profit organizations whose members get together year-round to plan their parade's theme, costumes and throws, according to Mardi Gras New Orleans. They are individually funded by members through dues, sales of krewe-related merchandise and fundraising, including corporate sponsorships. The city of New Orleans is not involved in coordinating Mardi Gras parades; its only involvement is to issue parade permits.\n\nThis story was originally published February 2018.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2019/03/05"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2022/07/31/when-is-mardi-gras-carnival-festivities-explained/10158156002/", "title": "Mardi Gras 2024: When is the holiday? Get to know more about Fat ...", "text": "Extravagant costumes, large parades and colorful masks are often associated with the all-out celebration known as Mardi Gras. Across the globe, from France to the U.S., millions celebrate Mardi Gras each year.\n\nThough it began as a religious holiday observed before Lent, Mardi Gras has become more than a single day, now encompassing a period of partying.\n\nBut when is Mardi Gras 2024 and how long does it last? Here is what you need to know about the holiday.\n\nKing cake:Feast your eyes on these 26 fabulous Mardi Gras king cakes from across the South\n\nWhen is Mardi Gras 2023?\n\nFat Tuesday, or Mardi Gras, in 2024 is Feb. 13, 2024.\n\nWhen does Mardi Gras start?\n\nMardi Gras is French for \"Fat Tuesday,\" according to Britannica. It is traditionally celebrated on Shrove Tuesday, before Ash Wednesday, following the Christian liturgical calendar.\n\nHistorically, on this day, people were meant to use \"all the fats in the home before Lent in preparation for fasting and abstinence,\" says Britannica. Christians would binge on all the rich, fatty foods, such as meat, eggs and cheese, in their home prior to the period of Lenten fasting.\n\nMardi Gras is a part of the Carnival festivities. The word \"Carnival\" derives from the medieval Latin word, \"carnelevarium,\" which means to take away or remove meat, says History.com.\n\nToday, these customs are not the primary focus of Mardi Gras. Instead, Mardi Gras in the U.S. is known for its parades, king cakes and beads of green, purple and gold.\n\nMardi Gras:What is it, and how do people celebrate every year\n\nHow long is Mardi Gras?\n\nAlthough Mardi Gras technically refers to one specific day, Shrove Tuesday, it is often considered a whole season. The first Mardi Gras festivities often take place on the Twelfth Night, or the Epiphany, on January 6, according to Britannica.\n\nThese parades and events continue until the climax on official Mardi Gras. The Mardi Gras celebrations last anywhere from four to eight weeks, depending on when Ash Wednesday lands, according to Condé Nast Traveler.\n\nAccording to the French Quarter official website, on Mardi Gras Day outdoor celebrations last until midnight, and then you will be \"asked to clear off the street.\"\n\nJust Curious: We're here to help with life's everyday questions\n\nIs Mardi Gras celebrated every year?\n\nYes, Mardi Gras is generally celebrated every year. In 2021, the New Orleans parades were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.\n\nMardi Gras festivities in 2024 are set for Feb. 13 in New Orleans.\n\nCelebrating Mardi Gras? Here's how the locals do it\n\nMardi Gras traditions: How (and why) one New Orleans man ate more than 100 King cakes this Mardi Gras season", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/07/31"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2018/02/13/what-mardi-gras-most-famous-new-orleans-and-how-celebrated/332796002/", "title": "What is Mardi Gras, most famous in New Orleans, and how is it ...", "text": "What does ‘Mardi Gras’ mean?\n\nMardi Gras is French for \"Fat Tuesday,\" also called Shrove Tuesday. It is the day before Ash Wednesday, which marks the start of Christian Lent season leading up to Easter. During Lent, many Christians fast, and the name Fat Tuesday refers to the last day of eating richer foods before the leaner days of Lent begin. This year it is celebrated on Feb. 13.\n\nWhere is it celebrated?\n\nIn America, celebrations for Mardi Gras are most famous in New Orleans, where it is the conclusion of weeks of parades that begin in January. Other Southern cities, especially with French heritage, such as Mobile, Ala., also mark Mardi Gras. The day is the culmination of the Carnival season, which begins on or after the Christian Feast of the Epiphany in January. Carnival season also is celebrated in many Catholic-majority countries, most well-known in Brazil, where elaborate parades fill the streets.\n\nWhat is its history in the United States?\n\nAccording to the official Mardi Gras New Orleans website, the first U.S. Mardi Gras occurred in Mobile in 1703 with a secret society, the Masque de Mobile, formed to organize the celebrations. This society is similar to the “krewes” in New Orleans who sponsor the elaborate floats used in the parades before and during Mardi Gras. The celebration arrived in New Orleans soon after its founding in 1718.\n\nAbout a century later, according to Mardi Gras New Orleans, street parades had become established in the city and many krewes had formed, their members remaining anonymous and their faces hidden by masks. In 1872, a “King of Carnival,” Rex, was introduced to preside over the parades. The tradition of float riders throwing trinkets to the crowds also began in the 1870s. Typical “throws” include beads, cups, coins and stuffed animals.\n\nMore:When is Lent 2018? The Christian tradition begins on Valentine's Day\n\nMore:2018 Mardi Gras specials\n\nMore:Not just a drunken party: kids enjoy Mardi Gras\n\nMore:Check out these over-the-top Mardi Gras costumes\n\nWho organizes and pays for Mardi Gras?\n\nKrewes are private, non-profit organizations whose members get together year-round to plan their parade's theme, costumes and throws, according to Mardi Gras New Orleans. They are individually funded by members through dues, sales of krewe-related merchandise and fundraising, including corporate sponsorships. The city of New Orleans is not involved in coordinating Mardi Gras parades; its only involvement is to issue parade permits.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2018/02/13"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/02/19/mardi-gras-fat-tuesday-parades-king-cake-explained/11291666002/", "title": "2023 Mardi Gras: What is it? What to know about Fat Tuesday holiday", "text": "Mardi Gras is here.\n\nCarnival season festivities will close Tuesday in spectacular fashion with colorful parades, glitzy beads and masked celebrants.\n\nMardi Gras is celebrated around the globe and has roots in Christian traditions. In the United States, the grandest celebrations are held in New Orleans, where Mardi Gras is core to the southern city’s identity.\n\nThe city's famous annual parades were back in full swing for the second year in a row after the pandemic put the partying on pause in 2021. More than 1 million visitors have flood the city for Mardi Gras, according to a study by WalletHub.\n\nNew Orleans Mardi Gras parade 2023 livestream:Watch NOLA's iconic krewe parade floats\n\nBeignet recipe:Let the good times roll this Mardi Gras with this beignet recipe exclusively from Universal Orlando\n\nHere’s what to know about the celebration.\n\nWhen is Mardi Gras?\n\nMardi Gras, which is French for \"Fat Tuesday,\" is on Feb. 21. The next day is Ash Wednesday, which marks the start of Christian Lent, a time of fasting and abstinence that culminates in the Easter holiday. The name Fat Tuesday arose from the custom of using all the fats in the home before the start of Lent, according to Britannica.com.\n\nNew Orleans hosts the most famous Mardi Gras celebration in the U.S. This year it has been holding events since the official start of Carnival season on Jan. 6, which is known as Twelfth Night, the Mardi Gras New Orleans website says.\n\nBands will play Tuesday, and floats sponsored by local krewes (social clubs) will parade down city streets. Float riders throw trinkets to the crowds, a tradition that began in the 1870s. Typical “throws” include beads, cups, coins and stuffed animals.\n\nKrewes organize their own parades. One of the more popular parades, the Rex (King) Parade, is put on by the historic Rex krewe, which was founded in New Orleans in 1872 and is one of the oldest participating Mardi Gras clubs in the city.\n\nThe Rex krewe is responsible for many of the traditions famous today, including Mardi Gras’ official colors: purple, green and gold, according to the Mardi Gras New Orleans website. The Rex Parade features hundreds of riders, and the “Rex” or king of the krewe.\n\nEach year, a new king is selected to oversee the parades, and their identity is kept a secret until Lundi Gras, the day before Mardi Gras, according to the city's Mardi Gras website. Rex is usually a community leader in the city.\n\nWhere is Mardi Gras celebrated?\n\nAnother city with prominent Mardi Gras festivities is Mobile, Alabama, which in 1703 became the first community in the present day United States to celebrate Mardi Gras, according to the Mardi Gras New Orleans website.\n\nOther notable Mardi Gras celebrations in the U.S. include:\n\nHow did Mardi Gras get started?\n\nThe tradition dates back thousands of years to pagan celebrations of spring and fertility, including the Roman festivals of Saturnalia and Lupercalia, according to History.com.\n\nIn other places such as Brazil and Venice, the entire celebration period is called Carnival.\n\nIn the U.S., Mardi Gras celebrations were introduced by 18th century French settlers who founded Mobile and New Orleans, according to the Mardi Gras New Orleans website.\n\nWhat is King cake?\n\nKing cake is also known as the Twelfth Day cake because it celebrates Epiphany, a Christian holiday that commemorates the visit of the Magi to the baby Jesus 12 days after Christmas.\n\nThe special cake is eaten throughout Carnival season, according to the Southern Food and Beverage Museum. The cake traditionally contains a tiny plastic or porcelain baby figurine. Tradition calls on whoever finds the trinket in their slice of cake to host the next King cake party, the museum said.\n\nContributing: Matthew Diebel and Olivia Munson, USA TODAY", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/19"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2021/01/22/mardi-gras-2021-louisiana-what-to-know/6657167002/", "title": "Mardi Gras 2021 is on the horizon. Here's what you need to know", "text": "If you're new to south Louisiana, welcome. Maybe you've asked yourself \"Why are there beads on so many trees?\" or \"Why do people chase chickens?\"\n\nMardi Gras, also known as Carnival is recognized in many countries and celebrated in a variety of different ways before the Roman Catholic religious season of Lent begins.\n\nHere's how south Louisiana celebrates.\n\nWhen is Mardi Gras in 2021?\n\nIn 2021, Mardi Gras falls on Feb. 16.\n\nWhy does the date of Mardi Gras move?\n\nThe Mardi Gras season always begins on the same day, Jan. 6. The starting date is always the same because it is 12 days after Christmas, also known as the Feast of the Epiphany, Twelfth Night or Three Kings' Day.\n\nHowever, the date of Mardi Gras, which in French is \"Fat Tuesday,\" is a moving target. Mardi Gras is the day before Ash Wednesday, also the first day of Lent. The name Fat Tuesday comes from eating richer foods and drinks before the leaner days of Lent begin, when most Catholics fast.\n\nAsh Wednesday is 46 days before Easter Sunday, which changes dates, thus affecting the date of Mardi Gras. Easter is on the first Sunday following the first full moon after March 21, the vernal equinox, aka the Paschal Full Moon.\n\nIn the late 17th century, Mardi Gras celebrations arrived in North America by way of brothers Pierre Le Moyne d'Iberville and Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville. In 1875, the Louisiana State Legislature declared Mardi Gras an official holiday in the state.\n\nLouisiana's Mardi Gras celebrations grew out of Catholicism but also wove in \"French celebrations, African music and the masquerade tradition,\" Louisiana State Museum historian Karen Leathem said.\n\nIn New Orleans, the first written record of Mardi Gras celebrations is from 1699 with gatherings around a campfire. By the 1730s, many modern-day traditions had started Leathem said in a USA Today article.\n\nWhat's the purpose of Mardi Gras?\n\nMardi Gras is a tradition that dates back thousands of years to pagan rituals involving spring and fertility. In Medieval Rome, instead of abolishing local traditions, newly arrived Christian leaders decided to incorporate these celebrations into the new faith.\n\nAs a result, the pagan rituals morphed into the extravagance the Mardi Gras season has become as prelude to Lent.\n\nThe length of Carnival varies from location to location and is based on tradition. In south Louisiana, the Mardi Gras season typically stretches from Jan. 6 to Fat Tuesday. Other areas, like Brazil, start their celebration the Friday afternoon before Ash Wednesday.\n\nIn Mobile, Alabama, social events start in November, with society balls on Thanksgiving, and on New Year's Eve. Further balls and parades in January and February occur, celebrating up to midnight on Fat Tuesday.\n\nAfter the parades, trees are weighed down with beads thrown by krewes during parades. Some throws end up tangled in the branches of trees along the routes due to bad aim. Others are purposefully thrown in trees that are said to give good luck, like Tulane’s Bead Tree — tradition says if a student tosses beads in the tree and the necklace sticks, the student will pass their classes.\n\nWhat is a Courir de Mardi Gras?\n\nCourir de Mardi Gras, Louisiana French for \"Fat Tuesday Run,\" is a primarily southwest Louisiana traditional Mardi Gras event. Although most celebrations are the urban carnival version of Mardi Gras, Courir de Mardi Gras is the rural Cajun French revelry of the holiday.\n\nThe celebration's origins are founded in medieval French rituals, specifically the fête de la quémande, \"feast of begging.\" Food supplies were short after long winters, causing disguised poor to travel in groups to beg for food from the wealthy, dancing and singing in return for the generosity of the nobles.\n\nIn 1930s and '40s, courirs began to fade due to World War II because many men who participated in the runs were serving in the war. In the following decades, the tradition had a Cajun \"renaissance\" — a local effort to promote pride in the food, culture, music and language of south Louisiana.\n\nContact Victoria Dodge at vdodge@theadvertiser.com or on Twitter @Victoria_Dodge", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/01/22"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2020/02/18/mardi-gras-colors-real-reason-purple-green-gold-represent-symbolism/4760713002/", "title": "The real reason purple, green and gold represent Mardi Gras", "text": "The colors of Mardi Gras first surfaced in New Orleans, but it's not clear why purple, green and gold were chosen.\n\nThose colors appeared in 1872 as part of a spectacle honoring the New Orleans visit of Grand Duke Alexei Alexandrovich of Russia during carnival season.\n\nThe Rex Organization was created to help welcome the Grand Duke that same year. Leading up to their celebratory parade, newspapers ran proclamations from King Rex of carnival that balconies should be draped in purple, gold and green.\n\nThis is where things are less certain. It is unknown why these specific colors were chosen.\n\nSome accounts suggest they were selected for their aesthetic appeal, as opposed to any true symbolism. Others believe they were inspired by the house colors of the Russian Grand Duke, who is said to have handed out beads with the three colors to the crowds during his visit.\n\nMore:What you should bring to Mardi Gras parades\n\nIt's even possible that the Rex organization took the initiative and chose those colors in honor of Grand Duke Alexandrovich.\n\nErrol Laborde, historian and editor for the New Orleans Magazine, argues otherwise. While researching his book \"Marched the Day God: A History of the Rex Organization,\" he offered another theory.\n\nLaborde suggests the colors were based on heraldry — the system of which coats of arms and other armorial bearings are devised, described, and regulated. The rule of tincture states that metals, gold or silver, should not be placed next to other metals, and colors should not be placed next to other colors.\n\nAlthough the colors are now typically displayed in purple, green and gold, an order that doesn't comply with the rule of tincture, the Rex organization might have been trying to create a tricolor to represent its \"kingdom,\" Laborde says. And a kingdom must have a flag.\n\nMore:Places to eat in Lafayette along the Mardi Gras parade route\n\nBut why three colors? The United States, Great Britain, and France each have tricolor-ed flags, and at the time they were the ruling countries of the world.\n\nWhen choosing from the color wheel, some of the choices seem obvious. Purple is widely associated with royalty. White was considered but at the time was heavily used on other national flags, and thus avoided.\n\nBoth metals and colors are necessary in a coat of arms, according to the heraldry system, so then gold, another obvious choice, was picked, according to Laborde.\n\nAnd according to heraldry, there are only five acceptable color choices left: red, blue, purple, green and black. Laborde believes the final choice came down to purple, gold and green or purple, gold and black.\n\nPhoto gallery:The Royal Order of Unicorns celebrate their annual Mardi Gras ball\n\nNo one is sure why green was picked over black, but it has become part of the pageantry of Mardi Gras.\n\nIn 1892, the colors gained symbolism to go along with the Rex Parade theme \"Symbolism of Colors.\" Purple means justice, green means faith, and gold means power.\n\nContact Victoria Dodge at vdodge@theadvertiser.com or on Twitter @Victoria_Dodge", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/02/18"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/regional/bike-week/2021/03/03/daytona-beach-bike-week-history-beer-motorcycles-bikers-rally-cole-slaw/6902102002/", "title": "Daytona Bike Week: A history of beer, bikes, cole slaw and 'rowdyism'", "text": "DAYTONA BEACH — Bike Week, now marking its 82nd year, may not be your grandfather's — or even your great-grandfather's — bike rally. A gathering for motorcycle race fans, a drunken party, a biker brawl or a family vacation destination, Bike Week has been a lot of things over the years.\n\nIt’s our Mardi Gras, our Fantasy Fest, our Carnival. It’s a portable, 10-day street party of motorcycles of all kinds, eye-popping costumes, bikini-clad women, sidewalk vendors, parades, Clydesdales, beards, tattoos and alcohol. Bikers and locals alike go to nonstop concerts and bike shows, go on long rides or just stay on Main Street for days watching it all go by.\n\nIt all began in 1937 when almost a hundred daredevils on motorcycles raced each other on the road and packed sand of Daytona Beach in the first Daytona 200, launched by a group that included not-yet-NASCAR-president Bill France. About 15,000 fans watched Ed “Iron Man” Kretz ride his No. 38 Indian Motorcycle to the win before heading to Main Street to celebrate.\n\nBike Week and Biketoberfest:City discusses possible changes for hugely popular events\n\nBike Week and Biketoberfest changes?Here are four new things Daytona leaders are considering\n\nAfter the storms:Daytona Beach tourism works to weather impact of tropical storms Ian and Nicole\n\nIn the next four years crowds and entries doubled and things at the “Handlebar Derby” got a bit wilder. In 1939 a News-Journal article reported that \"the party got so rough that city firemen had to be called to dampen the crowd's spirits with a little cold water\" and the National Guard had to be summoned.\n\nCity leaders attempted in 1941 \"to limit, if not eliminate the rowdyism\" by organizing activities for fans, including field events, a 100-mile race for novices, a parade of motorcycle clubs, and \"the presentation of trophies to the best-dressed woman motorcyclist.\"\n\nIn 1942 the race was put on hold for five years while the country fought in and recovered from World War II, which is why we're celebrating the 82nd anniversary this year instead of the 86th. But some locals and visitors continued to show up for the party every year anyway, race or no race, for an unofficial event that became known as Bike Week.\n\nFrance kicked things off again in 1947 and Daytona Beach was \"jammed to the rafters,\" according to a Feb. 21 story that reported every available hotel room and apartment was rented. Most places were \"only charging moderate rents,\" an average of $4 or $5 for a double room without a private bath.\n\nBut things reportedly got so out of control that a Chamber of Commerce committee was formed to come up with a plan in 1948, endorsed by the American Motorcycle Association, for \"preventing unbridled rowdyism.\" The plan included checking mufflers at all approaches to the city and handing out lists of rules for behavior to all visitors to help limit the influx of what the AMA referred to as \"one-percenters,\" as compared to the \"99% of the motorcycling public\" who are \"law-abiding.\"\n\nDid it work? Not right away. A tear gas grenade was used to quiet the crowd in 1949 when some motorcyclists insisted on racing on Main Street, which had been blocked off for a street dance.\n\n\"We have plenty more grenades if we need them,\" the sheriff was quoted as saying.\n\nEarly Bike Weeks: The Mild Ones\n\nBike Weeks in the ’50s were, comparatively, sedate. The 1950 event was described as quiet, orderly and \"the most successful racing weekend in Daytona Beach history.\" And by 1951, the \"Wild West\" atmosphere was deemed a thing of the past.\n\nThis was likely helped along by the officers from 70 out-of-town police forces brought in by city leaders to help control the crowd and lay down the law that year. But wholesome fun was still encouraged: An \"entertainment program for the diversion of motorcycle enthusiasts\" was slated that included a \"contest for the best uniformed police squad.\"\n\nIt also didn't hurt that Marlon Brando and James Dean were on the big screen a few years later making bikes, white T-shirts and leather jackets look cool.\n\nBy 1961, France moved the motorcycle races to his newly-built Daytona International Speedway but the party stayed largely on the beach. Gradually, the \"Wild West\" returned.\n\nBike Week expands to more cities\n\nIt also started spreading. Over in Samsula in 1967 Olga “Aunt Ollie” Weber, daughter of the town’s co-founder Joe Sopotnick, took over the neighborhood gas station and general store he’d built in the mid-’20s and gradually turned it into a bar and, twice a year for Bike Week and Biketoberfest, a biker haven where visitors could hang out, bet on illegal drag racing and camp in the old cabbage field next door.\n\nYears later, in the late ’80s, it became even more of a must-see destination when Ron Luznar, Weber’s nephew and the bar’s new owner, noticed that “wrestling” events involving bikinis and gooey ingredients were becoming popular. Rather than having women grapple in mud or whipped cream, Luznar stayed on-brand and coleslaw wrestling quickly became a notorious, world-famous attraction at Sopotnick’s Cabbage Patch.\n\nMeanwhile, a smaller Bike Week was forming. Tommy Asberry, a Black biker from Atlanta, was ticketed in 1971 for parking his Harley-Davidson on Main Street and found a more hospitable welcome, along with many other shunned Black motorcyclists, in Daytona's Second Avenue area (since renamed Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Boulevard) to enjoy Black Bike Week, a major event in the local Black community to this day.\n\nOver in New Smyrna Beach in 1981, Gilly Aguiar, owner of Gilly’s Pub 44, took a stand against the trade deficit of the day by inviting everyone to bash a Japanese bike for charity, and that immediately became a popular annual event.\n\nDepending on what you thought Bike Week should be, the 1970s and ’80s were either the event’s Golden Age or a decidedly unfriendly, uncontrollable invasion. A popular motorcycle magazine suggested there shouldn’t even be a 1981 event.\n\nNewspapers reported disorderly conduct and women exposing their breasts. Trouble with rival motorcycle gangs began to get the attention of the law enforcement community. Daytona Beach police were on overtime to assure crowd control. A former Orlando motorcycle gang leader was sent to prison for murdering a Daytona Beach biker.\n\nEven the Boot Hill Saloon — long since a world-renowned biker bar icon — famously stayed closed during its first Bike Week in 1974 because new owner Dennis Maguire \"didn't want any problems with bikers,\" as he told the Sun-Sentinel years later.\n\nOn Main Street, no colors allowed\n\nLocals feared that tourists were starting to stay away and law enforcement and city officials were unhappy. The Bike Week Festival Task Force was formed in 1988 to bring some formal organization to the event. Alan Robertson, the original owner of Main Street's Beach Photo & Video, served as chairman and relentless Bike Week supporter.\n\nKarl Smith, a.k.a. Big Daddy Rat, long one of the forces of nature of Bike Week, was one of the first to see the commercial potential. Big and burly (but with a degree in fine arts), he sold airbrushed shirts from The Rat’s Hole and his other shops, organized motorcycle shows in Daytona and around the world, and helped spread the message that Bike Week didn’t have to be a slugfest.\n\nDaytona Beach police began cracking down more harshly on gang members while welcoming peaceful visitors. The Boot Hill was reportedly one of the first bars to ban colors (gang patches) to reduce rival fights, a practice that quickly spread. And over the next 20 years, Bike Week slowly evolved into a more family-friendly, if still rough-edged event.\n\nNot everyone was happy with a softer Bike Week. In the late 80s the Iron Horse Saloon, a rough and tumble Main Street staple, moved to U.S. 1 on the north end of Ormond Beach to avoid Daytona’s planned decorative renovations.\n\nThroughout the ’90s and into the 21st century, police and bikers got friendlier and local tourism agencies began marketing family activities to draw in vacationers.\n\nBike Week attractions continued to spread out from the beach. A welcome center with vendors across the Halifax River on Beach Street drew off some of the Main Street crowds. Auto dealer Bruce Rossmeyer, who opened a successful Harley-Davidson dealership on Main Street in 1994 that kicked off his chain of Harley locations, moved it 20 years later to the new 150-acre Destination Daytona complex he built along Interstate 95 near Ormond Beach to give bikers more restaurants, bars, shops, a hotel and condos to go to.\n\nRevving up during COVID-19\n\nEven during the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 when major sporting events and public gatherings of all times were being canceled, the motorcycles rolled on in Daytona Beach despite growing concern from health officials and warnings from city officials and the Daytona Regional Chamber of Commerce.\n\n“We can’t cancel it. The people are already here. You can’t put gates around the city,” said Nancy Keefer, the chamber’s CEO. “We help with the permitting, master-planning and marketing of the event, but we don’t control the businesses (that put on the events).”\n\nThere was a brief outcry when initial media reports stated that a New York resident who traveled to Daytona Beach for Bike Week was among three new presumptive coronavirus cases, back when three new cases were a big deal.\n\nIt was later learned that the 63-year-old man never made it to Daytona Beach. However, a 59-year-old man from St Lucie County who attended Bike Week became the first COVID-related death on the Treasure Coast a few weeks later.\n\nWhile hand sanitizer was visible at most bars and venues, few masks were in evidence on Main Street. At the last minute city and county officials announced they were revoking permits for any gatherings of 100 people or more, which meant that vendors would have to pack up.\n\nBut while white-topped tents over T-shirts, food and other wares were missing and outside bars were shut down, the crowds still came. An estimated 500,000 people attended the 2020 event.\n\nBike Week 2021:Even with COVID restrictions, Bike Week still crowded scene as closing weekend approaches\n\nWhat pandemic? Daytona Bike Week shifts into high gear with big crowds\n\nRiding into the future: only motorcycles allowed\n\nAfter weathering heightened health concerns during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic and recovering from damages from 2022's tropical storms Ian and Nicole, this year’s Bike Week marks a return to normal.\n\nThere will be activities, concerts and attractions all over the area for visiting bikers. Biker-friendly bars are scattered up and down U.S. 1. The bucolic city of DeLand holds a bike parade every year. Bikers looking for a quieter (if still raucous) place to go head to Flagler Beach. Destination Daytona will have vendors, motorcycle demonstrations and music on outdoor stages. Many visitors come down just to ride the Loop in Ormond Beach, a scenic, 34-mile ride through twisting, tree-lined roads in largely undeveloped Florida.\n\nBlack Bike Week, traditionally held the second weekend of the larger 10-day event, brings thousands of people of all ethnicities to enjoy the street-party festivities at Joe Harris Park in Daytona Beach.\n\nAnd, of course, at the Speedway across the street from the Official Bike Week Welcome Center at OneDaytona there’s the Daytona Supercross, and the Daytona 200 that started it all.\n\nMore:Daytona Supercross course the 'hardest,' most rewarding track on the circuit\n\nIt’s not the racing-based party where it began or the crime-ridden bacchanal it became. Bike Week in Daytona, like many of the regulars, has matured over the years into a somewhat mellower mix of people looking to have a good time, ride through some beautiful scenery and enjoy the company of other bikers from around the world.\n\nAdditional information from bikeweek.com.\n\nC. A. Bridges is a Digital Producer for the USA TODAY Network. Follow him on Twitter at @cabridges", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/03/03"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2021/05/23/tardy-gras-strip-club-vaccines-lifeguard-shortage-news-from-around-states/5236256001/", "title": "'Tardy Gras', strip club vaccines, lifeguard shortage: News from ...", "text": "From USA TODAY Network and wire reports\n\nAlabama\n\nMobile: Thousands of joyful revelers, many without masks, competed for plastic beads and trinkets tossed from floats as Alabama’s port city threw a Mardi Gras-style parade Friday night, its first since Carnival celebrations were scrapped earlier this year by the COVID-19 pandemic. Many lined up shoulder-to-shoulder and several deep along sidewalks, shouting and cheering as nearly 30 floats and several high school marching bands crossed a stretch of downtown Mobile. With COVID-19 hospitalizations and vaccinations ebbing, many partied with abandon. It was definitely not a Mardi Gras parade: Those can only be held during Mardi Gras, the period before Lent. But it felt a lot like one, which was a big part of the goal after months of lockdowns, illness, deaths and face masks. James L. Hurst said he was jubilant to be out partying after a difficult year. Many had no face coverings amid an upbeat mood sweeping the crowd on a balmy spring night with clear skies. Some took part in small house parties near the parade staging point. Others on the route eagerly held up hands, aiming to catch cheap beaded necklaces tossed by riders atop the floats. “We didn’t get a chance to celebrate our Mardi Gras last year because it was canceled because of the COVID-19,” Hurst told the Associated Press. “It feels great to be out! We have our vaccines and we are ready to go!”\n\nAlaska\n\nJuneau: Alaska had 19,100 more jobs in April than it did the same month in 2020, but the numbers still lagged what they were before the pandemic, the state labor department reported. There were an estimated 297,200 nonfarm jobs in Alaska last month, compared to 278,100 in April 2020 and 322,400 in April 2019, the report showed. The report provided a comparison to April 2020, the first month in which huge job losses hit as pandemic fears prompted business closures and restrictions. The department said industries that recovered the largest numbers of jobs last month were those that took the biggest hits last spring, such as leisure and hospitality, which last month had 6,300 more jobs than a year earlier. Retail gained 3,400 jobs, and education and health care had 4,600 more jobs. On the other end, the oil and gas sector had 2,600 fewer jobs last month than in April 2020, and mining and logging had 1,800 fewer. Alaska’s preliminary unemployment rate for April stood at 6.7%, though the department has cautioned against reading too much into the unemployment rate, saying it has been an “unreliable and misleading” economic indicator during months affected by the pandemic.\n\nArizona\n\nPhoenix: A pop-up vaccination clinic was set up Saturday morning at Grant Park with the goal of encouraging and providing easy-to-access vaccines for the communities of districts 7 and 8 in Phoenix. A row of canopies shaded a concrete path to the basketball gym, where vaccination registrations had opened at 8 a.m. People stood in line under the shade – some with children between ages 12 and 18 who had recently been green-lit for the Pfizer Vaccine. Those over the age of 18 could choose which vaccine to take. The clinic had all three available: Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson, according to the Arizona Department of Health Services Director Dr. Cara Christ. “If they want one dose, then the Johnson & Johnson is here. If they have already had a dose of Moderna, they can get the second dose of Moderna here,” she said. The program makes second doses available to anyone who has had their first dose somewhere else, as long as they bring their COVID-19 vaccine card with them and fit the time frame.\n\nArkansas\n\nFort Smith: More than 27% of people living in Franklin County were fully vaccinated against COVID-19 as of Saturday, according to data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC considers someone fully vaccinated two weeks after they have been given a single-dose shot (Johnson & Johnson) or a second shot (either Pfizer or Moderna). Arkansas has reported 340,040 total cases of coronavirus as of Saturday. The five state counties with the highest percentage of their populations fully vaccinated as of Saturday are Pulaski (34%), Conway (33%), Woodruff (33%), Desha (32%) and Dallas (32%).\n\nCalifornia\n\nLos Angeles: The most common coronavirus variant of concern circulating in Los Angeles County is now the U.K. variant, health officials said. Previously, two California variants were dominant, but in the past week, 53% of 40 specimens analyzed by a public health laboratory were the U.K. variant and none was a California variant, the county Department of Public Health said. The county also detected six Brazilian variants and one South African variant. The department said the findings highlight the need for continuing precautions, especially by those who are not vaccinated against COVID-19. “Recent research findings provide added evidence that the currently available vaccines appear to be highly effective against the variants of concern that are circulating here now,” the department said. Once staggering under COVID-19, the county of 10\n\nmillion residents on Saturday reported 14 new deaths and 265 new cases. There were 330 people hospitalized and 24% were in intensive care units. The daily test positivity rate was 0.4%.\n\nColorado\n\nDenver: Gov. Jared Polis and a panel of doctors urged parents and caregivers to vaccinate their 12- to 15-year-olds as middle and high school students continue to have the highest rate of COVID-19 infection in the state. “For younger Coloradans, two doses of the life-saving Pfizer vaccine … can bring an end to over a year of forced social isolation and illness and help us return to normal,” Polis said. “And for all of us, this means we can feel more secure as we continue to go about our summers.” Although hospitalizations are lower than they were during the pandemic for older people, pediatric hospitalizations are nearing their rate during the fall wave of COVID-19, according to data presented by state epidemiologist Rachel Herlihy. She said about half of Colorado’s pediatric hospitalizations over the last few months would now be considered vaccine-preventable. “We need to see increased vaccination rate among those individuals to protect them from infection,” Herlihy said. She added that parents of children who are not yet eligible for the vaccine should continue to take precautions because they could transmit COVID-19 to their unvaccinated children.\n\nConnecticut\n\nNew Haven: Yale New Haven Health is closing mass vaccination sites, the New Haven Register reported. Dr. Ohm Deshpande, associate chief clinical officer for the health system, told the Register that the system will cease first doses after Tuesday, and after that, it will be open for second doses by appointment and on a walk-in basis. Deshpande said pop-up clinics will continue and the trailer from the Federal Emergency Management Agency will return to New Haven in June.\n\nDelaware\n\nWilmington: The first lawsuit seeking to hold long-term care facilities accountable for how they cared for patients in the early days of the pandemic has been filed against a Prices Corner nursing home. It’s likely to be the first of several lawsuits in Delaware that claim wrongful death and gross negligence against a long-term care facility. A Delaware Online/News Journal analysis published last summer found that in the early weeks of the pandemic, about one-third of nursing homes failed to follow protocols to slow the spread of the virus. More facilities failed inspections in recent months. Americans across the country are grappling with how the virus ravaged nursing homes. Unlike other states, Delaware has not granted long-term care facilities immunity during the pandemic, which means they are not protected from lawsuits. This lawsuit was filed on March 23, nearly a year after the first Delaware nursing home resident died of COVID-19. At the center are two Brandywine Nursing and Rehabilitation Center residents: Charles Secrest, 82, and Sophie Star Sakewicz, 95, who were considered high-risk for COVID-19 and died from it in April 2020. The suit was filed by the residents’ daughters. The facility, according to the lawsuit, provided “substandard care by allowing an environment to be created which exposed the Plaintiffs to an extremely dangerous and infectious disease, after being put on notice by (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid) that there was an imminent threat to the wellbeing of its residents.” The administrator of the Brandywine Nursing and Rehabilitation Center did not return calls seeking comment. Through their attorney, the plaintiffs, Terri Hansen and Beverley Shinnen, declined to comment. Although nursing home residents make up only about 2.5% of Delaware’s COVID-19 cases, their residents make up almost half of the deaths. As of May 17, 753 nursing home residents died of COVID-19 – about 45% of all COVID-19 deaths.\n\nDistrict of Columbia\n\nWashington: Over the first weekend with almost all of D.C.’s coronavirus restrictions lifted, businesses and neighbors are cautiously embracing the rollback, WUSA-TV reported. As of Friday, almost all businesses, including restaurants, gyms, retail stores and churches, have the green light from the city to remove all COVID-19-related restrictions. Some neighbors who had been hibernating months finally felt comfortable to step outside in the again-bustling Adams Morgan neighborhood. “This is actually our first time out in about a year and 5 months of the pandemic. We’ve been in the house on lockdown,” Aarum Hurse said. “So it’s a little strange to be outside.” Still, many businesses are still opting to keep some restrictions in place, such as patrons wearing masks inside and social distancing. Matteo Catalani, owner of the Retrobottega bar, said the bar will still require masks inside for the time being. “We’re not planning on lifting that anytime soon,” he said. “Just, you know, to make feel everyone confident and comfortable.”\n\nFlorida\n\nMiami Beach: Some of the biggest celebrity chefs were in Miami last weekend for the annual South Beach Wine & Food Festival, including Bobby Flay, Giada De Laurentiis, Guy Fieri and Martha Stewart. But behind the glamour and private dinners that can sell for as much as $500 a ticket, the festival was quietly working behind the scenes to help restaurants struggling during the pandemic. Last year’s event, which fed more than 65,000 people at more than 100 events, was held just weeks before the COVID-19 lockdown. Miami has long been a foodie town with hundreds of local chefs and restaurants contributing to the massive food festival. As restaurants laid of staff and closed up shop, festival creator Lee Brian Schrager jumped into action to help his cooks and servers. The festival partnered with Florida International University’s Chaplin School of Hospitality to create a relief fund raising $1.6\n\nmillion that went directly to unemployed cooks, servers, dishwashers and other staff at more than 500 restaurants and bars across South Florida.\n\nGeorgia\n\nAtlanta: The advisory board for Georgia’s public health agency stopped holding meetings for more than a year during the coronavirus pandemic – a move that its leaders said was necessary to focus on the emergency response, though critics contended it made the agency less transparent at a time of crisis. The board of physicians and health professionals that advises the Georgia Department of Public Health held its last meeting on Feb. 11, 2020, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported Friday. That was before the first COVID-19 infections were confirmed in Georgia. The advisory board, which typically met monthly before the pandemic, still hasn’t held a public meeting more than 15 months later. Dr. Kathleen Toomey, the health agency’s leader, defended the lengthy hiatus. She said her staff needed to focus on fighting the virus. “We made a broad decision in discussions with various leadership that we would not have meetings at this time, but really invest in the work of the pandemic,” Toomey said. “Because our epidemiologists were tied up.” Toomey noted she has fielded questions on Georgia’s handling of the pandemic at dozens of media briefings and appearances, often at the side of Gov. Brian Kemp.\n\nHawaii\n\nWailuku: County officials in Maui are reminding travelers that they must provide COVID-19 vaccination documentation to be exempted from the testing requirement upon arriving on the island. Maui County began requiring all trans-Pacific travelers participating in the Safe Travels program to take an additional rapid COVID-19 test upon arrival beginning May 4, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported. But fully vaccinated trans-Pacific travelers in the program do not need to take a test with proof of vaccination. Travelers are considered vaccinated after 14 days have passed since receiving both doses of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines or one dose of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. “We remind trans-Pacific travelers that they need to provide proper documentation to be exempted from the post-arrival test,” Maui Mayor Michael Victorino said. “We need an original CDC vaccination card or a certificate of vaccination from the CDC. We are not accepting copies or photos of vaccination cards.” County officials said travelers whether vaccinated or not must still comply to all predeparture requirements. Officials said 17 of the more than 40,000 travelers that have visited the island from May 4 to May 19 have received positive results from the required postarrival testing at Kahului Airport. Those travelers were referred immediately to the Maui District Health Office.\n\nIdaho\n\nBoise: Some Idaho taxpayers will see a one-time tax rebate this summer as part of the income tax legislation passed earlier this year. Boise State Public Radio reported the one-time rebate will go to full-time Idaho residents who filed income tax returns in 2019 and 2020. Each person will get either a minimum of $50, plus $50 for each dependent, or 9% of the state income tax they paid in 2019, whichever is greater. It’s part of an overhaul of income tax law that includes rate reductions and consolidation of tax brackets. Supporters claimed it’s the largest tax cut in state history, and opponents said the tax cut and the rebate will benefit the rich more than working class Idaho residents. The state tax commission is still working out final details on the rebate with state lawmakers and the governor’s office, including how the rebates will be distributed. They could be sent as checks or deposited directly in a taxpayer’s bank account.\n\nIllinois\n\nSpringfield: State Democratic leaders said they have agreed to repay federal pandemic relief loans more than a year earlier than scheduled, saving taxpayers $100\n\nmillion in interest. The plan was announced as Democrats who control the House and Senate head into the final 10 days of the legislative session, still struggling to find ways to close a $1.4\n\nbillion deficit for the budget that begins July\n\n1. Washington lent money to in early 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic and containment measures left economies battered and hundreds of thousands on the unemployment line. Illinois borrowed $3.2\n\nbillion and has repaid $2\n\nbillion. The rest was due by December 2023, but the state has money to pay it earlier. “The federal loan was a lifeline to keep our state and our economy afloat,” said Senate President Don Harmon, an Oak Park Democrat. “That our economy has rebounded so strongly that we can now pay it off early is a testament to the resilience of the people and businesses of the great state of Illinois.”\n\nIndiana\n\nIndianapolis: The National FFA Organization is bringing its national convention back in-person to Indianapolis this fall after the meeting switched to a virtual format last year during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Indianapolis-based group devoted to agricultural education announced Wednesday that it expects anywhere from 30,000 to 40,000 people to attend its convention from Oct. 27-30 at the Indiana Convention Center and Lucas Oil Stadium. FFA’s annual gathering in Indianapolis typically brings at least 65,000 blue-coated youth and other attendees to the city, but organizers expect some restrictions may still be in place this year that could limit attendance, the Indianapolis Business Journal reported. Mandy Hazlett, FFA’s associate director of convention and events, said this year’s gathering “will look a bit different,” with a hybrid approach that offers in-person events for those who can attend in person and virtual activities for those who cannot. FFA is scheduled to convene in Indianapolis through at least 2033, following a contract extension that was announced last June alongside the group’s decision to temporarily go virtual. The event has been hosted in Indianapolis since 2006, with the exception of a three-year stop in Louisville, Kentucky, from 2013 to 2015.\n\nIowa\n\nColo: Niland’s Cafe was forced to close in August because of the coronavirus pandemic, but the historic diner is reopening under the new management of Danny and Abi Wilson, longtime Colo residents. The Wilsons are starting with a smaller menu full of homemade items, including tenderloins made using their own recipe. “We’re so excited. It took longer than expected to get open because of COVID,” Danny Wilson said. “The menu is going to be kind of limited at first. I just want to make sure that we do good food – good quality from scratch – and then add on. We’re going to make everything ourselves except a few things like onion rings and cheese balls.” The menu will also include items like burgers, roast beef, pulled pork, mashed potatoes and gravy, plenty of side dishes, pie, shakes and ice cream. There are a few changes in store for patrons. The vintage Cadillac that used to be parked in the dining room has been moved next door to the gas station museum to more than double the seating to 10 areas, both booths and tables. Situated between two other historic buildings, the Colo Motel and the gas station museum, Niland’s Cafe has display cases in the front room of the cafe and historic signs throughout. The display cases were donated by Duane Pundt of State Center.\n\nKansas\n\nTopeka: Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly on Friday vetoed a Republican proposal to set aside hundreds of millions of Kansas’ federal coronavirus relief dollars to compensate small businesses that faced restrictions earlier in the pandemic. Kelly said in her veto message that the measure was “well-intentioned” but violated a federal coronavirus relief law enacted in March. She also suggested that Kansas already has a more transparent process for giving out relief funds through a task force she created last year. “The COVID-19 pandemic has presented many challenges for Kansas businesses,” Kelly said in her message. “My administration has been committed to doing all we can to support their continued pandemic recovery efforts,” Kelly said in her message. Her veto sparked criticism in the Republican-controlled Legislature, particularly from conservatives who have argued for months that state and local government restrictions on businesses were too harsh and applied unfairly. House Majority Leader Dan Hawkins, a Wichita Republican, said Kelly’s administration is “a Death Star with the sole purpose of destroying the Kansas economy.” Kelly kept a stay-at-home order in place for five weeks last spring, defending it as necessary to prevent a surge in COVID-19 cases from overwhelming hospitals, as it had in Europe. She later sought a phased reopening of the economy, but lawmakers forced her to accept local control of such decisions to keep a state of emergency for the pandemic in place. Ryan Kriegshauser, an attorney for a Wichita fitness studio and its owner, who sued the state in December over pandemic restrictions, said the federal law cited by Kelly is “incredibly ambiguous.” He said the bill also had a provision nullifying its contents if they were found to violate federal law.\n\nKentucky\n\nFrankfort: Kentucky reported 426 new COVID-19 cases and five additional coronavirus-related deaths Saturday. The state also reported two deaths from its ongoing audit. Kentucky’s test positivity rate is 2.63%. As of Friday afternoon, 1,957,642 Kentuckians had received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Because of delays with the federal vaccination database, there was no vaccination report Saturday, Gov. Andy Beshear said on Twitter. There have been 455,575 total coronavirus cases and 6,705 deaths in Kentucky since the start of the pandemic. There were 357 Kentuckians hospitalized with the virus Wednesday, including 102 in intensive care units and 50 on ventilators.\n\nLouisiana\n\nNew Orleans: Figures from the Transportation Security Administration showed increasing traffic at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport in May, The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate reported. Preliminary counts showed 242,404 individuals were screened at the airport’s security checkpoints from May 1 through May 18. It’s an increase from last month. And its a strong improvement from the comparable period last year, when, early in the COVID-19 pandemic, only a little more than 20,000 passengers went through security lines. “In May, we’ve been observing the TSA throughput and seen a noticeable uptick in activity,” said airport director Kevin Dolliole, at the airport’s oversight board monthly meeting on Thursday. Dolliole said Armstrong has been improving faster than comparable midsize airports across the country. “We’ve been tracking in the top tier compared to other mid-sized airports, we’re tracking very well,” he told the board. Official passenger data from the airlines, which the newspaper noted is reported on a two-month lag, showed that passenger traffic for the first quarter of this year was just under 1.25 million. That was down about 56% from last year’s first quarter and 62% from 2019.\n\nMaine\n\nAugusta: A dust-up over masks could raise tensions as the Maine Legislature prepares to return to the State House, which has been closed since March 2020. The Legislative Council voted to reopen the State House effective Monday while requiring people to continue wearing masks. Republicans argued that the mask requirement defied federal public health recommendations. Also, Democratic Gov. Janet Mills is lifting mask mandates for most Mainers, effective Monday. The contradictory guidance will only confuse Mainers with the executive branch and legislative branch adopting competing rules on masks, Senate Republicans said Friday. “The state needs to speak with one voice and its statements regarding the pandemic must be based on science. The governor made her decision based on the latest science from the U.S. CDC and the Legislature should follow that same path,” Jeff Timberlake, Senate Republican leader, said Friday. During the council meeting, House Minority Leader Kathleen Dillingham, R-Oxford, suggested to House Speaker Ryan Fecteau that some in her caucus might ignore the mask requirement.\n\nMaryland\n\nOcean City: The COVID-19 pandemic complicated lifeguarding in 2020. The worldwide pandemic not only forced lifeguards to reconsider how they patrol, but it also made recruiting a challenge for Delmarva’s beach patrols. The pandemic disrupted testing opportunities, and forced beach patrols like in Ocean City to adjust its academy, meaning new lifeguards couldn’t get onto the beach until later in the summer. Heading into this year, beach resorts are hoping for a more normal summer, but so far, that hasn’t been the case for beach patrols, which have experienced many of the same problems as last year. Agencies in Delaware and Maryland reported having more issues this year with recruiting and staffing than they did in 2020. Despite the challenges, the agencies expect to either hit their staffing goals or exceed them and offer a record level of lifeguards on patrol this summer. Ocean City dealt with more issues than usual with recruiting new lifeguards and getting veterans to return, said Butch Arbin, captain of the Ocean City Beach Patrol. However, OCBP did resume its normal testing schedule. “This is definitely unique, actually more unique than last year, which is interesting,” Arbin said.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nBoston: Massachusetts will end its COVID-19 vaccine preregistration system at the end of May, the Baker administration announced Friday. The state’s COVID-19 Vaccine Finder will remain available. The site lists more than 900 locations across the state to receive a shot. Also Friday, the administration announced that beginning Monday, it is expanding the state’s homebound vaccination program to help schedule in-home vaccinations for eligible residents who are unable to get to a vaccine site. The homebound program is primarily using Johnson & Johnson vaccines, a vaccine that only requires one visit to an individual’s home. For individuals 12-17 years old who are homebound, the program is offering Pfizer vaccines. Over the next several days, all those still in the preregistration system will be contacted with an opportunity to book appointments before the system closes on May 31. All remaining people who have preregistered will be given an opportunity to book before the system shuts down, officials said.\n\nMichigan\n\nLansing: The state health department has settled a lawsuit by releasing information about people at long-term care sites who died of COVID-19, attorneys for a journalist said Friday. The department agreed to provide ages and dates of death but was unable to say whether the infection occurred at a long-term care facility “due to inadequate tracking,” the Mackinac Center Legal Foundation said. The group in March filed a lawsuit on behalf of Detroit-area journalist Charlie LeDuff, whose public records request was denied as exempt under state law. The health department said it worked with LeDuff to produce information that wouldn’t identify anyone, although he said he wasn’t seeking names. The department is “strongly committed to protecting residents of long-term care facilities from COVID-19 and to sharing data with the public related to the pandemic,” spokesman Bob Wheaton said. The Mackinac Center Legal Foundation often takes aggressive action to get public records. “This data is an essential part of accurately understanding the effects of this pandemic and the public policy implemented in response,” attorney Steve Delie said.\n\nMinnesota\n\nSt. Cloud: Minnesota added its lowest number of new COVID-19 cases since March 2 on Saturday, according to the Department of Health. The 443 new cases in Sunday’s report matched levels not commonly seen since last summer. In Benton and Sherburne counties, case counts rose by single digits. Nine new cases were found in Sherburne County, bringing its total cases to 11,889. Five new cases were reported in Benton County, bringin the total to 5,772 since the pandemic began. The more populous Stearns County saw 11 new cases Saturday, bringing its total to 22,419. As of Friday, 2,492,237 Minnesotans have completed the vaccination process, or about 46%, with another 356,087 having received one dose.\n\nMississippi\n\nJackson: The state Department of Health reported 105 new cases of COVID-19 and one coronavirus-related death Friday. Since the virus hit the state in March 2020, a total of 316,272 cases and 7,279 coronavirus-related deaths have been reported. The health department reported 25 outbreaks at Mississippi nursing homes. Residents between the ages of 25 and 39 represent the largest portion of the infected population in the state, with 70,171 cases reported Tuesday, the latest figure available. Among patients under 18, children between the ages of 11 and 17 have the highest infection rate, with 24,497 cases identified. According to health department data, 1,002,669 people have begun the vaccination process in Mississippi, as of Thursday morning. Since December, about 872,737 people have been fully vaccinated against COVID-19.\n\nMissouri\n\nSpringfield: Cider Days will be back for its 23rd year on Walnut Street from Sept. 18-19, with regional artists, crafters, performers and activities, along with apple cider, according to organizers. The community event was canceled last year because of the coronavirus pandemic. Vendor booths are expected to be placed 6 feet apart this year. Cider Days is managed by the Downtown Springfield Association and presented by the Historic Walnut Street Association. The festival hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on both days. It is $5 per person while children 10 and under are free.\n\nMontana\n\nGreat Falls: City Commissioners heard a presentation about the timeline for distribution and restrictions of allocation regarding the allocation of federal coronavirus relief funds. The city will be receiving close to $19.5\n\nmillion, the first $9.7\n\nmillion received this month and the latter half to be distributed in May 2022. Finance Director Melissa Kinzler said funds from the American Rescue Plan must be appropriated by Dec. 31, 2024, and be spent by the end of 2026. Deputy Finance Director Kirsten Myre said the funds must meet specific conditions for use as they are encouraged to focus spending toward supporting low-income individuals and those disproportionately impacted by COVID-19. These funds cannot be used to pay off debt, legal settlements or offset tax cuts. City Manager Greg Doyon said he has been meeting weekly with leaders in the community and the congressional delegation to monitor and keep track of all the information that relates to the American Rescue Plan and how best to leverage it for the community.\n\nNebraska\n\nLincoln: The state Department of Health and Human Services reported 588 new COVID-19 cases last week, a 43% drop from the previous week’s total of 1,368. The daily average of new positive cases in the last week was 84. Total hospitalizations in Nebraska due to COVID-19 number are at 6,630. Through last Wednesday, the latest day available, 788,985 Nebraskans age 16 and older (53.2%) have been fully vaccinated.\n\nNevada\n\nLas Vegas: Larry Flynt’s Hustler Club, with a spinning disco ball casting rainbow colors on the walls but more lights turned on than usual, was an unconventional site for a walk-in COVID-19 vaccination clinic. But as government officials and health workers try to address the slowing demand for vaccines, they’re increasingly turning to creative ways to incentivize people to show up and get a shot. “This is just another way to access our population,” said JoAnn Rupiper, the chief nurse of the Southern Nevada Health District, who monitored the clinic. “It might attract some people who like the novelty of it, I suppose.” The clinic opened for several hours Friday night, administering shots to about 100 people before the strip club opened for its usual business. Some people who showed up to get shots admitted they were reluctant to get the vaccine but decided to go for it if it meant visiting a strip club.\n\nNew Hampshire\n\nConcord: New England College in Henniker said it will require that students attending classes on campus this fall be fully vaccinated, as well as faculty and staff. “With the COVID-19 vaccine now widely available throughout the country, we will add it to our list of required vaccinations,” President Michele Perkins said in a statement Friday. “With limited exceptions, all students attending classes on campus in fall 2021 must be fully vaccinated. Faculty and staff must also be fully vaccinated by August 1, 2021 if they work on campus.” Perkins said vaccination of the on-campus community will allow more face-to-face classes, field trips, athletic competitions, and opening up its galleries and theater. In April, Dartmouth College Provost Joseph Helble announced that all students must be vaccinated before returning to campus for the fall, or must be vaccinated shortly after arrival.\n\nNew Jersey\n\nHackensack: Thirteen inmates at the Bergen County Jail remained quarantined Friday after testing positive for the coronavirus in an outbreak that infected 32 this month at the facility. Keisha McLean, a spokeswoman for the Bergen County Sheriff’s Department, said none of the inmates reported severe symptoms, and that the outbreak was contained to one unit of the jail. All those affected have been assessed daily by medical staff, she said. Detainees of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement who are held at the jail on River Street are not among those infected with the virus, McLean said. The facility has been the site of numerous protests in recent months by immigration activists calling for the release of ICE detainees held on civil immigration violations. Some detainees have also participated in hunger strikes in part to protest the conditions at the facility. Duane Holmes, 49, who has been held at the jail since 2019 on theft and burglary charges, said he was among the inmates who tested positive in recent days. Holmes said he was placed in the medical unit on Saturday, and spent three days there with symptoms that included body aches, nausea, coughing, headaches and a fever. He tested positive on Tuesday, a day after he was released from the medical unit, he said. His attorney, Eric Kleiner of Englewood Cliffs, has submitted a motion to the court for Holmes’ release that is awaiting a judge’s decision. Kleiner said he wants Holmes released to his family so he can get antibody treatment.\n\nNew Mexico\n\nLas Cruces: Southeast New Mexicans were going back to the movies as theaters throughout the region reopened with the relaxing of state health restrictions related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Las Cruces-based Allen Theaters, which owns cinemas in New Mexico, Arizona and Colorado, announced its theaters in the Land of Enchantment were open or planned to reopen soon as counties shifted into the “turquoise” category for COVID-19 infection risk, based on state gating criteria. Carlsbad’s La Cueva 6 reopened two weeks ago, and Alamogordo’s Aviator 10 and Ruidoso’s Sierra Cinema were set to reopen Friday, said Allen Theaters Vice President Russel Allen. The turquoise category means the theaters could reopen under a 33% capacity. The Eagle 9 in Hobbs is expected to reopen June 4 as Allen said the theater was undergoing new management training. Chaves County was still in the green category, which if held steady for two weeks can shift to turquoise, and its Galaxy 8 theater is expected to reopen May 28.\n\nNew York\n\nNew York City: A spike in assaults and harassment incidents in the city’s transit system is threatening its ability to restore ridership to prepandemic levels just as it needs to start replenishing its coffers. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which carried 5.5\n\nmillion people on its subways every weekday before the COVID-19 outbreak, faces a harsh reality: Even with $14.5\n\nbillion of federal aid, it must plug an estimated $1.5\n\nbillion deficit as soon as 2024 if ridership does not hit prepandemic levels. That scenario would bring back financial strains that could have dire consequences for the future of the nation’s largest transit system. At stake is the MTA’s $51.5\n\nbillion capital plan, which would improve access for the nearly 1\n\nmillion New Yorkers who identify as disabled, expand service to underserved neighborhoods and replace aging signals that cause delays and limit service.\n\nNorth Carolina\n\nHendersonville: Henderson County is the only county in the state that is highlighted green in the Department of Health and Human Services’ most recent COVID-19 Alert System Report. Green denotes low community spread in the color-coded system; light yellow is for moderate community spread; yellow for significant community spread; orange for substantial community spread; and red, the most severe, for critical community spread. The ranking is included in the state’s most recent COVID-19 County Alert System information, which was released May 13 and includes data from April 25 to May 8. The report showed no red counties, 19 orange counties, 56 yellow counties and 24 light yellow counties. As of Friday, the total number of COVID-19 cases in Henderson County was 10,245, with 160 reported deaths. The most recent vaccination numbers showed 50,574 people vaccinated with at least one dose in Henderson County, and 46,861 fully vaccinated.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nBismarck: The North Dakota Supreme Court ruled that Gov. Doug Burgum had the authority to close businesses during the coronavirus pandemic. Somerset Court LLC and salon operator Kari Riggin in April sued Burgum and then-State Health Officer Mylynn Tufte to allow the assisted living facility’s in-house hair salon to continue providing services to residents. They asserted that Burgum’s orders went beyond his authority and denied plaintiffs their constitutional right to earn a living. Burgum in late March issued executive orders temporarily restricting or closing some businesses, including hair salons to prevent the spread of COVID-19. The order expired in early May. The Somerset Court salon continued operating into April. Riggin was cited on April 14 for failing to comply with Burgum’s order. The infraction carried a potential fine up to $1,000. The justices in a Thursday ruling said the governor did not exceed his authority, Attorney Lynn Boughey, who represents Somerset Court and Riggin, told the Bismarck Tribune “there is a strong likelihood that we will appeal to the United States Supreme Court.”\n\nOhio\n\nColumbus: The number of people in Ohio age 16 and older who received their initial COVID-19 vaccine jumped 33% in the week after the state announced its million-dollar incentive lottery, though an analysis showed vaccination rates lag well behind what they were in March and most of April. In the week after the May 12 announcement about the lottery, 119,394 people age 16 and older received either the one-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine or their first part of the two-dose Pfizer or Moderna vaccinations, according to Ohio Department of Health data. That’s an increase of nearly 30,000 from the 89,464 people in the same age group who received a first shot during the seven-day period from May 6 to May 12, according to an analysis of state data by the Associated Press. The analysis did not include vaccination numbers for children ages 12 to 15, who only became eligible for the vaccine the day the lottery was announced. More than 1\n\nmillion people have entered Ohio’s vaccine lottery. Winners must be permanent Ohio residents and have received at least one dose of the vaccine, meaning the first person drawn by the state might not be the eventual winner. The first winners will be announced Wednesday at the end of Cash Explosion, the official Ohio Lottery TV show. Adults hoping for the $1\n\nmillion prize and teenagers looking for full-ride college scholarships to a state school can register themselves, but parents or legal guardians must verify their eligibility.\n\nOklahoma\n\nMcAlester: Convicted murderer Nicholas Alexander Davis was among death-row inmates moved off of the most restrictive unit in prison after the American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma threatened to sue. The transfer turned out to be fatal. At his new unit at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, Davis was exposed to the coronavirus during an outbreak in March and became ill. He died April 7 at a hospital in Lindsay from COVID-19 complications, a medical examiner concluded in a report. He was 46. He was awaiting execution for a fatal shooting inside an Oklahoma City apartment in 2004. A jury in 2007 chose death as his punishment for the murder. The U.S. Supreme Court in October rejected his final appeal. He had been held on Oklahoma State Penitentiary’s notorious H Unit. In a 2019 letter, the ACLU complained to the Corrections Department that H Unit was a dim underground bunker where condemned men were kept in permanent solitary confinement in violation of their constitutional rights. In a response, Scott Crow, then interim director, told the ACLU all qualifying death row inmates would be relocated to A Unit within 30 days.\n\nOregon\n\nPortland: A federal judge has determined that a group of businesses and political action committees that sought to block Gov. Kate Brown’s COVID-19 restrictions haven’t shown enough evidence to prompt such a move. The group – which includes the Gresham restaurant Spud Monkey’s Bar and Grill, its owner Melissa Adams and political action committees Oregon Moms Union and Heart of Main Street – filed a temporary restraining order against Brown on May 5, The Oregonian/OregonLive reported. The order protested the “unfair restrictions” they said the governor had put on businesses and public school children. Such a filing indicated members of the group believe they are at risk of facing immediate damage from the restrictions. Judge Karin Immergut declined to issue the restraining order, saying last week the group “failed to show sufficient facts and adequate legal support” to warrant a block on Brown’s restrictions. Brown’s attorneys argued none of the plaintiffs could show they suffered specific ramifications as a result of the governor’s orders.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nErie: New data showed that Erie County’s minority populations are getting vaccinated against COVID-19 at a far lower rate than the county’s white population. About 31% of the county’s African Americans age 15 and older has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Health, ccojmpared with 44% of the county’s white population as of May 14. “This is not a surprise at all,” said Shantel Hilliard, executive director of the Booker T. Washington Center. “We know there has been some hesitation among people of color, even going back to the initial COVID-19 testing.” To improve COVID-19 vaccination and testing rates, Erie Insurance has awarded a $100,000 grant to the Minority Community Investment Coalition. The funds will be used to improve health education in Erie’s most vulnerable neighborhoods. MCIC will partner with local community centers, like the Booker T. Washington Center, and other organizations to spread the word about various health subjects, including COVID-19 vaccinations and testing.\n\nRhode Island\n\nNewport: The city’s July Fourth fireworks show is returning this year after being canceled in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic. The tradition is scheduled to take place at 9 p.m. with a rain date of July 5, Mayor Jeanne Marie Napolitano announced Thursday, according to The Newport Daily News. The event will be designed with all relevant COVID-19 safety protocols in mind. The city is also launching a fundraising campaign that will allow businesses and individuals to help pay for the display. The event is costly, not just because of the fireworks display, but also because of related public safety and traffic costs, the mayor said.\n\nSouth Carolina\n\nColumbia: The state Department of Health and Environmental Control reported 205 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 on Saturday and four new deaths statewide. The agency also reported 121 probable new cases.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nSioux Falls: The South Dakota Department of Health reported Friday an additional 100 people recovered from COVID-19 in the state, while 34 more people testing positive for the coronavirus. It was the 17th day in a row in which active infections decreased in South Dakota. There were no new deaths in Friday’s report, with the statewide total remaining at 2,001. The number of people with COIVD-19 who were occupying a hospital bed rose to 61 in Friday’s report. Seventeen were receiving intensive care and five were on ventilators. The new infections included 10 Minnehaha County residents and four in Brown County. There were no new cases in Codington County. Five new positive cases were reported among long-term care residents.\n\nTennessee\n\nMemphis: A final report from the Tennessee Department of Health concluded that multiple deficiencies existed in the Shelby County Health Department’s management of vaccine inventory, but that vaccine was stored within acceptable temperatures from receipt in the pharmacy to administration. The report recommends that ongoing assessment and corrective actions to support the vaccine program be carried out once new leadership is identified in the health department. The report, dated May 12, came less than three months after the state stripped the Shelby County Health Department of its vaccine distribution responsibilities, transferring those to the city of Memphis after the state was notified of expired doses of vaccine and an excess of unused doses. The state’s report focused on the local health department’s ability to maintain the vaccine at appropriate temperatures. It did not focus in-depth on the 2,400 wasted doses or reasons for the backlog. The report does not recommend anyone who has been vaccinated to get vaccinated again.\n\nTexas\n\nAustin: Under pressure from Gov. Greg Abbott, Austin and Travis County public health leaders on Friday chose to end the local mask mandate, thus avoiding a potential courtroom conflict with the governor over pandemic policy. Dr. Mark Escott, whose tenure as interim Austin-Travis County health authority began only months before the coronavirus pandemic gripped central Texas, announced in one of his last public briefings on the virus that businesses would no longer be required to make sure partially vaccinated or unvaccinated customers wear masks. “Now is not the time for us to be in conflict, now is the time for us to focus on the message,” said Escott, who is stepping away from his role as county health authority at the end of the month. “And the message is that unvaccinated people or partially vaccinated people need to wear a mask when they’re out in public. Those who are unvaccinated need to be vaccinated. This is the best protection that we have right now.” Under Abbott’s new orders, masks can only be required in Texas wherever businesses want them. But masks will continue to be required at state-supported living centers; government-owned or -operated hospitals; Texas Department of Criminal Justice facilities; Texas Juvenile Justice Department facilities; and county and municipal jails.\n\nUtah\n\nSt. George: The Washington County Justice Court will be opening for some in-person hearings on Monday, and yellow-phase protocols will be in place. Utah courts have been closed for in-person hearings for 14 months since the pandemic and have done hearings through Webex. As Washington County is seeing fewer coronavirus cases, going from the red phase to yellow, the court administration is discussing how to proceed for those wanting in-person hearings. Washington County Attorney Eric Clarke said there has been one in-person hearing, roughly a month ago. It was a test run on court hearings in the yellow phase and required everyone who attended to be tested for the coronavirus and masked. The Washington County Justice Court is the only court partially opening in St. George for now. As part of the Pandemic Response Plan, The Washington County Justice Court will be encouraging remote hearings and require masks and social distancing for in-person. However, the judge can decide whether a person can enter a courtroom if they refuse to wear a mask.\n\nVermont\n\nMontpelier: Vermont will be distributing COVID-19 vaccines to primary care physicians, said Human Services Secretary Mike Smith. The state will start with the Moderna vaccine, but will expand to Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson vaccines when enough supplies are available, he said Friday during the governor’s twice-weekly virus briefing. It’s part of the push to get 80% of eligible Vermonters vaccinated. Gov. Phil Scott said Friday that he would drop all pandemic-related restrictions early if the state reaches that vaccination rate before the July 4 full reopening plan. People no longer have to sign up for vaccines and can walk in to clinics, pharmacies and school clinics and get a shot, Smith said. The state is also renewing its effort to vaccinate vulnerable populations including the homeless and people under Department of Corrections supervision, he said.\n\nVirginia\n\nCharlottesville: University of Virginia students living, learning or working on campus this fall will be required to be vaccinated against the coronavirus and regular testing will be required for unvaccinated employees starting this summer, administrators said. News outlets reported that unvaccinated students won’t be allowed on campus without exemptions for health or religious reasons. Administrators said they hope it will help return campus life to something closer to how it used to be, with few distancing requirements and few online course alternatives, according to a memo to students, faculty, staff and employees. Students will be required to provide proof of vaccination no later than July 1. The Provost’s office will work with schools to develop accommodations for students or instructors with circumstances that make it impossible to return to in-person instruction, administrators said. Administrators expect any worker without approved religious or medical exemptions to get their shots and will monitor employee vaccination rates and consider whether to mandate vaccines for employees. Most employees who worked at home during the pandemic will be required to return to their offices, at least for now, administrators said.\n\nWashington\n\nPoulsbo: The city is implementing a mandate that requires employees to be fully vaccinated for COVID-19 by July 1, Mayor Becky Erickson said, though she noted she would not verify whether employees comply with the rule. Erickson said the policy is being implemented because city employees work side-by-side with other city employees and with the public. The policy, she said, sets an example. “I am not going to run around and look at people’s cards and make sure that they’ve done this,” she said. “The policy is if you’re a city employee, you’re dealing with the public, you should be vaccinated. That is our policy.” Dr. Patricia Kuszler, who teaches health law at the University of Washington, said it has become common in medical fields for organizations to require nurses, doctors and other providers to be vaccinated. “It makes good public health and medical sense,” she said. Public employers would need to enact a valid regulation to create a requirement, and private employers have a “fair bit” of latitude in what they can require for conditions of employment, Kuszler said, noting a new Delta Air Lines policy that requires new employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Requirements for allowing exemptions for those who are immunosuppressed or for religious or philosophical reasons typically exist for public and private employers, she said.\n\nWest Virginia\n\nShort Gap: A classroom at Frankfort High School is now in quarantine after two students tested positive for the coronavirus. In the release from Mineral County Schools superintendent Troy Ravenscroft, two or more confirmed cases among students and/or adults from separate households but in the same classroom constitute an outbreak. Mineral County has 12 students who have tested positive for the coronavirus, with 24 students and one adult in quarantine. Ravenscroft said despite Gov. Jim Justice’s lifting of outdoor mask requirements and his plan to lift indoor requirements by June 20, Mineral County Schools will continue to require masks and social distancing through the end of the school year.\n\nWisconsin\n\nMadison: The state might not reach herd immunity from COVID-19 until the fall if vaccination rates continue to trend downward, said Department of Health Services Deputy Secretary Julie Willems Van Dijk. She said earlier this spring that 70% of Wisconsin’s population would need to be vaccinated to achieve herd immunity, and that the state could reach that benchmark by July. But vaccination rates have slowed dramatically since then. The health department was seeing daily increases of 1% to 2% in the number of shots administered during the early days of the vaccine rollout in January, February and March, Van Dijk told the Associated Press in an interview last week. Now the department is seeing a 1% increase every week, she said. At this rate it, likely will be fall before the state reaches the 70% mark, she said. As of Thursday, 40% of the state’s eligible population had been fully vaccinated.\n\nWyoming\n\nJackson: Visitation at Yellowstone National Park last month has increased by 40% compared to 2019, an increase of about 19,000 people and a record for the month, park officials said. The park was temporarily closed in April 2020 as the National Park Service determined how to operate during the coronavirus pandemic. Once the park reopened, visitation increased and records were set. Superintendent Cam Sholly predicted the park would be busier early this year based on the inability of tourists to travel internationally as demand for outdoor recreation increased last year, The Billings Gazette reported Friday. The previous high visitation for April was in 2016, when more than 59,000 people visited Yellowstone, officials said.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/05/23"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/50-states/2020/11/17/plasma-shortage-fight-club-pen-pal-programs-news-around-states/114970028/", "title": "Plasma shortage, fight club: News from around our 50 states", "text": "From USA TODAY Network and wire reports\n\nAlabama\n\nMobile: The city is moving ahead with plans to hold Mardi Gras celebrations in early 2021 despite the coronavirus pandemic, which is quickly worsening. Some groups already have called off parades and balls because of concerns about spreading the virus that causes COVID-19, but news outlets report that Mayor Sandy Stimpson’s office has released a memo saying Mardi Gras isn’t being canceled in the port city. Instead, the city is getting ready to issue permits for parades that will wind through downtown streets. Stimpson’s memo, which was released publicly by a City Council member on social media, said the number of people riding on floats will be limited, and participants will need to wear face masks. “This is a fluid situation, and we’re in uncharted waters,” said the note, which also said that organizations which rent city facilities for Mardi Gras balls will be able to cancel events as late as one week beforehand without a penalty.\n\nAlaska\n\nJuneau: The city will receive its own machine to process coronavirus tests starting in December, which should lead to a quicker turnaround time for results. The Juneau Assembly had authorized $700,000 from the federal coronavirus aid fund for testing equipment in June. But with the machines in high demand across the world, the city expected to have to wait until 2021. The new machine will be able to process almost 400 tests every eight hours. That means people should be able to receive same-day or next-day results, KTOO Public Media reports. “Ideally, we will have the staff and supplies in order to process all of our tests that occur in Juneau on the system,” said Emergency Operations Center Planning Chief Robert Barr. Juneau currently conducts roughly 150 to 200 tests a day on average, Barr said. Every test must be flown to a laboratory to be processed. Most results still take two to three days to finalize, KTOO Public Media reports.\n\nArizona\n\nPhoenix: State health officials reported 1,476 new confirmed coronavirus cases Monday but no new deaths. The state Department of Health Services’ latest coronavirus figures showed the number of hospitalizations due to COVID-19 including ventilator use continues to trend upward. The total number of positive cases in Arizona since the pandemic started now stands at 276,912, with the death toll at 6,302. Arizona’s outbreak bottomed out in September but has steadily increased through October and into November. Health officials have said the recent increase is due to factors that include business and school reopenings and public fatigue with precautions such as masking. Warning that conditions likely will get worse due to Thanksgiving family gatherings and other socializing, officials advise against congregating outside households that live together.\n\nArkansas\n\nLittle Rock: A newly formed task force dealing with the coronavirus in Arkansas was set to begin meeting Monday, a day after COVID-19 hospitalizations hit a new record high in the state. Hospitalizations rose to 830 on Sunday, which is a record high for the state since the pandemic began. The state also reported 874 new cases of the virus Sunday, Gov. Asa Hutchinson said. “We had significant testing and lower numbers. This is part of weekend lag, but I am grateful for all who follow the guidelines and are making a difference,” he said. Hutchinson announced the Winter COVID-19 Task Force on Friday, when the state reported a single-day record of 2,312 cases. The task force includes 19 physicians, state officials and health care executives. Hutchinson will serve as the chair of the committee and Arkansas Surgeon General Dr. Greg Bledsoe as vice chair.\n\nCalifornia\n\nSan Diego: Four San Diego County restaurants and gyms that were forced to halt indoor operations beginning Saturday have filed a lawsuit seeking an emergency injunction to halt the shutdown. The lawsuit filed on behalf of all restaurants and gyms came as 11 California counties, including San Diego, were forced to impose stricter limits on businesses after coronavirus cases rose above thresholds established by the state. Under the purple level of the state’s COVID-19 reopening system, restaurants, bars that serve food, gyms, churches and movie theaters are limited to outdoor operations only. The plaintiffs assert that the state and county orders interfere with their rights and violate the California Constitution, the San Diego Union-Tribune reports. They are asking a judge to allow affected businesses to operate indoors under proper sanitation and social distancing protocols, a move they say will “redress the harms suffered by them without undermining the government’s legitimate interest in public health.” A hearing in the lawsuit is scheduled for Tuesday before a San Diego Superior Court judge.\n\nColorado\n\nDenver: The state corrections department would hire a consultant to help it identify and protect medically vulnerable inmates from the coronavirus under a proposed settlement of a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union. The deal, which must be approved by a judge, also requires the state to do several things it already says it is doing, such as providing masks to inmates, conducting wide-scale testing, prioritizing placing those most at risk of being harmed by the coronavirus in single cells, and conducting audits of prisons to ensure compliance with policies aimed at preventing the spread of the virus. However, in the proposed deal filed in Denver District Court, the ACLU says that many of the actions taken by the department have only been partially or sporadically implemented. If the order is signed by a judge, either side would be able to ask the judge to enforce its terms.\n\nConnecticut\n\nHartford: Gov. Ned Lamont has requested that the National Guard be allowed to continue supporting the state’s coronavirus response efforts through the middle of next year. The governor, in a letter to President Donald Trump, also requested that the federal government pick up 100% of the cost of using those troops. The current authorization is scheduled to expire Dec. 31. More than 1,000 members of the Guard have been deployed in Connecticut during the pandemic, performing tasks such as setting up field hospitals, distributing personal protective equipment, assisting in nursing home inspections and helping to run COVID-19 testing sites. Between April 2 and Sept. 30, the federal government picked up the entire cost of those deployments. Since Oct. 1, the state has been responsible for 25% of the cost. The governor’s office said Monday that change is estimated to cost the state $2.5 million during the current authorization.\n\nDelaware\n\nDover: Public health officials on Sunday disclosed that the personal information of thousands of people who were tested for the coronavirus this summer was mistakenly shared with an unauthorized individual. The state’s Division of Public Health said the data breach happened when a temporary staff member sent two unencrypted emails in August that included files with the test results, names, dates of birth and phone numbers of 10,000 people. The files did not include financial information. The emails were meant to be distributed among the employees of a call center who help people obtain their test results, but the temporary agency staffer sent it to an unauthorized user by mistake, officials said. The person who received the emails Aug. 13 and Aug. 20 alerted the division about the error and reported deleting the messages. People with questions can call 1-833-791-1663.\n\nDistrict of Columbia\n\nWashington: The local teachers union and DC Public Schools are one step closer to making it possible for kids to have an in-person learning option even as the pandemic rages on. After months of negotiations, the two sides have reached a tentative deal, WUSA-TV reports. Washington Teachers’ Union President Elizabeth Davis said many of her members were worried. “They were concerned. Many of them work in schools that are 65 and 70 years old, with windows that won’t open, schools that have no central air conditioning. No heating ventilation system that works properly. They had reason to be concerned,” Davis said. A 50-item checklist for safety is part of the tentative deal. Davis said those protocols will get oversight from teachers and parents. She said teachers will be able to opt out of in-person teaching from now until February. After that, they can opt out unless there’s a shortage of staff.\n\nFlorida\n\nSt. Petersburg: State officials reported more than 10,000 new coronavirus cases Sunday – the highest number of daily cases reported since July. According to statistics released from the Florida Department of Health, 885,201 people in the state have contracted the virus. More than 146,000 test results were reported Sunday, which could explain the dramatic rise in positive cases. On Saturday, Florida logged 4,452 new coronavirus cases. The state also tallied another 30 deaths Sunday. Since the start of the pandemic, 17,734 people in Florida have died from the virus. The number of patients being treated for COVID-19 in Florida hospitals has also risen in recent weeks. The state’s online census of hospitals showed numbers hovering between 2,000 and 2,200 for most of last month, but on Sunday, there were 3,118 coronavirus patients in hospitals.\n\nGeorgia\n\nAtlanta: Gov. Brian Kemp announced Friday that he is extending coronavirus-driven social distancing and sanitization restrictions for businesses, gatherings and long-term elderly care facilities in the state. Kemp signed an executive order effective at midnight Sunday and running through the end of the month, leaving the current set of restrictions in place. “As COVID-19 case numbers and hospitalizations rise across the country, (Georgia Commissioner of Public Health) Dr. (Kathleen) Toomey and I are asking Georgians to remain vigilant in our fight against COVID-19,” the governor said. “Continue to wash your hands, wear a mask, watch your distance, follow public health guidance, and get a flu shot. By taking these simple steps, we will protect lives –and livelihoods.” The latest order keeps in place a ban on gatherings larger than 50 people and continues to make wearing a mask voluntary at the statewide level rather than mandatory. Cities and counties have been allowed to impose their own mask mandates since August so long as their local requirements do not apply to businesses and residences.\n\nHawaii\n\nHonolulu: The annual Remembrance Day ceremony to commemorate the attack on Pearl Harbor will be closed to the public this year and streamed online as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. The ceremony will begin at 7:50 a.m. Dec. 7 at the Pearl Harbor National Memorial’s Contemplation Circle in Hawaii. A small number of veterans will be in attendance on site, Hawaii News Now reports. A moment of silence will be observed at 7:55 a.m., the time when the Japanese attack on the American naval base began in 1941. “America’s obligation to honor its veterans has been a sacrosanct pillar of our society, and we encourage everyone to join us virtually for this important ceremony,” said Scott Burch, acting superintendent of Pearl Harbor National Memorial.\n\nIdaho\n\nRexburg: Administrators at nursing homes and assisted living centers have started pen pal programs for their residents to safely interact with others during the coronavirus pandemic. Madison Carriage Cove Activities Director Emily Spencer collected the names of residents who were interested and put out a Facebook call asking people to write them, the Post Register reports. Spencer said five residents had signed up for the program in late August. Ombudsman Tera Fellows, who spends her days talking to people, said the program has spread across the region, and she has started her own as well. Fellows is paid by the state to investigate complaints from patients or residents in long-term care facilities in eastern Idaho. Four of the 36 long-term care facilities across nine eastern Idaho counties in which Fellows works are involved in the pen pal program. “It’s still in the early stages,” Fellows said. “I can’t wait one day to be visiting the patients and ask them face to face if they’re still getting letters.”\n\nIllinois\n\nSpringfield: The Illinois Department of Public Health on Sunday reported 10,631 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 in the state and 72 confirmed new deaths. With the latest announced number, Illinois has reported 573,616 cases of COVID-19, including 10,742 deaths. The latest confirmed and probable cases were the result of 84,831 tests administered over 24 hours. The seven-day statewide test positivity rate is 14.8%. As of late Saturday, 5,474 people in Illinois were reported hospitalized with COVID-19. Of those, 1,045 patients were in intensive care units, and 490 patients with the coronavirus were on ventilators. The latest numbers come after Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Friday ordered an extension of several of coronavirus-related executive orders for another 30 days, including an extension of a moratorium on evictions. State officials also released data covering the period from Aug. 1 to Nov. 7 showing Illinois is short of its goal of launching contact tracing for 90% of cases.\n\nIndiana\n\nTerre Haute: The Vigo County Health Department is pleading with the community to take coronavirus precautions seriously after county officials announced they’ve rented four refrigerated semitrailers to store bodies of COVID-19 decedents. With some funeral homes in the area already becoming “overrun with bodies,” health department administrator Joni Wise said there aren’t enough places to put them. “We have to have some place for mass casualties to go, and this is one of those situations that is going to get worse before it gets better,” Wise said Thursday in a video statement. Community spread of COVID-19 continues to increase in Vigo County, said County Commissioner Brendan Kearns. Gatherings at bars, restaurants and similar venues continue to be a main source of virus transmission. “People are not wearing masks,” Kearns said in the video statement. “The hospitals are already pretty much at capacity … they’re busting at the seams … employees are stressed out. This is overwhelming the community.”\n\nIowa\n\nDes Moines: Eight labor and civil rights groups filed a federal complaint Friday alleging the state has failed to protect workers in meatpacking, dairy, construction, transportation, health care facilities, nursing homes and other industries. The complaint filed with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration office in Kansas City seeks a full investigation and corrective action by the federal government. While it cites several examples of alleged failure of Iowa OSHA to do on-site inspections or investigate unsafe conditions related to the coronavirus pandemic, the groups say Iowa work safety issues go beyond coronavirus problems. Gov. Kim Reynolds is supportive of the work Iowa OSHA has done and “believes any federal review would find Iowa OSHA has followed all guidance to protect Iowa workers throughout this pandemic,” said spokesman Pat Garrett.\n\nKansas\n\nTopeka: Counties that require masks saw about half as many new coronavirus infections as counties that don’t mandate face coverings, a study found, as cases statewide surged again to record levels. “Do Masks Matter in Kansas” produced by the Institute for Policy and Social Research at the University of Kansas found that counties that require masks saw a decrease in their seven-day rolling average of daily cases per 100,000 population starting 14 days after the mandate was issued. “Masks, it is important to note, do not eliminate COVID, but they significantly slow the spread of the disease – at least here in Kansas,” said Donna K. Ginther, the institute’s director, in a video presenting the study’s findings. The Institute for Policy and Social Research at the University of Kansas has been tracking the impact of COVID-19 on the state, The Kansas City Star reports. “We found a 50% reduction in the spread of COVID-19 in counties that had a mask mandate compared to those without,” Ginther said.\n\nKentucky\n\nLouisville: The state again recorded a record-high weekly total of new coronavirus cases, with 1,449 additional cases and three more deaths reported Sunday. The state has set weekly records over the past month, with the rate for positive tests also increasing, sitting at 8.88% on Sunday. Kentucky passed its daily record three times last week, reporting 3,303 new cases Saturday. “Coronavirus is present in every corner of the commonwealth, and it’s spreading at a truly alarming rate,” Gov. Andy Beshear said in a statement. “This is not a drill; this is a health emergency that we all need to take seriously. Let’s come together as Team Kentucky to defeat this virus.” Dr. Steven Stack, the state’s public health commissioner, reminded people to maintain social distance, wear a mask and wash hands often. “Kentucky’s state motto is ‘United We Stand, Divided We Fall.’ This motto has never been more applicable than now, as we fight the most deadly pandemic in over 100 years,” Stack said in a statement. “Unless Kentuckians come together, we will continue on this dangerous trajectory with disastrous consequences.”\n\nLouisiana\n\nLafayette: Acadiana’s elected leaders leaned on the region’s medical community to lead efforts to prevent a third COVID-19 wave Thursday, with Lafayette Mayor-President Josh Guillory calling on them to do more to avoid the need for economic restrictions. During a conference call with parish leaders, Regional Medical Director Dr. Tina Stefanski warned that Acadiana is experiencing a growth in new coronavirus cases and in hospitalizations for the virus, similar to the increase seen in the run-up to the summer’s massive wave of cases and hospitalized COVID-19 patients. Stefanski blamed the increase on risky behavior and fatigue with COVID-19 mitigation measures, reinforcing the need for everyone to adhere to social distancing guidelines, the state’s mask mandate and good hand hygiene in what she called a “pivotal, pivotal” moment in the virus’s trajectory locally. St. Martin Parish President Chester Cedars agreed that people have stopped following COVID-19 protocols and asked Stefanski to coordinate with local health care providers to make another plea with the public to use the mitigation measures.\n\nMaine\n\nPortland: The organizers of an annual holiday tree and wreath festival have decided to cancel the event this year because of the rise in coronavirus cases in the state. The Midcoast Tree Festival has been postponed to 2021. The event had been scheduled to start Friday. “It just isn’t responsible to hold a major event that will bring hundreds and possibly thousands of people to one location before sending them off to their family Thanksgiving meals and holiday gatherings,” Southern Midcoast Maine Chamber Executive Director Cory King said. The festival is a joint fundraising event between the chamber and other organizations that involves crafts, food and entertainment in addition to the trees and wreaths. The latest average coronavirus positivity rate in Maine is 2.14%. The seven-day rolling average of the positivity rate has risen over the past two weeks from 1.05% on Nov. 1 to 2.14% on Sunday. State authorities said the state surpassed 9,000 reported coronavirus cases Monday.\n\nMaryland\n\nBaltimore: Drivers have become more aggressive during the pandemic. And the proof is in Baltimore County. The Baltimore Sun reports citations from speed ticket cameras in the county are on track to set a record. Officials say people drove faster this year as more people stayed home because of the pandemic. The county has seen a 10% increase in speed camera violations so far in 2020. It issued more than 180,000 citations between January and Oct. 13. The same period last year saw 164,000 citations. At the same time, revenue from speed cameras rose by nearly 38%. And more than $4.56 million in speeding fines was collected compared to $3.31 million. The city of Baltimore also saw a rise in citations, although not as high. Citations were up by 7% by more than 500,000 through September. Those citations generated more than $12 million in revenue.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nBoston: The city is offering more help to local small businesses struggling to stay viable amid the pandemic. Mayor Marty Walsh on Friday announced three new relief funds totaling $6.3 million. One will provide up to $15,000 to small businesses that are struggling to pay their rent. Another will make $15,000 grants available to businesses owned by minorities, women or veterans. The third will offer grants to restaurants to enable them to retain or rehire employees. Since the start of the pandemic, the city has set aside more than $15 million in total to help businesses survive the economic downturn caused by the pandemic. Massachusetts hit 10,015 confirmed coronavirus deaths Thursday, nearly nine months after the state’s initial case was detected. Confirmed cases have topped 174,000, and the number of cities and towns designated as “high risk” nearly doubled over a two-week period last month.\n\nMichigan\n\nLansing: Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said Monday that she has the authority to issue a second stay-at-home order to curb the spiking coronavirus if necessary and called a comment by an adviser to President Donald Trump urging people to “rise up” against Michigan’s latest restrictions “incredibly reckless.” The Democratic governor spoke with Capitol reporters a day after announcing limits amid a surge of COVID-19 cases that has led to increased hospitalizations and deaths. She has urged the public to “double down” with precautions to avoid a shelter-in-place order like what was instituted in the spring. Under the restrictions that start Wednesday, Michigan high schools and colleges must halt in-person classes, restaurants must stop indoor dining, and entertainment businesses such as casinos, movie theaters and bowling alleys must close for three weeks. Gathering sizes also will be tightened. Whitmer called it a “targeted approach” informed by epidemiologists and public health experts. She renewed her call for the Republican-led Legislature to codify a mask requirement in law in part to send a unified message to the public.\n\nMinnesota\n\nMinneapolis: Democratic state senators are calling on Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka to resign from his leadership post after Senate Republicans failed to notify their Democratic colleagues, nonpartisan staff and Capitol security of a potential COVID-19 outbreak among GOP ranks in advance of a special session last week. Senate Minority Leader Susan Kent called on Gazelka to step down Sunday, hours after he disclosed he tested positive for the coronavirus. Kent said GOP gatherings led to an outbreak, and the information wasn’t shared, and there is still uncertainty about who was exposed. Gazelka did not immediately return a message seeking comment Monday. In a statement Sunday, he said he has been in quarantine since he began experiencing symptoms Nov. 9 and “will remain in quarantine as long as my doctor advises me to.” Gazelka is in Florida and said he did not attend the Legislature’s special session Thursday.\n\nMississippi\n\nJackson: Officials have identified an outbreak at a prison in the Mississippi Delta in which more than 50 inmates have tested positive for the coronavirus. The Mississippi Department of Corrections and the Mississippi State Department of Health confirm the outbreak occurred at the Marshall County Correctional Facility in Holly Springs. The facility is operated by private prison management group Management & Training Corporation of Centerville, Utah. Marshall County borders the Mississippi-Tennessee state line and the greater Memphis metropolitan area. Dr. Raman Singh, medical director for the correction department’s medical provider, VitalCore Health Strategies, said three inmates in the prison’s 959-inmate population became symptomatic last week and tested positive last Monday. Singh said the facility began contact tracing and identified 109 inmates who were either living in the area of the three positive inmates or had contact with them. He said most of the affected inmates are asymptomatic, with just a few showing mild symptoms.\n\nMissouri\n\nSt. Louis: The number of coronavirus cases continues to steadily increase across the state, and hospitalizations remain at a high level. The state reported 3,729 new virus cases Sunday for a total of 239,451 cases. The number of deaths increased by one to 3,374. The number of people hospitalized with the virus dipped Sunday to 2,447 from the previous day’s record of 2,523, but hospitalizations have doubled in the past month, and capacity is strained in parts of the state. In the St. Louis area, BJC HealthCare and Washington University Physicians announced plans Sunday to suspend some elective surgeries to preserve hospital space for COVID-19 patients. Local health officials have urged Gov. Mike Parson to impose tougher restrictions to limit the spread of the virus, but he has resisted requiring masks and largely left it up to local officials to impose restrictions. The seven-day rolling average of daily new cases in Missouri has nearly doubled over the past two weeks from 2,247.71 new cases per day Oct. 31 to 4,379.43 new cases per day Saturday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.\n\nMontana\n\nBozeman: Hundreds of Montanans who received Pandemic Unemployment Assistance payments have been asked to pay back the Montana Department of Labor and Industry – some receiving bills for over $10,000 – because of a federal change to how a person is deemed eligible for the money. Roughly 21,000 Montanans received at least one payment between March and November from the PUA program, a program created by congressional coronavirus relief legislation to distribute unemployment funds to people not eligible for regular unemployment, such as gig workers or people who are self-employed. As of last Tuesday, the state labor department had identified 8,802 issues on accounts that will require repayment, according to department spokesperson Lauren Lewis. At least 816 people have received full denial and have been asked to pay back benefits in full.\n\nNebraska\n\nOmaha: A group of about 35 people gathered outside a grocery store in southwest Omaha on Saturday to protest against the city’s mask mandate. The group originally planned to stage a mask-less shopping trip at the Hy-Vee grocery store, but the event turned into an outdoor march after the grocer worked with Omaha police to keep the protest out of the store. Omaha police said they would have officers at the store who would ticket people who tried to violate the city’s indoor mask requirement. Allie French said the group modified its plan after the backlash against it. French and other protesters gathered in front of the grocery store Saturday with signs and flags. Two police cars were parked among the group, and multiple officers stood at the entrance of the Hy-Vee along with several employees. Grace Willett attended the protest with her husband and 2-year-old daughter to take a stand for individual freedom. “It’s about standing up for our medical freedom to choose whether or not we wear a mask,” Willett said. “I’m fine with other people wearing a mask if they want to, but I think that we should all have the choice.”\n\nNevada\n\nLas Vegas: The city’s annual fireworks show on New Year’s Eve is canceled this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, officials said. The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority said in a statement that it would cancel its annual fireworks show Dec. 31. “Las Vegas has always been a bucket list New Year’s Eve destination, and we are going to make sure that remains the case – celebrating putting 2020 in the rear-view mirror in an ‘Only Vegas’ way,” Authority CEO Steve Hill said. “But as we have said throughout the year, the safety and security of our guests and employees is our top priority, and with that in mind, we will not have a fireworks show on December 31st.” Hill said the city will still “have some special things planned to welcome 2021 with the hope and promise it brings.” Individual hotels and casinos are free to launch their own fireworks independently.\n\nNew Hampshire\n\nConcord: The coronavirus pandemic has underscored the importance of building a system of care that strengthens families and prevents child abuse, neglect and delinquency, according to the head of a watchdog office for the state’s child welfare system. Moira O’Neill, director of the Office of the Child Advocate, said she sees parallels between the experience of living through a pandemic and living as a child in out-of-home care. “The stress and uncertainty we all feel under pandemic restrictions teaches us what children feel when placed away from home,” she wrote in an annual report released Friday. “They never really know when they will go home, if they will go home, or who will be there for them. This may be the greatest lesson of the pandemic.” O’Neill said the Division for Children, Youth and Families has forged partnerships to create new paths to supports and services during the pandemic, many of which are better than previous options. But she said there is an urgent need to implement the expansion of the entire system of care that was authorized in legislation a year and a half ago.\n\nNew Jersey\n\nTrenton: Gov. Phil Murphy said he will be reducing indoor and outdoor gathering limits because of the COVID-19 resurgence. The Democrat said Monday at a news conference that he will order the maximum number of people at indoor gatherings to fall from 25 to 10 and outdoor get-togethers from 500 to 150 people. The new indoor limit goes into effect Tuesday, while the outdoor level kicks in Nov. 23. The lower levels come just before Thanksgiving and ahead of the winter holidays. Murphy said he understood the new limits would lead to frustration, but little about this year has been normal. “I must again pull back the reins,” he said. “It gives me no joy.” New Jersey’s coronavirus levels have been spiking, which Murphy has said amounts to a “second wave.” There are some exceptions to the limits, the governor said. Among them are religious services, political activities and weddings. Murphy said the tighter limits are aimed at limiting house parties, which he said contribute to climbing COVID-19 rates.\n\nNew Mexico\n\nAlbuquerque: The state started its lockdown Monday as Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham and hospital administrators look to curb coronavirus infections. Under the latest public health order, people are being asked to stay home, and only essential businesses such as grocery stores, pharmacies, big box retailers, hardware stores, auto and bicycle repair shops, and other necessary operations will be open. Universities are transitioning back to full online classes, while many municipal and state government offices are closed to walk-in requests. Also as a result of the restrictions, Virgin Galactic said plans for the first space test flight from southern New Mexico will be pushed back. The company had announced recently that the window for the test flight would begin Nov. 19. Virgin Galactic CEO Michael Colglazier said in a statement that the company’s operations at Spaceport America will be minimized to the greatest degree possible in accordance with the public health order. New Mexico has been struggling with high case counts and deaths. On Sunday, the number of hospitalizations due to the virus surpassed 500, marking a first since the pandemic began.\n\nNew York\n\nNew York: The city’s sheriff’s deputies have stayed busy enforcing coronavirus rules, clamping down on several big, underground night spots over the weekend, including a fight club in the Bronx that drew as many as 200 people. Deputy New York City sheriffs enforcing COVID-19 crowd limits broke up an amateur fight night event late Friday in a warehouse. The unsanctioned fight would have been illegal even before the coronavirus pandemic but risked becoming a public health threat as infections rise around the state. The size of the crowd far exceeded the state’s limit on nonessential gatherings of 10 people, authorities said. Across New York, the virus continued to claim victims at a rate unseen since the spring. Nearly 2,000 people were hospitalized with COVID-19 as of Sunday, the state announced. That’s the most since early June, up from a low of 410 on Sept. 5. Over the past seven days, the state has averaged 4,500 positive tests per day. New York’s hospitals and nursing homes have reported 185 deaths over the past seven days.\n\nNorth Carolina\n\nRaleigh: The state’s depositories for old government and academic records, maps, books and genealogical materials have reopened to the public at reduced capacity after being closed for months due to the COVID-19 pandemic. State Archives public research locations in Raleigh and Manteo and the State Library of North Carolina in Raleigh planned to welcome visitors by appointment starting last Thursday, with the Western Regional Archives in Asheville following Friday. Guests must set up formal appointments online and are required to wear face masks inside. Public computer terminals there will also be closed. State archivists and librarians also urged people to check their agencies’ websites to determine whether research questions or access could be handled online.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nBismarck: Health officials on Monday reported a new high in the number of hospitalizations due to COVID-19, following a weekend in which the state enacted new measures in an effort to help slow the spread of the coronavirus. Gov. Doug Burgum announced the restrictions, including ordering the use of face coverings, late Friday. They went into effect Saturday and are set to remain in place until Dec. 13. Meanwhile, the number of virus patients in medical facilities rose by 10 on Monday, to 332. North Dakota has continued to rank first in the country for new cases per capita in the past two weeks. One in every 80 people in the state tested positive in the past week, according to Johns Hopkins University researchers. A weekend count of available staffed hospital beds in the state showed 11 in intensive care units and 181 in inpatient rooms.\n\nOhio\n\nColumbus: The state reported 7,853 new coronavirus cases Sunday, down for the second straight day from a record 8,071 on Friday. The pace of new cases has been accelerating in Ohio, increasing from an average of about 1,000 per day in mid-September to the record-busting counts over the past week. While cases again ticked down Sunday, they still sat well above the 21-day average of 4,761. Another 189 people were hospitalized, and eight more had died from the coronavirus as of Saturday, the state reported. The positivity rate was down slightly to 11.9% on Friday, the most recent day for which data was available. Since the start of the pandemic, Ohio has reported 298,096 cases, and 5,722 people have died from the virus. A total of 22,265 have been hospitalized with COVID-19, and 4,204 were admitted to intensive care units.\n\nOklahoma\n\nOklahoma City: Gov. Kevin Stitt on Monday announced new restrictions as the numbers of COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations surge across the state. In a news conference, Stitt announced new mandates to limit bar and restaurant capacity in an attempt to reduce the spread of the coronavirus. Effective Thursday, bars and restaurants must close by 11 p.m., except for to-go and drive-thru orders. Restaurants will also have to space out all tables 6 feet apart. Asked about whether he considered limiting capacity in bars in restaurants instead of the requirement that seating be spaced out, Stitt said limiting capacity could be difficult because businesses vary in size. Stitt also announced that all state employees and visitors to state facilities will be required to wear masks. The mask mandate for state employees will take effect Wednesday. There are roughly 33,000 state employees, Stitt said.\n\nOregon\n\nPortland: State health officials reported 868 new confirmed or presumptive cases of COVID-19 on Sunday and two more deaths. The state is experiencing a spike in coronavirus infections and has reached record-high positivity rates and hospitalizations in November. Oregon has surpassed 1,000 cases a day twice this month. The state total was 56,880 cases Sunday. The two new deaths were those of an 81-year-old man and a 66-year-old woman, both in Umatilla County. On Friday, Gov. Kate Brown announced a two-week “freeze” of new restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of the disease. Restaurants and bars will be limited to takeout only, and there will be closures of gyms and indoor and outdoor recreational facilities. The freeze will take effect starting Wednesday and running at least through Dec. 2.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nPhiladelphia: The city is banning indoor dining at restaurants and indoor gatherings of any size, public or private, as it battles a resurgence of the coronavirus, officials announced Monday. The city also plans to shutter gyms, museums and libraries, prohibit in-person instruction at colleges and high schools, and reduce occupancy at stores and religious institutions, the health commissioner, Dr. Thomas Farley, said at a news conference Monday. The new restrictions take effect Friday and extend at least through the end of the year. The Philadelphia school district had planned to start returning K-12 students to the classroom but said last week that schools will remain virtual for the foreseeable future in light of the explosion in cases. City officials said dramatic action is needed to respond to an exponential growth in cases and hospitalizations. The state is reporting an average of 4,900 new infections per day, up nearly 120% in two weeks, according to an Associated Press analysis of data from the COVID Tracking Project. The daily death toll has nearly doubled in that period, to about 42 per day, though it remains far below what it was last spring. Hospitalizations and the percentage of virus tests are also up sharply.\n\nRhode Island\n\nWarwick: A state-run psychiatric hospital is dealing with a “significant” coronavirus outbreak caused in part by employees showing up to work sick, authorities said. The outbreak includes a dozen staff members and six patients, according to an email sent to staff Friday by Brian Daly, the chief medical officer at Eleanor Slater Hospital in Cranston, and obtained by The Providence Journal. Randal Edgar, a spokesperson for the state Department of Behavioral Healthcare, Developmental Disabilities and Hospitals, which oversees the hospital, said in an email to the Associated Press on Monday that the newspaper’s report was accurate but did not provide additional details or updates. “The most troubling information we uncovered in doing contact tracing is that some staff members worked even while they had significant symptoms of cold or flu-like illness,” Daly’s email said. “This means that they signed the attestation we all sign every day saying they did not have these symptoms when they did.”\n\nSouth Carolina\n\nColumbia: With Thanksgiving and Christmas on the horizon, state health officials are urging people to get tested for the coronavirus before gathering for the holidays, to wear masks whenever they aren’t eating, and to celebrate outside if possible. But so far, health officials aren’t forcefully suggesting people skip holiday celebrations altogether. “We recognize that the holiday season is a sacred time, and we encourage South Carolinians to avoid indoor gatherings and maintain their commitment to activities that reduce the spread of COVID-19,” the state Department of Health and Environmental Control said in a statement Monday. Since the coronavirus pandemic started, South Carolina leaders have placed more emphasis on personal responsibility, such as encouraging people to wear masks, than government edicts such as mask requirements. “Those decisions are best made at the local level,” Gov. Henry McMaster said Thursday, saying local governments better know their businesses, compliance with the commonsense rules and their capacity to enforce mask rules.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nSioux Falls: City Council members who pushed for a coronavirus mask mandate that failed to pass last week plan to give it another try as the state continues to be a hot spot for COVID-19. The mask ordinance is on the agenda for the council’s meeting Tuesday, as well as one that would place limits on the number of people allowed in local businesses. The mask ordinance is largely similar to the one that was voted down by Mayor Paul TenHaken following a 4-4 tie Nov. 10. And the second ordinance would place restrictions on businesses similar to those that were in place in May before they were repealed. The COVID Tracking Project said Sunday that there were nearly 2,062 new cases per 100,000 people in South Dakota over the past two weeks, which ranks second in the country behind North Dakota for new cases per capita. One in every 86 people in South Dakota tested positive in the past week.\n\nTennessee\n\nNashville: Vanderbilt University announced Monday that the school will limit attendance for the final two home games of the football season to families of student-athletes and a group of other students due to concerns about the coronavirus. A specified number of graduate and professional students will be able to attend the games, which will be held Saturday and on Nov. 28, but fans and other Vanderbilt students won’t be allowed in, the university’s athletics program said in a news release. The majority of the school’s undergraduate body will leave the campus Friday, when in-person classes for the semester are scheduled to end. The school said it is also planning to begin its basketball season without spectators at the games. “Similar to our approach with fall sports, we owe it to ourselves, our student-athletes’ families and our fans to gather as much information as possible and understand all aspects of what a basketball game day looks like during this pandemic before determining our fan attendance policies,” Vice Chancellor for Athletics & University Affairs Candice Lee said in the news release.\n\nTexas\n\nAustin: The state surpassed 20,000 confirmed coronavirus deaths Monday, as COVID-19 continues to surge in the United States. That is the second-highest death count overall in the U.S., trailing only New York, according to researchers from Johns Hopkins University. It’s the 22nd-highest per capita at 69.7 deaths per 100,000 people. So far, Texas leaders have given no indication of forthcoming restrictions to keep people from gathering and spreading the virus. Instead, Republican Gov. Greg Abbott in recent days has been emphasizing that new therapeutics and vaccines are expected to become available soon. A state appeals court last week sided with Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton and lifted a local shutdown order in El Paso, where mobile morgues are being trucked in to help overwhelmed hospitals and funeral homes. The El Paso county morgue reached out to the El Paso Sheriff’s Department for help after it became “overwhelmed,” according to El Paso Sheriff’s Department Public Affairs Director Chris Acosta. Inmates of the county’s detention facility “were asked to help for a stipend of $2 an hour,” Acosta said in a statement.\n\nUtah\n\nOrem: The City Council has passed an ordinance outlawing demonstrations targeting homes following a protest outside the governor’s private residence. The Orem City Council passed the ordinance Friday after a protest targeted the private home of Republican Gov. Gary Herbert, KSTU-TV reports. The demonstration followed the announcement of a statewide mask mandate issued last week in an attempt to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Protests must remain at least 100 feet from the property line of any residence, with violations to be charged as misdemeanors. “The public health and welfare and the good order of the community require that citizens enjoy in their homes and neighborhoods a feeling of well-being, tranquility, and privacy, and enjoy freedom from being a captive audience to unwanted speech in their homes,” the ordinance said.\n\nVermont\n\nMontpelier: The state will start testing K-12 teachers and staff for COVID-19 starting this week as a strategy that health officials hope will help to track the spread of the coronavirus in communities. Teachers and school staff are not at a higher risk of contracting the illness caused by the virus, but they “represent a large group of individuals in an organized setting” and could help the state better identify cases before an outbreak, Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine said this week. The tests will be given voluntarily starting this week and resume monthly after the Thanksgiving holiday break. Those who are tested will not be required to quarantine while awaiting their results. “Testing of school personnel is a public health surveillance strategy,” Levine said. The state reported 94 new cases Saturday, while the number of deaths remained at 59. The seven-day rolling average of daily new cases in Vermont has risen over the past two weeks from 20 new cases per day Oct. 30 to 60 new cases per day Friday.\n\nVirginia\n\nRichmond: State lawmakers were feuding Monday after Democratic House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn announced plans for that chamber to again conduct its work remotely because of the coronavirus pandemic when it convenes in January. Shortly after the speaker’s office made the announcement, House and Senate Republican leaders said they would use a procedural move to limit the 2021 session to 30 days, rather than the typical, longer session Filler-Corn said she expected. Such a move could hinder the breadth of what Democrats, who have a narrow majority in both chambers and Ralph Northam in the governor’s mansion, are able to address. “I think it’s extremely disappointing that the Republicans would use this moment – a time when we should be helping Virginians through this pandemic -– to exercise their limited power to cut the planned 45-day legislative session short,” Filler-Corn said in an interview. The Republicans said that given the lengthy special session that concluded earlier this month, during which lawmakers approved a new state budget and passed a host of major new criminal justice reforms, 30 days should be sufficient time to complete the year’s work. The 100-member House also conducted its work virtually during the special session.\n\nWashington\n\nSeattle: A long-term care facility reported 94 people have tested positive for the coronavirus since late October, its second outbreak since the pandemic began. Snohomish Health District spokeswoman Heather Thomas confirmed that 53 residents and 41 staff members at Josephine Caring Community in Stanwood have contracted the virus, The Seattle Times reports. It is unclear how many people have been hospitalized. Thomas said in an email over the weekend that at least “a few” were taken to the hospital and that she didn’t know of any deaths. It’s the second outbreak connected to the facility about 50 miles north of Seattle. In the first, the facility reported a handful of infections in March, which grew to at least 34 cases, including six deaths as of April 17. Long-term care facilities account for about 1% of the U.S. population but represent 40% of COVID-19 deaths, according to the COVID Tracking Project.\n\nWest Virginia\n\nCharleston: There were 107 active known cases of the coronavirus among inmates at a federal correctional institution last week. Gilmer County Health Department announced the numbers Wednesday. The county of about 8,500 in central West Virginia has two other active cases. The federal facility has nearly 1,300 inmates. Among state-owned correctional facilities, the largest outbreak among inmates is at McDowell County Corrections, where there are 40 active cases, the state reported Thursday. An additional 40 state correctional employees have the coronavirus overall across over two dozen facilities.\n\nWisconsin\n\nMilwaukee: There is a critical need for blood plasma from recovered coronavirus patients in the state, according to officials. Convalescent plasma has been shown to be effective in treating the most seriously ill coronavirus patients, but the demand is far greater than the supply. Versiti Blood Center of Wisconsin’s chief medical officer, Dr. Thomas Abshire, said the need for convalescent plasma in Wisconsin is about double the number of donors giving plasma. Advocate Health Care transplant director Dr. Ajay Sahajpal said Wisconsin has already needed to import plasma from other states, but that might not continue as the shortage of donors continues elsewhere. “For convalescent plasma, specifically, it’s a critical shortage,” he said. Sahajpal said he is worried that as the holidays approach, fewer people will donate blood, which could lead to a crisis across several medical fronts. Saphajpal said plasma and coagulation products, which cause the blood to clot, are being rationed, even for patients in intensive-care units, some with liver failure and those awaiting transplants.\n\nWyoming\n\nJackson: County officials have said residents could see tighter coronavirus safety measures, including limits on further gatherings, as cases surge. Currently, state coronavirus health orders prohibit gatherings of more than 50 people. Republican Gov. Mark Gordon said Friday that more restrictive health orders could be implemented. But Teton County District Health Officer Dr. Travis Riddell said he felt it was time to take more drastic action now, the Jackson Hole News & Guide reports. “I’m not willing to wait,” Riddell said. “These cases have totally overwhelmed the capacity of our state and local health departments.” The request will next need approval from state health officer Dr. Alexia Harrist, who has granted other variances. The Wyoming Department of Health reported Teton County, which includes Jackson, has had 41 newly confirmed COVID-19 cases, increasing its active total to 175 as of Friday.\n\nFrom USA TODAY Network and wire reports", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/11/17"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/50-states/2021/01/07/drive-lawmaking-masked-mardi-gras-virtual-farm-show-news-around-states/115265388/", "title": "Drive-in lawmaking, masked Mardi Gras: News from around our 50 ...", "text": "From USA TODAY Network and wire reports\n\nAlabama\n\nTuscaloosa: The University of Alabama is requiring that students who will live on campus for the spring 2021 semester must be tested for coronavirus, officials said. The tests must happen within seven days of their arrival, no later than Jan. 19. The spring semester will begin Jan. 13. The university will offer free testing, or students can choose to get tested before returning to Tuscaloosa. Test results are expected to be provided within 24 hours to three days. The spring reentry testing is only required for those living on campus, including in residence halls and fraternity and sorority houses. In addition to reentry testing, the university is continuing to conduct a variety of testing for all students, including sentinel, for-cause, exposure and symptomatic testing. More details about the testing can be found on the university’s website.\n\nAlaska\n\nAnchorage: Residents 65 and over will be able to start receiving COVID-19 vaccinations next week, state health officials said. The Department of Health and Social Services announced that people in that age group can start scheduling appointments Wednesday on the state’s vaccine website, the Anchorage Daily News reports. People were asked to choose appointments for Monday or later, officials said. Alaska last month received more than 60,000 doses of COVID-19 vaccine produced by Pfizer and Moderna and expects almost 53,000 additional doses this month. Health care workers were the first eligible to get the vaccine. A state allocation committee determined last week that people 65 and older would make up the next phase of recipients. But state officials had said the vaccine would not be available to the more than 90,000 Alaskans in that group until late this month. Gov. Mike Dunleavy announced the new timeline for seniors’ vaccinations at a presentation Monday to the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce, saying people over 65 are among the groups hardest hit by the coronavirus.\n\nArizona\n\nPhoenix: The state on Wednesday reported a triple-digit number of additional COVID-19 deaths for the second day in a row along with more than 7,200 additional known cases and another record high of virus-related hospitalizations. Arizona has the worst coronavirus diagnosis rate in the country, with 1 of every 119 people in the state being diagnosed in the past week. According to the state coronavirus dashboard, Arizona had a record 4,877 COVID-19 patients occupying hospital beds as of Tuesday. The Department of Health Services reported 127 additional deaths and 7,206 cases, increasing the state’s totals since the pandemic began to 574,680 cases and 9,444 deaths. Meanwhile, a group of Tucson bars on Tuesday filed a lawsuit seeking to overturn Pima County’s mandatory 10 p.m. curfew as unconstitutional, discriminatory and ineffective at combating the spread of COVID-19, the Arizona Daily Star reports. And the Arizona National Guard has begun training retired medical professionals and current medical students who have volunteered to support COVID-19 vaccination sites statewide.\n\nArkansas\n\nLittle Rock: The state on Tuesday adjusted its rollout of the COVID-19 vaccine as the number of coronavirus patients in Arkansas hospitals continued hitting record levels. Gov. Asa Hutchinson said the state will move police, firefighters and other first responders to the first phase of vaccines being administered. Hutchinson said the state is also adjusting the second phase to include people 70 and older, rather than the original plan that called for people 75 and older. Hutchinson said the plan is to administer the vaccine to those in the first phase, which also includes health care workers and nursing home residents and staff, by the end of January before moving on to the next phase. The state’s virus cases rose by 4,107, its second-highest single-day jump. The number of people hospitalized because of COVID-19 rose by 27 to a new high of 1,323. Thirty-six more people died from COVID-19, bringing the state’s total fatalities to 3,836. “What we are seeing now is what I and all of us have warned about, and that is a surge on top of a surge,” Dr. Jose Romero, the state’s health secretary, said at a news conference. “How much of the second surge we have on top of that first surge is unknown.”\n\nCalifornia\n\nLos Angeles: The state is so swamped by the coronavirus pandemic that it has ordered hospitals with room to accept patients from others that have maxed out on intensive care beds. The public health order issued late Tuesday is the latest attempt by California authorities to confront a surge in coronavirus infections and hospitalizations, a deteriorating situation that could worsen before it gets better, as gatherings during the recent holidays could accelerate cases. The order, which will last three weeks, could result in patients being shipped to Northern California from Southern California and the agricultural San Joaquin Valley, where 14 counties were immediately ordered to delay nonessential “and non-life-threatening” surgeries in order to provide beds. The directive also applies to any county where ICU capacity to treat COVID-19 patients is bottoming out. “If we continue to see an alarming increase of COVID-19 patient admissions at hospitals statewide, some facilities may not be able to provide the critical and necessary care Californians need, whether those patients have COVID-19 or another medical condition,” said Dr. Tomás J. Aragón, the state’s public health officer.\n\nColorado\n\nDenver: The Colorado Department of Transportation estimates it will receive $150 million from the coronavirus pandemic relief bill Congress passed late last year. The state Transportation Commission on Monday approved a proposal to spend the stimulus money on more than a dozen projects, Colorado Public Radio reports. The funding includes $9.7 million for new noise walls along Interstate 25 in the Denver area and $25.5 million for a grade-separated interchange in Colorado Springs. The projects are meant to take a “meaningful bite” out of the transportation department’s 10-year plan, Executive Director Shoshana Lew said. “We’re not trying to do everything because we just can’t,” Lew said Monday. Planned improvements also include repairs to U.S. 50 between Grand Junction and Delta, a new transit hub at I-25 near Berthoud and repaving projects on rural roads statewide. There is also expected to be $2 million set aside for the department’s Revitalizing Main Streets program, which has helped cities create pandemic-era public spaces such as car-free streets.\n\nConnecticut\n\nHartford: Greeted by hundreds of protesters, lawmakers on Wednesday officially convened what will be a highly unusual and possibly contentious legislative session that’s expected to mostly take place in the virtual world because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite the extraordinary circumstances, Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont urged the General Assembly during a pretaped address not to allow COVID-19 to place limitations on this session. While Democrats, who control the House of Representatives and Senate, appeared to agree with Lamont’s optimism, the two top Republican leaders were less enthusiastic about taking on major issues outside of the budget and the pandemic, especially since members of the public will have limited ability to express their views to lawmakers. Beginning Thursday, legislative committees will meet on Zoom and YouTube. The Capitol has been closed to the general public since March. Many of the protesters Wednesday voiced concern about a legislative effort to eliminate the religious exemption from required vaccinations for schoolchildren. Some held signs that read, “God is my scientist,” “Let me call the shots,” and “My body, my choice.”\n\nDelaware\n\nDover: Democratic Gov. John Carney is urging public school officials to resume hybrid instruction mixing both remote and in-person learning next week after recommending last month that classroom instruction be put on hold because of the coronavirus. Carney, joined by Director of Public Health Dr. Karyl Rattay and Education Secretary Susan Bunting, sent an open letter to school leaders, teachers and parents urging the resumption of hybrid instruction starting next Monday. That decision came just days after Carney continued to maintain schools were “safe places” and should continue using a hybrid approach of in-person and virtual classroom instruction. “As we have said many times, we do not believe there is a public health reason to close schools,” Tuesday’s letter said. “We have spent the past four weeks helping schools try to address the operational challenges they are experiencing. And we can all agree that students learn best when they’re in school. In addition to the more robust and engaging instruction that in-person learning allows, many students rely on schools for meals, counseling, and social and emotional support.”\n\nDistrict of Columbia\n\nWashington: D.C. reported 316 new cases of the coronavirus and five new deaths Wednesday, WUSA-TV reports. It was the first time in two weeks the city had reported more than 300 cases in a single day, with the average having hovered around 250 new cases and four deaths per day.\n\nFlorida\n\nFort Lauderdale: About 1,700 South Florida teachers who have been working remotely during the coronavirus pandemic have been ordered to return to their campuses when the spring semester begins next Monday. Some teachers say they are living in fear as principals and Broward County school administrators each say it is the other’s responsibility to approve future remote work, the South Florida Sun Sentinel reports. “Some of us have conditions that specifically state if we catch this virus, we’re dead,” said Anne Skurnick, a computer science teacher in Pembroke Pines, who has been teaching remotely due to the effects of medicine she takes for rheumatoid arthritis. “No one is taking responsibility for extending accommodations.” The district wants to eliminate “overflow rooms,” where students sit in large areas with students from other classes and take online classes from a remotely working teacher. “They’d rather us take a leave and have no certified teacher to teach,” Skurnick told the newspaper. “So it’s better to have a sub than a teacher from home?” South Florida has been especially hard-hit by COVID-19.\n\nGeorgia\n\nSavannah: For the second straight year, the city is canceling its traditional and nationally renowned St. Patrick’s Day events because of the coronavirus pandemic. Mayor Van Johnson announced Tuesday during his first weekly update of 2021 that he spoke with health officials and city leaders before making the decision to cancel this year’s celebrations, WTOC-TV reports. “I hoped and prayed that our situation might improve,” Johnson said. “But I think that with what we witnessed this holiday season, we put the health of our city and our citizens at risk.” The mayor cited behavior by residents and visitors over the holidays as an example of why they do not feel confident in allowing the parade to happen. “If we could not manage this during a holiday weekend, how could we manage St. Patrick’s Day?” Johnson asked. Chatham County has reported 13,308 confirmed COVID-19 cases, 230 deaths and nearly 1,070 people hospitalized as a result of the virus, the state Department of Health reported Tuesday. The mayor said he believes things may have been different regarding the parade if there had been a statewide mask mandate.\n\nHawaii\n\nHonolulu: The state has announced it’s suspending all surfing competitions because of concerns about the coronavirus pandemic. The decision Tuesday means at least two World Surf League events will be canceled – the Jaws Championships that was planned for January to March in Pe’ahi, Maui, and the Sunset Open that was scheduled for Jan. 19-28 on the North Shore of Oahu, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reports. The Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism said protecting health and safety drove the decision because it would be difficult to enforce crowd sizes on public property. “Following many discussions with health and natural resource leaders of the state to find a way forward for future surf contests in Hawaii, we have determined that the state will be suspending surf competitions at this time,” the department said in a statement. The Billabong Pipe Masters had been held on the North Shore of Oahu in December under a film permit approved by the city and state. That competition did not allow fans in person.\n\nIdaho\n\nBoise: COVID-19 vaccinations for 130,000 front-line health care workers and long-term care residents should be finished by the end of January, Gov. Brad Little said Tuesday. The Republican governor said the timeline for the first round of vaccinations in the state depends on Idaho continuing to receive the vaccine from the federal government. He also said it’s not clear what percentage of people in the first group will opt to get vaccinated. Through Monday, more than 20,000 doses had been administered of the two-shot vaccine. Little’s objective is to distribute the vaccine’s limited supply to preserve health care capacity and protect the most vulnerable. “Believe me, we want to get vaccines in arms and get through this pandemic as fast as possible,” Little said during an AARP call-in program Tuesday. Idaho can expect to receive 20,000 vaccinations per week going forward, health officials said at a news conference. That adds up to about a million people being vaccinated for 2021. Idaho has about 1.8 million residents, though the currently available vaccines aren’t certified for children under 16.\n\nIllinois\n\nChicago: The state will make COVID-19 vaccinations available to residents 65 and older in the next inoculation phase, Gov. J.B. Pritzker announced Wednesday, as Illinois neared 1 million infections since the pandemic began. The age threshold is lower than a government advisory panel’s recommendation of 75 and older. Pritzker said it was lowered in Illinois to make distribution more equitable, citing data showing elderly Black and Latino residents die at younger average ages from COVID-19. “For people of color, multigenerational institutional racism in the provision of health care has reduced access to care, caused higher rates of environmental and social risk, and increased comorbidities,” Pritzker told reporters. “I believe our exit plan for this pandemic must overcome structural inequalities that have allowed COVID-19 to rage through our most vulnerable communities.” Illinois logged 7,569 new confirmed and probable cases of COVID-19 on Wednesday and 139 related deaths. Overall, Illinois has reported 999,288 cases and 17,096 deaths.\n\nIndiana\n\nIndianapolis: The state reported 6,214 new coronavirus cases Wednesday and an additional 80 deaths, as the weekly update of Indiana’s county metrics map depicted an even redder state than the one shown last week. The newly reported cases and deaths bring the state’s totals to 539,229 cases and 8,371 deaths. Out of the state’s 92 counties, 35 were orange for the second-highest level of viral spread, and the remainder fell in the red category. Last week 46 were coded orange, one yellow and the rest red. The number of counties facing the highest level of restrictions also rose. Last week, 41 counties shaded orange on restrictions, and the rest were red. This week all but 27 counties are shaded red. A county must be shaded orange for two weeks on the overall metric before it can move out to a lower advisory level. All of the state’s counties remain in the red for having 200 or more coronavirus cases per 100,000 residents. State Health Commissioner Dr. Kristina Box has said she would like to see every county in the blue category of fewer than 10 cases per 100,000 residents.\n\nIowa\n\nDes Moines: The number of Iowans with COVID-19 who have died has surpassed 4,000, with the state reporting an additional 61 deaths Wednesday. Deaths caused by COVID-19 appear to have resulted in record numbers of deaths overall in Iowa, the Associated Press reports. Iowa’s death total last year is the highest single-year total at least since 1915, public health data in available vital statistics records show. The state also reported 2,785 new coronavirus cases Wednesday. On Tuesday, 604 people were hospitalized in Iowa, up from 582 on Monday, according to the latest information available from the state. Hospitals admitted 125 patients, up from 69. Also, there were 116 COVID-19 patients in intensive care units Tuesday, up from 115 on Monday. There were 54 patients on ventilators, up from 53. Additionally, 91 nursing homes in Iowa were reporting coronavirus outbreaks Wednesday, down from 100 on Tuesday.\n\nKansas\n\nTopeka: Republican legislators and the state’s GOP attorney general said Tuesday that privacy is key, as lawmakers prepared to decide whether to rewrite a law that allows people exposed to COVID-19 to refuse to disclose their close contacts to health officials. Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly wants legislators to rewrite the law enacted last year, arguing in a recent interview that provisions allowing people to opt out of contact tracing “served no purpose.” Some health officials say the law hinders efforts to trace new coronavirus cases to their source and warn others who might have been infected. Attorney General Derek Schmidt and Republicans in the GOP-controlled Legislature aren’t ruling out changes, but some said they want to make sure people’s privacy remains protected. The law was enacted for the COVID-19 pandemic and is set to expire May 1, forcing legislators to review it during the annual 90-day session opening Monday. Legislators included the contact-tracing law in a package of measures governing the state’s coronavirus response. Kelly said she was forced to accept the whole package to preserve a state of emergency for the pandemic and called the provision “not helpful.”\n\nKentucky\n\nLouisville: Jefferson County Public Schools Superintendent Marty Pollio said Tuesday that the pace of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout in the state and how many doses the district receives will affect how soon in-person classes resume this year. Pollio said last month that a best-case scenario would see the state’s largest district resume in-person classes for preschool through third grade students at some point in February. However, that plan could be too ambitious, as it is dependent on when JCPS receives its first COVID-19 vaccine shipment and how many doses are included. Nearly 75% of JCPS employees – or more than 13,000 people – told the district in a survey that they would like to get vaccinated when possible. JCPS had 5,400 staff members decline the vaccine or not complete the survey. K-12 school personnel are next in line for vaccinations as part of “Phase 1B” of Kentucky’s vaccine rollout, with first responders and persons 70 and older joining them in the second group. Gov. Andy Beshear has said that, depending on how efficiently things progress with vaccine distribution, the second group could begin receiving the vaccine as early as Feb. 1, “plus or minus a week.”\n\nLouisiana\n\nNew Orleans: A subdued Carnival season began Wednesday after the coronavirus pandemic put an end to the crowd-heavy balls and street parades that draw thousands of people to the city every year. The Mardi Gras season always starts Jan. 6 and ends on Fat Tuesday, which this year falls Feb. 16. The season is usually marked by extravagant balls and parades in which costumed riders throw trinkets to the mobs of people packed along the parade routes. The coronavirus has put an end to those large events. But that has not stopped notoriously creative New Orleanians from coming up with socially distant ways to celebrate. The Krewe de Jeanne d’Arc – a club that annually pays homage to the fallen French hero with a parade through the French Quarter on the official start of the Carnival season – is hosting a “Tableaux de Jeanne d’Arc,” where onlookers will drive by various “tableaux,” a French term for “living pictures,” that will include stations of costumed revelers sparring as knights, sharpening their swords and feasting at a grand fireplace with a pig roasting in the background. “Life as usual is gone, so we had to look for different ways of doing things this year,” said Antoinette de Alteriis, one of the club’s captains.\n\nMaine\n\nPortland: The state plans an online registry for COVID-19 vaccinations as it prepares for the next phase of the rollout. The online tool will aim to reduce lines and cut the risk of exposure by people getting the vaccine, said Dr. Nirav Shah, director of the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention. The system would also speed the process by allowing people to fill out paperwork in advance, he said. As of Tuesday, 35,536 people in Maine had received at least the first dose of vaccine. Meanwhile, state lawmakers will be considering more than 1,600 bills this session, but COVID-19 will take up much of their time. A slew of bills would curtail the governor’s executive powers, protect the rights of patients and help hard-hit businesses. Assistant House Majority Leader Rachel Talbot Ross, D-Portland, wants to address the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on people of color. Rep. Jon Connor, R-Lewiston, wants to eliminate sales tax on hard-hit restaurants and lodging establishments. Sen. Cathy Breen, D-Falmouth, wants legislative oversight over how the state spends federal COVID-19 relief funds. Sen. Lisa Keim, R-Dixfield, wants to establish a COVID-19 review commission.\n\nMaryland\n\nAnnapolis: Gov. Larry Hogan announced steps Tuesday to speed up vaccinations against COVID-19 to “get more shots into more arms.” Hogan said 270,150 doses of the vaccine have been put directly in the hands of front-line vaccinators in the state over the past three weeks. However, as of Tuesday, only 76,916 people had been vaccinated so far, or about 1.3% of the state’s population. “While none of us are thrilled with the pace of this rollout over the first couple of weeks, I can assure you that it is improving every day,” Hogan said at a news conference. The governor said 11,553 people were vaccinated Tuesday, the highest number so far. Starting Wednesday, the Republican governor said the National Guard would begin to dispatch emergency vaccination support teams across the state to help local health departments to expand vaccination capacity. Hogan also said there has been uneven data reporting of vaccinations that have been administered so that the state can determine where help is needed. He also said any facility that has not administered at least 75% of its total first doses may have future allocations reduced until it can speed up vaccinations.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nBoston: Northeastern University has become one of the first colleges in the U.S. to administer the coronavirus vaccine. The Boston school announced Tuesday that 88 people who work in the university’s Cabot Testing Center and the Life Sciences Testing Center received their first dose. Those who received the vaccine included clinical and nonclinical health care workers doing direct COVID-19-facing care, police and first responders. “It’s not only remarkable that we’re one of the first to have the vaccine, but also that we’ve built a testing facility that is the gold standard,” President Joseph Aoun said in a statement on the school’s website. Iloisa Teixeira, who works in the Cabot Testing Center as a medical assistant overseeing swabbing, was the first Northeastern community member to receive the vaccine. About 1,500 people in the university community are eligible for vaccinations in the state’s first phase, the school estimated.\n\nMichigan\n\nLansing: The state will begin issuing COVID-19 vaccines to seniors and front-line workers such as teachers and police next week, officials said Wednesday while announcing accelerated access for people who are at least 65 years old. The state had planned to next immunize people 75 and older and essential workers including first responders, prison guards and child care providers. But residents age 65 to 74 will be included, too. “Every shot in the arm is a step closer to ending this pandemic,” Gov. Gretchen Whitmer said. So far, the vaccine has been limited to health care workers and nursing home residents – those in Phase 1A of the vaccine rollout plan. At least 152,000 people in the state have received the first dose in just over three weeks. Michigan will move to Phase 1B on Monday and will also include 65- to 74-year-olds from Phase 1C. Seniors can book appointments by contacting county health departments and other local vaccine clinics. Essential workers including police, firefighters, prison and jail staff, pre-K-12 teachers and child care providers will be notified by their employers about clinic dates and locations.\n\nMinnesota\n\nMinneapolis: Bars and restaurants can resume limited indoor service starting Monday, Gov. Tim Walz announced Wednesday as he also loosened up coronavirus restrictions on youth sports, gyms, entertainment venues and churches. “The situation in Minnesota is undeniably better than it was last month,” Walz said in a statement. “We have reasons to be optimistic, and Minnesotans’ sacrifice and commitment to their communities helped change the pandemic’s trajectory and saved lives. But we need to protect the progress we’ve made.” The dialing-back returns bars and restaurants about to where they were before Walz imposed a “pause” amid soaring cases in mid-November and extended it last month, which kept them closed through the holiday season except for takeout and delivery service. The restrictions generated sharp pushback, with some bars and restaurants defiantly reopening in recent weeks, risking fines and losses of their liquor licenses. The state has gone to court against several violators. The Democratic governor noted that new cases and hospitalizations have been falling in Minnesota in recent weeks, while tens of thousands of front-line medical personnel and nursing home residents and staff have gotten their first vaccine doses.\n\nMississippi\n\nJackson: The Mississippi State Department of Health reported 38 new coronavirus-related deaths Wednesday, topping the 5,000 mark since the pandemic began, and 2,791 new cases. A single-day record of 91 deaths was reported Tuesday. Since the virus hit the state in March, a total of 228,235 cases and 5,013 coronavirus-related deaths have been reported. Daily case reports over the past 30 days have continued to hover around the 2,000 mark. Health experts have warned they expected the number of cases and deaths to continue to climb following the holidays. It takes anywhere from two to 14 days for symptoms to appear after exposure, health experts have said. Hospitalizations remain at record levels, putting a strain on health care resources. The department on Tuesday reported 1,444 hospitalizations of confirmed coronavirus cases, with 349 patients in intensive care units and 223 on ventilators.\n\nMissouri\n\nKansas City: A group of medical professionals is leading an effort to persuade Black residents in the metro area to overcome their skepticism and get the COVID-19 vaccine. Kansas City’s Black Health Care Coalition and a team of Black medical professionals are working to get information about the vaccine to about 45,000 Black residents in the region. During a media briefing Monday, they said Blacks are concerned about the vaccine’s possible side effects and how quickly it was rolled out. They also noted many Blacks distrust the medical profession because of past controversial medical experiments that were performed on Black citizens, KCUR reports. City Councilwoman Melissa Robinson, president of the coalition, said Blacks also are less likely to be able to work from home or take time off work, which increases the risk of infection. The doctors said evidence has shown the vaccine to be safe. And they said the country won’t be able to defeat the pandemic unless Black citizens participate in the vaccination effort.\n\nMontana\n\nHelena: A lawmaker’s decision to block residents from testifying before a state Senate committee via videoconferencing didn’t last very long Tuesday before the chairs of all Senate committees decided to allow such testimony amid the coronavirus pandemic. Committee leaders overruled Republican state Sen. Keith Regier’s decision Tuesday, Kyle Schmauch, a spokesperson for the Senate Republican caucus, told the Montana State News Bureau. Regier, a Kalispell Republican, said Tuesday morning that the Senate Judiciary Committee would not allow the public to testify over Zoom but would take submitted written comments, as the committee has done before in non-pandemic sessions. “For 130 years, people have been coming to this building to testify on bills. They rode their horse, their old Model T, but they came here physically to the Capitol. And I’ve decided not to accept Zoom testimony from witnesses outside of the building here,” Regier said. The legislative session is being held under a hybrid model that allows lawmakers to participate remotely to limit the spread of COVID-19. Most Republicans plan to come to the Capitol daily, and many are not wearing masks.\n\nNebraska\n\nLincoln: A new, more contagious strain of the coronavirus that has been discovered in five states is probably in Nebraska as well, but officials haven’t yet confirmed its presence, the state’s chief medical officer said Wednesday. Dr. Gary Anthone said the new strain is concerning because it could lead to an increase in hospitalizations. Anthone said the state’s public health lab is purchasing its own equipment to test for the mutated virus. The new strain has led to a national lockdown in England, and the virus has been detected in California, Florida, New York, Georgia, and neighboring Colorado. “We can all say with some certainty that it’s most likely … here in Nebraska,” Anthone said at a press conference with Gov. Pete Ricketts. Ricketts said state officials plan to keep close watch for the new strain, and he expects to see a confirmed case soon given the state’s proximity to Colorado. Anthone said the current tests provided through state-sponsored TestNebraska sites can identify positive cases from the mutated strain but can’t determine which strain has infected a person. He said the new version of the virus shows the need for continued mask-wearing in public and social distancing.\n\nNevada\n\nLas Vegas: The city’s unemployment rate is the highest in the nation among big metropolitan areas. A U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics report released Tuesday showed an estimated 11.5% of Las Vegas workers were out of jobs in November. That’s the highest rate among 51 metros with at least 1 million people. The COVID-19 pandemic has essentially transformed Las Vegas from a global destination to a regional gambling hub dependent on drive-in business. Casinos downsized, operating hours atrophied, and thousands were left to navigate pandemic life without paychecks. In April, Gov. Steve Sisolak ordered all casinos to close to stem the coronavirus’ spread. With the closure of The Strip and other Nevada businesses, Las Vegas’ jobless rate jumped to 34%. Visitation is now down to levels the state hasn’t seen since 1993. With concerts and conventions canceled and hotel towers closed, Nevada will remain in financial trouble with thousands of jobless residents stuck in a jammed unemployment system until COVID-19 restrictions are rolled back and travelers regain their confidence.\n\nNew Hampshire\n\nDurham: The usual shoulder-to-shoulder was more like bumper-to-bumper for the state House of Representatives on Wednesday as one of the world’s largest legislative bodies convened from the socially distant confines of their cars instead of the Statehouse. The start of the legislative session was delayed by more than an hour as cars lined up to get into the lot at the University of New Hampshire where the session was being held. Legislators were greeted by a handful of protesters who felt the session has failed to reasonably accommodate members with disabilities. One sign read that drive-ins are for movies and making out, “NOT for the NH State Legislature!” Minority leader Renny Cushing, D-Hampton, said he was stuck in traffic for nearly an hour. “It kind of reminded me of going to a Patriots football game,” he said. As business got underway, House Clerk Paul Smith advised, “If you’re having trouble with voting, please put on your hazard lights.” Some lawmakers also honked their horns to get the staff’s attention. The 24-member Senate also convened Wednesday, but in a fully remote session. The House clerk and speaker will conduct their session from a heated platform, while members watch and listen via a large movie screen or through their car radios.\n\nNew Jersey\n\nTrenton: Police officers and firefighters in the state are eligible to get the COVID-19 vaccine beginning Thursday. They follow health care workers as the second wave of professionals eligible to get the shot. Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy made the announcement Wednesday. “We are able to open up vaccination to them based on the available supply,” Health Commissioner Judy Persichilli said. New Jersey has about 400,000 shots on hand, she has said, and more than 134,000 vaccines have been administered so far, up from 101,000 the previous day, she said. Persichilli said health care workers and those in long-term care homes continue to be a priority, and expanding vaccination eligibility to another group doesn’t mean earlier categories are now closed to getting the shots. More than 450,000 people have signed up so far on the state’s new vaccine pre-registration site, Murphy said. They will get word when they’re eligible to get the shots. The state launched the website Tuesday and faced technical problems stemming from high demand. Murphy said the state is working with the vendor to fix issues so the site works without interruption. New Jersey passed the 500,000 mark Wednesday for confirmed cases.\n\nNew Mexico\n\nSanta Fe: O’Reilly Automotive Stores Inc. has said it will pay $79,200 in penalties to the state for violating a public health order intended to limit the spread of COVID-19. The New Mexico Environment Department announced Tuesday that the company agreed to pay the fine before Feb. 1 after the auto parts store in Santa Fe received two citations following multiple citizen complaints to the department. The payment is expected to be deposited in the state’s general fund. It is believed to be the largest penalty related to coronavirus public health violations issued by the department so far, the Albuquerque Journal reports. Inspectors with the department’s Occupational Health and Safety Bureau cited the store for failing to enforce the use of masks by employees and for failing to post signs requiring the use of masks after an inspection in July. Officials said subsequent inspections determined store management corrected the violations, the Santa Fe New Mexican reports. O’Reilly contested the penalties but agreed to a settlement with the state that does not admit to a violation.\n\nNew York\n\nNew York: Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a plan Wednesday to offer COVID-19 vaccines to most city police officers, only to have Gov. Andrew Cuomo say an hour later that the officers aren’t yet eligible for them. De Blasio said the city hoped to offer the vaccines to 25,000 officers and to provide shots to 10,000 by Sunday. “We want to make sure that all of these front-line workers, folks who work directly with everyday New Yorkers, folks who do things like having to perform CPR or working in very close proximity, that they’re going to get the opportunity to be vaccinated starting right now, starting today,” the mayor said at his daily coronavirus briefing. But Cuomo said at his own briefing an hour later that most members of the New York Police Department don’t qualify for vaccinations yet under state guidelines. “We need to get the health care population done first because they are the front line,” Cuomo said. The NYPD has about 35,000 uniformed members, but only about 25,000 hold public-facing jobs. A smaller number are emergency service officers who might be considered vaccine-eligible front-line workers under Cuomo’s rules.\n\nNorth Carolina\n\nRaleigh: The state’s top public health official said Tuesday that most nursing home workers are refusing to take COVID-19 vaccines being offered. North Carolina has become one of the slowest states in the nation to get doses into peoples’ arms. Mandy Cohen, secretary of the state Department of Health and Human Services, attributed some of the sluggishness behind the rollout to staffing shortages, lack of familiarity with the state’s technological systems, and logistical hurdles of working with dozens of hospitals and 100 different counties throughout the state. “We have a decentralized system in North Carolina,” Cohen said. “We have 83 local public health departments; we have 100 counties. We have great pride in that, but when you decentralize things, it does create slowness.” Nearly 110,000 people in North Carolina had received their first dose as of Tuesday morning, according to data from the state health department. Nearly 500 people had received a second dose. Data gathered and shared by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday placed North Carolina as the sixth-worst state in the country in per capita first-dose vaccinations.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nBismarck: State health officials said Wednesday that hospitalizations due to the coronavirus dropped from 93 to 85 in the past day, with 13 patients currently requiring treatment in intensive care units. Medical facilities across the state have seen a steady drop in patients since the middle of November, when many of the largest facilities scrambled to provide staffed ICU beds. The state’s hospital tracker showed 31 staffed ICU beds and 326 staffed inpatient beds available throughout the state Wednesday. Health officials reported 341 new positive tests in the prior 24 hours, with a daily positivity rate of 5.4%. Five new deaths were confirmed, lifting North Dakota’s fatality count to 1,334. The per capita death count compared to the rest of the country moved up from sixth- to fifth-highest based on data compiled Tuesday by the COVID Tracking Project. Health officials say data updated through Saturday showed the state had administered about two-thirds of its existing COVID-19 vaccine supply.\n\nOhio\n\nColumbus: About 35 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine expired after a nursing home overestimated the number needed and left pharmacists scrambling to get shots into arms. A nursing home in Lawrence County at the southern tip of Ohio requested too many COVID-19 vaccines from pharmacy partner Walgreens. After inoculating staff and residents there, the pharmacy had about 195 doses of the COVID-19 vaccine left over, or 39 vials, said Dan Tierney, a spokesman for Gov. Mike DeWine. “They did everything they could. They got everyone who would take a shot, but they had some leftover, a lot leftover,” DeWine said at Tuesday’s news conference. The pharmacy reallocated 13 vials to other long-term care facilities and distributed 19 vials to residents 65 years and older and Walgreens pharmacy employees. After that effort, seven vials, or about 35 doses of the vaccine, expired before they could be administered on New Year’s Eve, a Walgreens spokesman confirmed. “There were some that were wasted. That was the first time that has occurred, to our knowledge, in Ohio,” DeWine said Tuesday. Tierney did not know the name of the nursing home, only its location.\n\nOklahoma\n\nOklahoma City: Registration began Wednesday for residents to be notified when they are eligible for a COVID-19 vaccination, according to the state health department, which later reported a one-day record increase in deaths due to COVID-19. Those who register at vaccinate.oklahoma.gov will be notified by email when an appointment is available, the department said in a news release. The availability of appointments depends on the vaccine supply in each county, which changes weekly, health officials have said. Residents will enter personal information to determine when they are eligible for vaccinations based on the state’s distribution plan that began Dec. 14 with front-line health care workers being inoculated. Beginning Thursday, Oklahoma residents 65 and older, health care workers and first responders will be able to schedule appointments on the site as part of the program’s second phase. The Oklahoma State Department of Health later reported 3,305 additional cases of the virus and 62 more deaths due to COVID-19, eight more than the previous daily high of 54 on Dec. 2. It also reported a one-day record of 1,994 hospitalizations.\n\nOregon\n\nPortland: State health officials had a goal of administering 100,000 coronavirus vaccines by the end of 2020 but as of Tuesday had only administered 51,283. Now, Gov. Kate Brown has set a new goal of 12,000 vaccinations per day within the next two weeks. Health authority officials said Tuesday that if they expand the number of administration sites and adjust prioritization requirements, they are confident they will reach that goal. “In the first 19 days of COVID-19 vaccinations, we’ve learned some key lessons we’ll use to speed our vaccination efforts,” Oregon Health Authority Director Patrick Allen said. The first phase of vaccination prioritization focused on health care workers and residents and staff in nursing homes and other long-term care facilities. Effective this week, Oregon Health Authority will expand vaccinations to hospice programs, mobile crisis care, outpatient settings serving specific high-risk groups, in-home care services, non-emergency medical transport, health care providers in other outpatient settings, and public health workers.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nHarrisburg: Pennsylvania’s Farm Show Complex is usually bustling with activity in the days leading up to the annual agricultural event. But this year the arenas and exhibit halls are quiet. And, with the exception of some baby ducks, they will remain quiet throughout the show that opens Saturday and runs through Jan. 16. Because of concern surrounding COVID-19, officials made the difficult decision to hold a virtual Farm Show for its 105th year. When that decision was announced in August, the plan was to still hold a variety of competitions, including some livestock events. Those plans changed as a second wave hit the state, and safety concerns grew. The only livestock competition that will be held this year is for the largest cattle. But the event won’t be held at the Farm Show Complex. And the kids won’t be there to show their cattle. “That’s the saddest part of this,” Department of Agriculture Press Secretary Shannon Powers said Tuesday. “The decision had to be made back in the summer, and one group of kids had already purchased their animals. That show will be held at New Holland Sales Stables.” Powers said the kids won’t be there to show the animals, but they still will be judged on their hard work.\n\nRhode Island\n\nProvidence: State health officials said Tuesday that several hundred people not currently eligible to be vaccinated against COVID-19 attempted to get inoculated with the help of eligible people who improperly shared their confidential appointment registration links. Health officials said the link given to employers for their workers to register for vaccinations was shared. The employers were not identified. The state took down registration links and canceled hundreds of appointments this week after discovering the problem. The issue is being addressed, said Alysia Mihalakos, co-lead of the state Health Department’s Mass Vaccination Workgroup. “The demand for the vaccine is clearly high, and people are willing to push others aside to get themselves and their loved ones vaccinated,” Mihalakos said during a remote news conference. The state has prioritized getting the vaccine to those at highest risk from the virus.\n\nSouth Carolina\n\nColumbia: After being rebuked in court for trying to spend his share of federal COVID-19 money on private school tuition grants, the governor wants to spend the money on early childhood education, job training and tutors for foster children instead. Gov. Henry McMaster announced Tuesday how he will spend about $20 million of the $48 million set aside for him to spend at his own discretion. The governor has a May deadline to decide how to spend the remaining $28 million in grant money. McMaster’s initial plan announced in July was to spend most of the money on grants of up to $6,500 to help parents send children to private or religious schools, which were providing in-school instruction when most schools across the state were still holding virtual classes at least part of the time. The state Supreme Court ruled in October that McMaster’s plans broke the state constitution by sending public money to private schools. The decision also put on hold $2.4 million set aside by the governor for technology improvements to historically Black universities and colleges. McMaster has not announced if he will restore that money.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nSioux Falls: State health officials on Wednesday confirmed six new deaths due to complications from the coronavirus, after two straight days with no fatalities. The deaths lifted the total to 1,519 since the start of the pandemic. That death count is the seventh-highest per capita in the country at about 171 deaths per 100,000 people, according to the COVID Tracking Project. The update showed 608 new positive tests, including 144 in Minnehaha County, 31 in Lincoln County, 36 in Brown County and 35 in Codington County. The state has confirmed 91,875 cases overall. South Dakota ranks 34th in the country for new cases per capita in the past two weeks, Johns Hopkins University researchers said. One in every 302 people in South Dakota tested positive in the past week. Hospitalizations in the state fell by six, to 264.\n\nTennessee\n\nNashville: State officials have set up an online tool that helps people figure out when they will be eligible for the COVID-19 vaccine. Gov. Bill Lee’s office announced the initiative Tuesday as the state reported more than 169,000 Tennesseans have been vaccinated with their first dose so far. Tennessee also continues to struggle to contain one of the highest new case counts per capita nationwide. There were 1,221 new cases reported per 100,000 people in Tennessee over the past two weeks, which ranks third in the country on that metric, according to researchers at Johns Hopkins University. Tennessee’s online tool involves completing a form with questions about age, county, type of employment, health conditions and other risk factors. It provides risk-based and age-based phase information at the county level. The website lets people opt in to receive updates and notifications about their vaccine phase. It can be found at covid19.tn.gov.\n\nTexas\n\nAustin: Coronavirus cases are exhausting the availability of intensive care unit beds in parts of Texas as hospitalizations of COVID-19 patients continue to soar to record levels, state health statistics showed Tuesday. Hospitalizations set their ninth consecutive record by topping 13,300 on Tuesday, with 626 patients requiring intensive care, according to the Texas Department of State Health Services. All ICU beds at hospitals in the Abilene and Bryan-College Station areas are full, while only two are available in the Laredo area and three in the Paris-Texarkana area. ICU bed availability is in the single digits in the Wichita Falls-Northwest Texas, Lufkin-Piney Woods, Waco, Galveston-Beaumont and Victoria areas. Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo tweeted that the Houston region officially topped the state’s hospitalization threshold triggering COVID-19 reopening rollbacks. For seven days in a row, COVID-19 patients have filled in 15% of the Houston region’s hospital beds, according to state health statistics. But U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, the Republican congressman representing some of Houston’s northern suburbs, urged the public to ignore the appeal by Hidalgo, a Democrat, and said that “businesses should not comply.”\n\nUtah\n\nSalt Lake City: People waving Trump flags, holding “Stop the Steal” signs and largely ignoring coronavirus safety rules rallied at the Utah Capitol on Wednesday as violent clashes broke out between supporters of the president and police in Washington, D.C., while Congress was trying to confirm the Electoral College’s votes for the presidency. The crowd of about 200 people in Salt Lake City crowded around a television monitor on the steps of the state Capitol to watch the president give a speech promoting his baseless claims of election fraud at a rally in Washington. The majority of Utah protesters were not wearing masks or abiding by social distancing guidelines. Colton Fiedler, 23, of South Jordan, said he was the first person to arrive at the statehouse at just before 9 a.m. in the hopes that the nation’s representatives in Congress would “finally find the courage to do the right thing.” “I am a registered Republican, but I don’t know how much longer I will be,” said Fiedler, who was holding a Trump 2020 sign. “The Republican Party is dead as of this year. It is the party of Trump now.”\n\nVermont\n\nMontpelier: The group representing hospitals across the state says uncertainty about the amount of COVID-19 vaccine they will receive is prompting delays in administering those doses. In a Wednesday news release, the Vermont Association of Hospitals and Health Systems, which represents the state’s 14 nonprofit hospitals, said hospitals have routinely experienced delays in the arrival of doses. They have also received fewer doses than expected. Conversely, there have also been cases in which vaccine vials have contained more doses than expected. “We have a population that is eager to be vaccinated, and we’ll need ongoing patience and support to continue making progress,” said association President Jeff Tieman. Despite the challenges, Vermont Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine said the state ranks seventh in the nation for the percentage of doses received that have been administered.\n\nVirginia\n\nWilliamsburg: Busch Gardens Williamsburg, in a reversal of pandemic-era trends, is keeping its gates open during the winter for the first time since it opened 45 years ago, park officials said. The popular theme park is looking at ways to rethink its operations by hosting smaller, limited-capacity special events, the Richmond Times-Dispatch reports. “We had to figure out how to operate safely and how to operate (economically) and still give our members and guests something that they love doing,” park spokeswoman Cindy Sarko said. The park said it will operate on certain weekends in January, February and March for three new limited-capacity events, including Mardi Gras and St. Patrick’s Day. The winter events will be held on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays and will admit a maximum of 4,000 people each for each of the slots on those days, the park said. Busch Gardens held similar limited-capacity events last year. Being open in January and February also has been a request of patrons for years, Sarko said. The park typically opens in mid-March for the beginning of the season.\n\nWashington\n\nOlympia: Gov. Jay Inslee on Tuesday announced a regional economic reopening plan, with some COVID-19 restrictions on entertainment and individual fitness training being eased next week, but prohibitions on indoor dining at restaurants and indoor gyms remaining. The new guidelines, which will go into effect Monday, will require regions to meet four metrics in order to move to the next phase, at which point restaurants and indoor fitness center can open indoor dining at 25% capacity, sports competitions can resume with limited spectators, and wedding and funeral ceremonies can increase their number of guests. Each Friday, the state Department of Health will be looking at the regional case rates, hospital admission rates, intensive care unit occupancy rates and test positivity rates to see which areas can move to a new phase. While in the first phase, some outdoor entertainment – limited to 10 ticketed guests – is allowed, and appointment-based fitness training with one client per 500 square feet is also allowed, as are things like outdoor tennis instructions, gymnastics, and no-contact martial arts, as long as it is limited to five athletes.\n\nWest Virginia\n\nFairmont: The Marion County Chamber of Commerce is working on a project to attract remote or self-employed workers to move there, news outlets report. Marion County offers indoor and outdoor recreation along with good local restaurants and access to major cities like Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C., in just a few hours’ drive, officials said. “We don’t want to change Marion County per se; we love Marion County as it is. However, we want to share Marion County with everyone that we can,” Chamber Board Chairman Jonathan Board said. The coronavirus pandemic has changed how many people work, with many now working from home, which means some have more flexibility in where they can live, officials said. The Marion County chamber has been working with local organizations to put together a video highlighting the area’s best points. The full video won’t be released until next month, officials said.\n\nWisconsin\n\nMilwaukee: More than 5,000 people have died from COVID-19 in the state since the start of the pandemic. Wisconsin crossed the milestone Wednesday, reporting the most recent 1,000 deaths in just the past 25 days. It took about five months for the first 1,000 Wisconsin residents to die from COVID-19. By Halloween, the state had reached 2,000 deaths. Three weeks later, on Nov. 21, Wisconsin hit 3,000 COVID-19 deaths. Another three weeks later, on Dec. 12, it passed 4,000. Experts at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation were nearly correct when they projected Wisconsin would pass 5,000 deaths from COVID-19 just before the end of the year. The institute now projects more than 1,800 people could die from COVID-19 in Wisconsin in the next month, and the state could see a death toll of more than 7,700 by April 1. Meanwhile, total COVID-19 cases are nearing 500,000 in the state. The state was just over 5,000 cases away Wednesday. The average positivity rate – first-time positive tests over the past seven days – was 32% Wednesday.\n\nWyoming\n\nGillette: Lawmakers will consider a proposed $100 million public education funding cut when they meet this winter. The bill would take away millions of dollars from school districts across the state while increasing the state sales tax by a percentage point, the Gillette News Record reports. Wyoming has been struggling with a steep decline in revenue from the coal, oil and natural gas industries due to low prices and the coronavirus pandemic. The virus has resulted in less travel and lower demand for oil worldwide. Gov. Mark Gordon in November submitted a proposed supplemental budget for 2021-22 containing more than $500 million in cuts to some of the state’s largest agencies, including the Department of Health, Department of Corrections, Department of Family Services and the University of Wyoming. The Legislature is scheduled to convene a one-day, online session Jan. 12. Lawmakers usually meet for about eight weeks in odd-numbered years. This year, they plan to reconvene for either a virtual session in February or an in-person session in Cheyenne in March, depending on COVID-19 trends.\n\nFrom USA TODAY Network and wire reports", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/01/07"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_2", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:38", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_3", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:38", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/us/brittney-griner-us-arrival-monday/index.html", "title": "Brittney Griner is back in the US and dunking again after almost 10 ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nFresh off her elated return to the US after months in Russian custody, two-time Olympic gold medalist Brittney Griner is back on a basketball court.\n\nBut her reintegration into American life is far from over, as is the fight by WNBA players for equity as US professional athletes. The issue was highlighted by the 10-month detention of Griner, who’d gone to Russia to play basketball in the WNBA offseason.\n\nGriner’s first move on a Texas basketball court Sunday was a dunk, her agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, told CNN on Monday.\n\nConfirming news first reported by ESPN, Colas said Griner wore a pair of black Chuck Taylor shoes, Phoenix Suns shorts and a T-shirt touting Title IX as she played. Months ago, in pre-trial detention in Russia, Griner was offered a basketball and a hoop, but she declined to play, Colas said.\n\n“I think it’s fair to say that her picking up a ball voluntarily and the first thing being a dunk … it was really encouraging,” Colas said. “She was really excited.”\n\nThe 32-year-old had arrived two days earlier at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio for routine evaluation after her release Thursday from what US officials deemed wrongful detention. She was freed amid Russia’s war in Ukraine in a prisoner swap for notorious convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.\n\nIt’s not clear how long Griner will stay at the medical center, Colas said.\n\n“She’s had a lot of psychological support,” Colas said. “The resources are very robust. It’s very supportive and very BG centered. It’s about her developing agency.”\n\nGriner’s agent believes she will try to “utilize her fame for good” but did not detail what that would look like. Colas said Griner opted into the Department of Defense’s Post Isolation Support Activities, or PISA, program that has served other wrongfully detained Americans.\n\nIt’s also unclear whether the Phoenix Mercury center will return to the WNBA. The 2023 regular season begins May 19, with training camps typically opening a month before.\n\n“If she wants to play, it will be for her to share,” Colas told ESPN’s T.J. Quinn. “She has the holidays to rest and decide what’s next without any pressure. She’s doing really, really well. She seems to have endured this in pretty incredible ways.”\n\nBut the fact that Griner typically plays basketball in Russia during her WNBA offseasons highlights the inequities faced by professional female athletes in the US, fellow WNBA players said.\n\nFor many years, WNBA players have spent their offseasons playing in international leagues, where they often can earn more money.\n\n“We’ve been talking about the pay disparity for a long time, and players have been going overseas for a long time,” Elizabeth Williams, a Washington Mystics player and secretary for the Women’s National Basketball Players Association, told CNN on Monday.\n\n“I think this is when people are realizing … the dangers and perils of people going overseas and the impact of what those pay equity issues are.”\n\n‘A horrendous experience’\n\nBrittney Griner spent most of the 18-hour flight from Russia speaking with a US presidential envoy for hostage affairs. RIA\n\nGriner was arrested on drug charges at a Russian airport in February and sentenced to nine years in prison. As concerns grew that Griner was being used as a political pawn, efforts to negotiate her release took months.\n\nNow back on US soil, it’s not clear how long Griner will stay in Texas for medical evaluation.\n\n“I’m understanding that it’s going to be a few more days before she gets out,” former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson told CNN on Sunday.\n\nRichardson and his center privately work on behalf of families of hostages and detainees. He previously traveled to Russia to discuss Griner’s release, as well as Paul Whelan, a US Marine veteran who was wrongfully detained and remains in custody.\n\nRichardson said it’s important to give former detainees like Griner ample time to get settled.\n\n“We’ve got to give them a little space, a little time to readjust because they’ve had a horrendous experience in these Russian prisons,” said Richardson, who served as US ambassador to the United Nations in the Clinton administration.\n\nWhile held in a Russian penal colony, Griner was unable to perform the work done by many female prisoners due to her size, Griner’s Russian lawyer Maria Blagovolina told ESPN and confirmed to CNN.\n\nMost of the women in the penal colony worked sewing uniforms, but the 6-foot-9 Griner was too tall to sit at a work table, and her hands were too big to manage the sewing. So instead, she carried fabric all day, her attorney said.\n\n‘I’m here to take you home’\n\nOn the day of her release, Griner had a feeling she would be going home, said Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens, who led the prisoner exchange mission in the United Arab Emirates.\n\nBut it didn’t feel real until he boarded the plane and told her: “On behalf of the President of the United States, Joe Biden, and Secretary of State Tony Blinken, I’m here to take you home,” Carstens recalled to CNN.\n\nHe described Griner as an intelligent, compassionate, humble and patriotic person who immediately wanted to thank all the crew members who helped her.\n\n“When she finally got onto the US plane, I said, ‘Brittney, you must have been through a lot over the last 10 months. Here’s your seat. Please feel free to decompress. We’ll give you your space,’” Carstens recalled.\n\n“And she said, ‘Oh no. I’ve been in prison for 10 months now listening to Russian, I want to talk. But first of all, who are these guys?’ And she moved right past me and went to every member on that crew, looked them in the eyes, shook their hands and asked about them and got their names, making a personal connection with them. It was really amazing,” Carstens said.\n\nGriner spent 12 hours of an 18-hour flight talking with Carstens “about everything under the sun,” he said.\n\nWhen the government plane landed at Kelly Field, the person who emerged from the plane looked very different. Her long, signature dreadlocks had been cut while in captivity. Griner continuously battled the flu while detained because her hair kept freezing and she was unable to dry them, Colas said.\n\nThe new do was not a surprise to her family, though, as she sent word home weeks earlier about her decision to cut her hair, Colas said.\n\nIn San Antonio this weekend, she received a real hair cut to clean up her “Russian fade” as her friends and family jokingly call it. After that, she hit the basketball court.\n\nA challenging journey ahead\n\nGriner’s life has been forever altered, and adjusting to everyday life could be difficult.\n\nJorge Toledo – one of the “Citgo 6” – was released in October as part of a prisoner swap after being detained during a 2017 business trip to Venezuela with other oil and gas executives from the Citgo Petroleum Corporation.\n\nAfter returning home, Toledo told CNN, he’s had trouble sleeping and felt anxiety during normally mundane tasks such as driving.\n\nBut Toledo said he was part of a program in San Antonio that involved six days with a group of psychologists. He said the program was “extremely important” for his reintegration and hopes Griner can take advantage of similar resources.\n\nWhelan still held in Russia ‘for totally illegitimate reasons’\n\nWhile many celebrate Griner’s return, the fate of another American held in Russia remains uncertain.\n\nWhelan – a US, Irish, British and Canadian citizen – is imprisoned in a Russian penal colony after he was arrested in December 2018 on espionage charges, which he has denied. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison.\n\nWith Griner back in the US, Richardson said he’s optimistic about Whelan’s release – noting Russia previously offer a trade for Whelan.\n\nThe US tried to persuade Russia to swap both Griner and Whelan for Bout, but Russian officials would not budge on the matter. Russia said the Americans’ cases were handled differently based on the charges each of them faced.\n\n“This was not a choice of which American to bring home,” Biden said last week. “Sadly, for totally illegitimate reasons, Russia is treating Paul’s case differently than Brittney’s. And while we have not yet succeeded in securing Paul’s release, we are not giving up. We will never give up.”\n\nWhelan said he was happy Griner was released, but told CNN, “I am greatly disappointed that more has not been done to secure my release, especially as the four-year anniversary of my arrest is coming up.”\n\nGriner is eager to use power and influence to help others, her agent said, especially Whelan.\n\n“It was one of the first things she asked me about,” Colas said. “She’s very, very concerned about that. And will be sending a message to Paul.”", "authors": ["Nouran Salahieh Holly Yan", "Nouran Salahieh", "Holly Yan"], "publish_date": "2022/12/12"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/13/us/brittney-griner-us-arrival-tuesday/index.html", "title": "Brittney Griner is heartbroken Paul Whelan remains detained in ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nFreed from a Russian penal colony and back on American soil, WNBA star Brittney Griner got her first taste of a return to normal life over the weekend at a Texas military facility. But though she’s home, Griner is heartbroken that Paul Whelan is still detained, her agent said.\n\nThe Olympic gold medalist arrived Friday at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio and is now staying with her wife, Cherelle Griner, in a residential environment on the base – one her agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, decorated with a Christmas tree.\n\nGriner, 32, is “upbeat, thankful and hopeful,” Colas told CNN, after returning to the states from what US officials deemed wrongful detention in Russia.\n\nStill, she’s thinking of Whelan, who remains behind bars in Russia, her agent said.\n\n“She is thinking about his family and talked about her intention to call them as soon as she gets home,” Colas told CNN’s Anderson Cooper Tuesday. “She’s really committed to telling this story and making sure that this population of wrongfully detained Americans, that people know their names.”\n\nFor Griner – who spent nearly 10 months in Russian custody – “normal” has meant indulging in her favorites, including a Dr Pepper soda, the first drink she had in the airplane hangar after landing.\n\nGriner’s relatives also have visited her off and on for hours, bringing San Antonio barbecue for her to enjoy.\n\nThe athlete has been eating far more nutritious food and supplements compared with her time in detention, Colas said. “Her energy level was really high,” she added.\n\nGriner also got a haircut to clean up her “Russian fade,” as her friends and family jokingly call it, Colas said. Griner’s long, signature dreadlocks were cut while in captivity as she continuously battled the flu because her wet hair kept freezing, Colas said.\n\nAt the Texas military base, Griner hit the basketball court for the first time since she was imprisoned: Her first move was a dunk. Months ago, in pre-trial detention in Russia, Griner was offered a basketball and a hoop, but she declined to play, Colas said.\n\n“I think it’s fair to say that her picking up a ball voluntarily and the first thing being a dunk … it was really encouraging,” Colas said. “She was really excited.”\n\nGriner seems to be in good physical health, but whether she returns to the WNBA in the spring season will be up to her, according to Colas.\n\n“Is she going to be ready? We’ll see,” Colas said.\n\nBrittney Griner, right, arrives at Kelly Field in San Antonio, Texas, Friday following her release in a prisoner swap with Russia. Eric Gay/AP\n\nGriner is getting psychological support\n\nGriner arrived at the San Antonio medical facility for a routine evaluation after her release Thursday as part of a prisoner exchange between the US and Russia for notorious convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout.\n\nConcerns had grown that Griner was being used as a political pawn amid Russia’s war on Ukraine after she was arrested on drug charges in February at an airport in Russia, where she plays basketball in the WNBA off-season, then later sentenced to nine years in prison.\n\nNow, Griner’s focus will be on recuperating, including getting physical and psychological support from the government to help with her reintegration.\n\n“She’s had a lot of psychological support,” Colas said. “The resources are very robust. It’s very supportive and very BG-centered. It’s about her developing agency.”\n\nThat care is heavily focused on helping formerly captive people regain a sense of control over their lives after lengthy detentions. Griner opted into the Department of Defense’s post-isolation program, which other wrongfully detained Americans, including Trevor Reed, have participated in, Colas said; Reed is former Marine released in April after three years of wrongful detention in Russia.\n\nIt’s not clear how long Griner and her wife will stay in San Antonio, but the decision is hers, Colas said.\n\nBut what’s become clear is that “normal” will always look different after the ordeal Griner went through. For security reasons, for instance, the Griners have already begun the process of finding a new home, Colas said.\n\nGriner wants to help another detained American\n\nThough it remains unknown if fans will see Griner back on the basketball court in May, one thing is certain, Colas said: Griner is eager to use her power and influence to help others – especially Paul Whelan, another American still imprisoned in Russia.\n\n“It was one of the first things she asked me about,” Colas said. “She’s very, very concerned about that. And will be sending a message to Paul.”\n\nWhelan already sent a message through US representatives who spoke with him in recent days: “Please tell Brittney that Paul said he’s happy she’s home,” he told her, according to Colas.\n\n“She is absolutely thinking about the future,” Colas said. “She’s already talking about the position that she’s now in to help other people come home.”\n\nWhelan – a US, Irish, British and Canadian citizen – is imprisoned in a Russian penal colony after he was arrested in December 2018 on espionage charges, which he has denied. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison. He, like Griner, has been declared wrongfully detained by US officials.\n\nThe US tried to persuade Russia to swap both Griner and Whelan for arms dealer Bout, but Russian officials would not budge on the matter, with Russia saying both of the Americans’ cases were handled differently based on the charges each of them faced.", "authors": ["Abphillip Nouran Salahieh", "Nouran Salahieh"], "publish_date": "2022/12/13"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/wnba/2022/12/09/brittney-griner-returns-usa-prisoner-swap-russia/10857651002/", "title": "Brittney Griner back in US: What to know about her release from ...", "text": "On Friday, Brittney Griner arrived in the United States. It was the first time in almost 10 months the Phoenix Mercury star could say that.\n\nThe two-time Olympic gold medalist landed early Friday at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland in Texas. She was released into U.S. custody a day earlier after spending that time in Russian prison for allegedly trying to bring vape cartridges filled with cannabis oil into the country on Feb. 17.\n\nFollowing a trial legal experts classified as a \"sham,\" Griner was sentenced to nine years in a Russian penal colony. The eight-time WNBA All-Star was transferred from her pre-trial detention facility to the penal colony last month after her appeal was denied.\n\nOne day after her emotional and dramatic release following a prisoner exchange for arms dealer Viktor Bout, here is what we know about Griner and the deal that brought her home.\n\nMORE:What might Brittney Griner go through upon return home?\n\nOPINION:Brittney Griner's fierce WNBA family threw everything it had into getting her home\n\nGRINER IS FREE:WNBA star released in prisoner swap with Russia\n\nTIMELINE: Events from Griner's arrest to sentencing to release in prisoner swap\n\nOPINION: Griner prisoner swap is both joyful and heartbreaking\n\nWho is Brittney Griner?\n\nBorn in Houston, Griner blossomed into a basketball star. The 6-foot-9 center began dominating at Minitz High School (McDonald's All American, 2009) and played collegiately at Baylor from 2010-13. There, she was a member of the 2012 national championship team and was a two-time first-team All-American.\n\nRepresenting the United States at the 2016 Rio and 2020 Tokyo Olympics with the women's basketball team, Griner won two gold medals.\n\nGriner has been married twice. Her first marriage was to fellow WNBA player Glory Johnson, but that ended after one year in 2016. Two years, Griner became engaged to her current wife, Cherelle Griner. The couple married in 2019.\n\nHow long has Brittney Griner been in the WNBA?\n\nThe Phoenix Mercury selected Griner No. 1 overall in the 2013 WNBA draft, and she has spent her entire nine-year WNBA career with the organization. In her second season, Griner helped the Mercury claim the 2014 WNBA championship.\n\nGriner has led the WNBA in blocks in all but one of her seasons (2020) and is a two-time Defensive Player of the Year winner. Last year, she was named to the league's 25th anniversary team.\n\nGriner has played in Russia during the WNBA offseason since 2014. With UMMC Ekaterinburg – she was en route to joining the Russian club when she was detained – Griner has won four EuroLeague championships.\n\nWhy did Brittney Griner go to jail in Russia?\n\nRussian prosecutors claimed to find 0.7 grams of hashish oil in vape cartridges while searching Griner's luggage in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport. During her trial, Griner testified she had inadvertently packed the cartridges in haste and that she had no criminal intent.\n\nDrug laws in Russia are \"draconian\" compared to those in the U.S. The penalty for smuggling carried a 10-year maximum sentence, and the prosecution asked for 9.5 years; a judge handed down the nine-year sentence on Aug. 4, more than a month after the trial began.\n\nWhat was it like for Brittney Griner in Russian penal colony?\n\nGriner was transferred to the IK-2 penal colony in Mordovia, about 350 miles southeast of Moscow, in November to begin her 9-year sentence on drug charges. She was imprisoned there for nearly a month before being freed in a prisoner exchange.\n\nGriner’s Russian attorney Maria Blagovolina told ESPN that most women work during the day sewing uniforms, but Griner's 6-foot-9 frame made that impossible. She was too tall to sit at workstations and her hands were too large for sewing, so she was tasked with carrying fabric all day instead, a job Griner told her lawyer she didn't mind.\n\nGriner did mind the brutal winter weather, however, which led her to cutting off her signature locks that she's had since her days as a Baylor Bear.\n\n\"It's very cold in there and every time she washed her hair she got cold and would get a chill,\" Blagovolina told ESPN. \"She should have waited until New Year's Day.\"\n\nGriner recently battled and recovered from the flu during her confinement at the IK-2 penal colony, Blagovolina said.\n\nDespite the harsh conditions she faced, Blagovolina said Griner did not complain and was treated well.\n\n“I think that the reason for this is because of her very likable character,” Blagovolina said on CNN. “People like her. So everybody who is around her is trying to help her, to support her.”\n\nWho is Viktor Bout?\n\nSince her arrest, the most likely path for Griner's return was always via a prisoner swap with Russia. That came to fruition within the last week, with President Joe Biden and his administration agreeing to exchange notorious arms dealer Viktor Bout for Griner.\n\nBout, 55, is a former Soviet military officer and translator who was serving a 25-year prison sentence for conspiring to kill Americans. He and Griner actually walked past each other on an airport tarmac in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, where the two governments exchanged prisoners, video from Thursday showed.\n\nIt is the second prisoner exchange with Russia of Biden's administration. In April, ex-Marine Trevor Reed was freed while experiencing health issues for a Russian pilot and smuggler named Konstantin Yaroshenko.\n\nBrittney Griner’s lawyer: ‘There were positive signs’ for swap\n\nThroughout her case, Griner was represented by a pair of Russian attorneys, Blagovolina and Alexander Boykov. On Thursday, Blagovolina said she found out about the swap along with everybody else Thursday. But she added that she heard from Griner last week that good news could be on the horizon.\n\n“There were positive signs … she told me she was hopeful. We had an understanding that things would happen very, very soon,” Blagovolina said on CNN.\n\nThe most promising sign, Blagovolina told ESPN, was when Griner was moved to a Moscow jail on Monday: \"It was kind of stressful. We were worried about her -- she didn't have her glasses; she broke her glasses and we didn't know if she was getting food.\"\n\nOn Thursday, Griner was headed home.\n\nCBS News, which first reported the exchange with Russia, said it withheld publishing a story saying a deal was near last week at the behest of the government – so as not to disrupt the tense negotiations.\n\nU.S. officials who met with Griner when she arrived back to the States said the WNBA star appeared to be in good health and was in \"very good spirits,\" White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said. Griner offered additional care and counseling.\n\nWho is Paul Whelan?\n\nPaul Whelan has been connected to Griner because he is a fellow American considered \"wrongfully detained\" by Russia. He was first arrested four years ago this month and was given a 16-year sentence on charges of espionage.\n\nIn July, as Griner's trial was ongoing, Secretary of State Antony Blinken made the uncharacteristic move of providing an update on the negotiations with Russia, saying the U.S. had made a \"substantial offer\" in exchange for Griner and Whelan.\n\nWhite House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre and senior administration officials said Thursday that Russia would not engage in good faith negotiations for Whelan, likely due to the espionage accusations.\n\n\"It was either Brittney or no one at all,\" Jean-Pierre said. \"We're not going to apologize for that.\"\n\nWHELAN: Ex-Marine remains imprisoned in Russia after swap\n\nWho is Brittney Griner's wife, Cherelle?\n\nCherelle Griner has been vocal in supporting her wife and publicly advocated for her return by speaking at a rally for Griner hosted by the Mercury and appearing on morning news shows. She parlayed that into an audience with the president.\n\nOn Thursday, Cherelle Griner stood alongside Biden and vice president Kamala Harris as they announced Brittney Griner's return.\n\n\"It's a happy day for me and my family,\" Cherelle Griner said. \"Today, my family is whole.\"\n\nCherelle Griner also pledged that she and Brittney will continue to advocate for wrongfully detained Americans, like Whelan.\n\nPOWER OF LOVE: Why Cherelle Griner is the biggest hero in Griner's release\n\nWill Griner play in the WNBA again?\n\nRight now, it is too early to tell.\n\nGriner surely experienced mental anguish while isolated from friends, family and teammates for almost an entire year. The physical toll is unknown. Jean-Pierre said Griner would undergo mental and physical check-ups upon her arrival.\n\nFor now, however, the league is celebrating her return.\n\nI can't tell you what this means to the whole WNBA community to have her home safely,\" WNBA commissioner Cathy Englebert said.\n\nWill WNBA players continue to go to Russia in the off season?\n\nMany of the game’s top athletes have gone specifically to Russia in search of a big payday, including perennial All-Stars Diana Taurasi and Sue Bird.\n\nLas Vegas Aces coach Becky Hammon played in Russia for seven years, becoming a Russian citizen in 2008 and playing on the Russian national team during the 2008 Beijing Olympics. On ESPN Thursday morning, Hammon said Griner’s arrest was “disheartening because it’s been such a great experience for most of us playing over there.”\n\n“You can go down the list of women’s players who had good experiences over there,” Hammon said. “The Russian people took us in and took really good care of us.”\n\nAmericans even went over this winter to play, despite Griner’s detainment and warnings from the U.S. State Department of the dangers of traveling to Russia. The group of Americans currently playing in Russia includes at least one woman who was on a WNBA training camp roster in spring 2022.\n\nContributing: Lindsay Schnell, Scooby Axson; The Associated Press\n\nFollow Chris Bumbaca on Twitter @BOOMbaca.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/12/09"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/16/us/brittney-griner-departs-medical-military-facility/index.html", "title": "Brittney Griner is back home and she intends to play basketball this ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nBrittney Griner departed a medical military facility in Texas on Friday and returned home to Arizona, vowing in an Instagram post to play in the WNBA this season as she took another step in her reintegration into American life after her detention in Russia.\n\n“It feels so good to be home! The last 10 months have been a battle at every turn,” she wrote in her post. “I dug deep to keep my faith and it was the love from so many of you that helped keep me going. From the bottom of my heart, thank you to everyone for your help.”\n\nBrittney Griner embraces her wife, Cherelle Griner, upon her return to the US from Russia last Friday. Miguel Negron/US Army South\n\nGriner, 32, said she was “grateful to each person who advocated for me” and thanked the staff at the Texas military facility she briefly called home. She also remembered another foreign prisoner in Russia whose release could not be secured in the prisoner swap that secured her freedom.\n\n“President Biden, you brought me home and I know you are committed to bringing Paul Whelan and all Americans home too,” she said. “I will use my platform to do whatever I can to help you. I also encourage everyone that played a part in bringing me home to continue their efforts to bring all Americans home. Every family deserves to be whole.”\n\nGriner plans to return to WNBA’s Mercury\n\nGriner took off from San Antonio around 11 a.m. on Friday, CNN confirmed via her agent Lindsay Kagawa Colas.\n\nAs she boarded the plane, Griner was greeted by Phoenix Mercury GM Jim Pitman, team president Vince Kozar and teammate Diana Taurasi. They made a surprise appearance to welcome her home.\n\nGriner was headed back to Arizona, though her representatives would not confirm exactly where, citing security concerns. CNN previously reported that Griner and her wife, Cherelle, had already made plans to move upon her return to the United States.\n\n“I also want to make one thing very clear: I intend to play basketball for the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury this season, and in doing so, I look forward to being able to say ‘thank you’ to those of you who advocated, wrote, and posted for me in person soon,” Griner said.\n\nThe two-time Olympic gold medalist was released last week in a prisoner swap after nearly 300 days in Russian custody.\n\nHer detention, after Russian officials found vape cartridges containing cannabis oil in her luggage, became an international cause during a tense time in relations between Washington and Moscow. US officials deemed it a wrongful detention.\n\nShe had traveled to Russia to play basketball in the WNBA offseason and was arrested on drug smuggling charges at an airport in the Moscow region on February 17.\n\nDespite her testimony that she had inadvertently packed the cannabis oil in her luggage, Griner was sentenced to nine years in prison in early August and was moved to a penal colony in the Mordovia republic in mid-November after losing her appeal.\n\nA delicate diplomatic dance between US and Russia\n\nThe Mercury center became a pawn in Russia’s war in Ukraine and returned to the US on December 9 after the prisoner swap for notorious convicted Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout.\n\nFor months, a delicate diplomatic dance played out between the US and Russia, which waged war in Ukraine. The US enacted sanctions in response to the conflict while diplomats kept open lines of communication with Moscow over prisoner negotiations.\n\nPresident Joe Biden said efforts to bring Griner home took “painstaking and intense negotiations.”\n\nIn a scene out of a spy thriller, the one-for-one prisoner swap occurred on a tarmac in Abu Dhabi on December 8.\n\nOnce on US soil, one of Griner’s first moves was a dunk on a Texas basketball court, according to Colas.\n\nShe donned a pair of black Chuck Taylor shoes, Phoenix Suns shorts and a T-shirt touting Title IX as she returned to the court after a long hiatus. Months ago, in pre-trial detention in Russia, Griner was offered a basketball and a hoop but declined to play, Colas said.\n\nGriner also got a haircut to clean up what family and friends jokingly called her “Russian fade.” Her long, signature dreadlocks were cut while in captivity as she continuously battled the flu because her wet hair kept freezing, according to Colas.\n\nA bittersweet return\n\nStill, her return has been somewhat bittersweet. Griner is heartbroken that Whelan is still detained, her agent said.\n\nWhelan is a US, Irish, British and Canadian citizen who is imprisoned in a Russian penal colony after he was arrested in December 2018 on espionage charges, which he has denied. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison.\n\nLike Griner, Whelan has been declared wrongfully detained by US officials.\n\nGriner is eager to use her power and influence to help others, especially Whelan, according to her agent.\n\n“She is thinking about his family and talked about her intention to call them as soon as she gets home,” Colas told CNN. “She’s really committed to telling this story and making sure that this population of wrongfully detained Americans, that people know their names.”\n\nGriner stayed at Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio for a week for routine evaluation. She stayed with her wife in a residential facility on the base. A Christmas tree decorated their living space.\n\n“I appreciate the time and care to make sure I was okay and equipped with the tools for this new journey,” she wrote on Instagram, referring to staff at the San Antonio base.\n\nHer arrest and conviction brought attention to the plight of other Americans in Russian custody, including Whelan and Trevor Reed.\n\nWhelan’s release could not be secured in the latest prisoner swap, while Reed returned to the US in April after a nearly three-year ordeal.\n\nThe Griner prisoner exchange prompted criticism from Republicans, who accused the Biden administration of releasing a dangerous prisoner back to Russia while not securing Whelan’s release.\n\nIn multiple engagements over the past weeks and months, Russian officials made clear that releasing Bout was the only way they would free Griner from her detention.\n\nHer flight to Arizona Friday is just one more step in her reintegration.\n\nShe opted into the Department of Defense’s post-isolation program, which other wrongfully detained Americans, including Reed, have participated in, according to Colas. The program focuses on helping formerly captive people regain a sense of control over their lives after lengthy detentions.", "authors": ["Abphillip Ray Sanchez", "Ray Sanchez"], "publish_date": "2022/12/16"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/04/europe/brittney-griner-trial/index.html", "title": "Brittney Griner: WNBA star sentenced to 9 years in Russian jail for ..."}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/08/politics/russian-prisoner-swap-brittney-griner-explainer/index.html", "title": "What to know about Brittney Griner's Russian detention and prisoner ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nWNBA star Brittney Griner on Thursday was freed from Russian detention after a prisoner exchange for convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout.\n\nGriner, a championship-winning player with the WNBA’s Phoenix Mercury who for years played for a Russian basketball team in the WNBA’s off-seasons, had been held in the country since February after she was arrested on drug possession charges at a Moscow airport.\n\nHer release comes nearly eight months after Trevor Reed, a former US Marine who had been detained in Russia since 2019, was released during a prisoner swap for Russian citizen Konstantin Yaroshenko. The Biden administration had been working to secure Griner’s release along with another American, Paul Whelan, who has been held by Russia for alleged espionage since 2018. CNN first reported in July that a potential deal for a prisoner exchange of Bout for Griner and Whelan had been offered by the Biden administration.\n\nHere is what we know about Griner’s detention and the prisoner exchange that resulted in her release.\n\nWhy was she jailed and where was she being held?\n\nGriner, 32, was arrested on February 17, 2022, after having less than a gram of cannabis oil in her luggage while at Moscow’s Sheremetyevo Airport and Russian authorities accused her of smuggling significant amounts of a narcotic substance, which the Russian government says is punishable by up to 10 years in prison.\n\nGriner’s lawyers told Russian judges during a hearing in July that the cannabis oil was medically prescribed for “severe chronic pain,” and not for recreational use. She pleaded guilty to the charges in July and one month later was convicted and sentenced to nine years in jail. Her attorneys appealed the conviction in October and asked for a more lenient sentence but a Russian judge upheld her conviction while modifying her sentence to count the time she spent in pretrial detention after her February 17 arrest.\n\nAfter being held in a detention center in Iksha, in November she was transferred to a penal colony in Yavas in the western Russian region of Mordovia.\n\nThere had been concern about the health and well being of Griner, who is Black and a lesbian, while detained in Russia. Though Russia decriminalized homosexuality in 1993, homophobia and discrimination still persists. On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law a bill that expanded anti-LGBTQ laws.\n\nConditions vary among Russian penal colonies, but political prisoners are often placed in harsh conditions where they can be subjected to “solitary confinement or punitive stays in psychiatric units,” according to a recent human rights report from the US State Department. Russian law also allows forced labor in penal colonies, and in some cases, inmates have been tortured to death, the report says. There also are reports of prison authorities recruiting inmates to abuse other inmates, the report also says.\n\nHow did her release come about?\n\nThe prisoner exchange with Griner was “completed successfully at Abu Dhabi Airport” on Thursday, Russian state media said. Saudi Arabia and the UAE said in a joint statement that the two countries were involved in joint mediation efforts leading to the prisoner swap.\n\nThe Biden administration had been working to secure Griner’s release in a two-for-one exchange with Whelan, but the Russians signaled recently that they were only willing to negotiate for Griner and not Whelan, a US official said. That is because Russia has been handling their cases differently based on what each person has been accused of. The Biden administration repeatedly made offers to get Whelan released as part of the deal with Griner, even after Russia made clear only Griner was acceptable.\n\nPresident Joe Biden gave final approval for the prisoner swap freeing Griner over the past week, an official familiar with the matter has told CNN, adding that the president was updated on the swap as it took place.\n\nA senior administration official also told CNN Griner’s release was the right deal to make, while adding that it was “the only deal we could make right now.”\n\nThe decision to exchange Griner for a figure nicknamed the “Merchant of Death” is controversial. Bout, a former Soviet military officer, was serving a 25-year prison sentence in the United States on charges of conspiring to kill Americans, acquire and export anti-aircraft missiles, and provide material support to a terrorist organization. Bout has maintained he is innocent.\n\nWhat’s next for Griner now that she has been released?\n\nGriner is expected to land in San Antonio, Texas, a US official told CNN.\n\nThough White House officials have said Griner is in “good spirits” she is likely to undergo a thorough medical evaluation. National Security Council strategic communications coordinator John Kirby told CNN on Thursday the first priority right now is “to make sure that she gets the adequate care she needs” after being detained and under “intolerable conditions.”\n\n“We suspect that there will be a need here for her to have access to proper health care before she’s ready and fit to get back home. I don’t think that that will take a very long time,” Kirby told CNN’s Kate Bolduan. “But again, that is going to be up to the doctors to work with the family on. That is going to be the main focus now, is just making sure that we look after her well being before she’s able to, you know, to get on her way.”\n\nWhat has Paul Whelan said?\n\nThe former marine who is a US, Irish, British and Canadian citizen and was detained at a Moscow hotel in December 2018 for allegedly being involved in an intelligence operation, on Thursday told CNN he was happy that Griner was released but that he “was led to believe that things were moving in the right direction, and that the governments were negotiating and that something would happen fairly soon.”\n\nSpeaking in an exclusive phone call from the penal colony where he is being held in a remote part of Russia, Whelan also told CNN he was surprised not to have been included in the swap with Bout and that he is “greatly disappointed” the Biden administration has not done more to secure his release.\n\n“I am greatly disappointed that more has not been done to secure my release, especially as the four year anniversary of my arrest is coming up. I was arrested for a crime that never occurred,” he said. “I don’t understand why I’m still sitting here.”", "authors": ["Chandelis Duster"], "publish_date": "2022/12/08"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/05/europe/brittney-griner-russia-jail-sentence-whats-next/index.html", "title": "Brittney Griner is facing a 9-year sentence in a Russian jail following ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nAfter a Russian court sentenced WNBA star Brittney Griner on Thursday to nine years in prison for a drug smuggling conviction, the player’s supporters, teammates and numerous US officials swiftly condemned the decision, many concerned her detention is being used to advance Russia’s agenda in the Ukraine war.\n\nNow, Griner has returned to the detention center where she was held during her weekslong trial as her lawyers vow to appeal the sentence and the Biden administration continues to try to negotiate for her release.\n\nRussian officials “are ready to discuss” the prisoners being held by both countries, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told journalists at a news conference Friday, according to Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.\n\n“There is a specified channel that has been agreed upon by the presidents, and no matter what anyone says publicly, this channel will remain in effect,” Lavrov said, according to RIA Novosti.\n\nDuring the trial, Griner pleaded guilty to carrying less than 1 gram of cannabis oil in her luggage as she traveled through a Moscow airport on February 17. She testified in court she was aware of Russia’s strict drug laws and had no intention of bringing cannabis into the country, saying she was in a rush and “stress packing.”\n\nHer lawyers had hoped Griner’s guilty plea and statements of remorse would result in a more lenient sentence. She faced 10 years for the charges, and prosecutors requested she be sentenced to 9.5 years in jail. In addition to her nine-year sentence, Griner must pay a fine of 1 million rubles, which is roughly $16,400.\n\n“I made an honest mistake and I hope that in your ruling that it doesn’t end my life here,” Griner said in court before the verdict. “I know everybody keeps talking about political pawn and politics, but I hope that that is far from this courtroom.”\n\nThe US State Department has classified Griner as wrongfully detained. The Biden administration has offered to trade a convicted Russian arms dealer in exchange for Griner and another American detainee, Paul Whelan, CNN has reported.\n\nAfter the verdict, Griner’s agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, tweeted, “Today’s sentencing of Brittney Griner was severe by Russian legal standards and goes to prove what we have known all along, that Brittney is being used as a political pawn.”\n\nPresident Joe Biden called the sentence “unacceptable” and demanded she be returned to the US to be reunited with her family, according to a statement.\n\nHere’s what comes next for Griner as she awaits her lawyers’ appeal and the US continues to negotiate for her release.\n\nLawyers will appeal ‘unreasonable’ verdict\n\nGriner’s legal team will file an appeal to the court’s decision, which it must do within 10 days of the verdict, according to her lawyers, Alexander Boykov and Maria Blagovolina, who is a partner at Rybalkin, Gortsunyan, Dyakin and Partners law firm.\n\n“We are very disappointed by the verdict. As legal professionals, we believe that the court should be fair to everyone regardless of nationality. The court completely ignored all the evidence of the defense, and most importantly, the guilty plea,” they said in a statement.\n\nThey called the verdict “absolutely unreasonable” and insisted the decision “contradicts the existing legal practice” in Russia.\n\nThe average time in jail for this type of crime is five years, adding that almost a third of those convicted get parole, Blagovolina told reporters.\n\nDuring the trial, the lawyers argued Griner’s detention was handled improperly. Griner testified she was made to sign documents she did not fully understand and was not given adequate translations of the Russian-language paperwork.\n\nA defense expert also testified the examination of the vape cartridges containing the cannabis oil did not comply with Russian law.\n\nUS has proposed prisoner swap for Griner’s return\n\nThe Biden administration has proposed a prisoner swap, offering to exchange a convicted Russian arms trafficker for Griner and Whelan, CNN has reported. Whelan, a US citizen and former Marine, was handed a 16-year prison sentence in 2018 on espionage charges after a trial the US deemed unfair.\n\nAfter Griner’s sentence, National Security Council coordinator John Kirby said it was “up to the Russian side” on whether the conviction will open the door for prisoner-swap negotiations.\n\nAfter the US proposed a prisoner swap, Russia countered by requesting convicted murderer Vadim Krasikov also be released, sources familiar with the discussions have told CNN. The US has not considered the counter as a legitimate proposal, in part because the request was made through an informal backchannel.\n\nKirby reiterated Thursday the US position remains it wants Russia to “take the deal on the table because it’s a good one, it’s a fair one, and it’ll help bring Paul (Whelan) and Brittney home.”\n\nWhile US officials have long opposed prisoner trades, the successful release in April of Trevor Reed, an American and former Marine who was imprisoned in Russia, garnered bipartisan praise from lawmakers and was considered a political win for the Biden administration.\n\nFamily and supporters continue to fight for her return\n\nBrittney Griner plays during the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. Ned Dishman/NBAE/Getty Images Griner was born in Houston on October 18, 1990. She is the youngest child of Raymond and Sandra Griner. Brittney Griner/Facebook A young Griner, then in seventh grade, drives a four-wheeler. Brittney Griner/Facebook Griner would attend Nimitz High School, where she broke nearly all the school's basketball records. Brittney Griner/Facebook Griner signs autographs while playing for Baylor University in Waco, Texas. Darren Carroll/Sports Illustrated/Getty Images Griner huddles with Baylor teammates during a Final Four game in 2010. Eric Gay/AP Griner goes up for the opening tip at the 2010 Final Four. Eric Gay/AP Griner celebrates after Baylor won the NCAA title in 2012. She was named the Final Four's Most Outstanding Player as Baylor went 40-0 on the season. Jamie Schwaberow/NCAA Photos/Getty Images Griner pumps her fist as President Barack Obama talks about her basketball skills in 2012. The Baylor team was visiting the White House. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images Griner plays against Iowa State in 2012. Greg Nelson/Sports Illustrated/Getty Images Griner huddles with teammates before a game in 2012. Greg Nelson/Sports Illustrated/Getty Images Griner's image is seen on a building in downtown Phoenix after the Phoenix Mercury chose her with the No. 1 pick in the 2013 WNBA draft. Christian Petersen/Getty Images Griner talks with the media after being drafted in 2013. Jesse D. Garrabrant/NBAE/Getty Images Griner takes a photo during the 2013 WNBA All-Star Game. Chris Marion/NBAE/Getty Images Griner blocks a Skylar Diggins shot during a WNBA game in 2014. Shane Bevel/NBAE/Getty Images Griner talks with a fan at Chase Field in Phoenix in 2014. Griner was throwing out the ceremonial first pitch for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Barry Gossage/NBAE/Getty Images Griner holds the WNBA championship trophy after Phoenix defeated Chicago in 2014. Jonathan Daniel/Getty Images Griner huddles with a group of kids during a WNBA Fit All-Star Clinic in 2015. Brian Babineau/NBAE/Getty Images Griner gets fired up before a playoff game in 2015. Barry Gossage/NBAE/Getty Images Griner high-fives Obama as the Mercury visited the White House in 2015. Olivier Douliery/Getty Images Griner plays against Spain at the Rio Olympics in 2016. Christian Petersen/Getty Images Griner poses for a selfie with fans in 2016. Christian Petersen/Getty Images Griner plays a WNBA game in 2018. Christian Petersen/Getty Images Griner reacts after hitting a 3-pointer in 2020. Julio Aguilar/Getty Images Griner takes a selfie with her teammates after they won Olympic gold in 2021. Mike Ehrmann/Getty Images Griner kisses her wife, Cherelle, after a playoff win in 2021. Ethan Miller/Getty Images A girl walks past a Griner mural in Phoenix in April. Griner was arrested in Russia in February. Rebecca Noble/The New York Times/Redux Griner arrives to a hearing at the Khimki Court outside Moscow in June. Her case raised concerns she was being used as a political pawn in Russia's war against Ukraine. The US State Department classified her as wrongfully detained. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images Griner sits inside a defendants' cage in August before she was sentenced to nine years of jail time. Evgenia Novozhenina/Pool/Reuters Griner's wife, Cherelle, sits with President Joe Biden as they talk with Griner on the phone after her release. This photo was tweeted on the president's account, saying about Griner: \"She is safe. She is on a plane. She is on her way home.\" On the right are Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken. White House Griner arrives in San Antonio after being released from Russian custody in exchange for convicted arms dealer Viktor Bout. She shared this photo on her Instagram a few days later. \"It feels so good to be home!\" she wrote. \"The last 10 months have been a battle at every turn. I dug deep to keep my faith and it was the love from so many of you that helped keep me going. From the bottom of my heart, thank you to everyone for your help.\" Miguel Negron/US Army South Griner hugs her wife, Cherelle, after landing in San Antonio. Miguel Negron/US Army South In pictures: WNBA star Brittney Griner Prev Next\n\nThe swap proposal follows months of pressure from Griner’s family and members of the basketball community.\n\nThe star’s wife, Cherelle Griner, has been outspoken about her desire for US officials to take more substantial action to bring her wife home. Days after Cherelle Griner expressed frustrations in an interview with CNN, Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris held a call with her to reassure her they were committed to securing her wife’s release, according to a White House call readout.\n\nGriner has also had the steady support of her WNBA team, the Phoenix Mercury, as well as other members of the basketball community.\n\nBefore the start of a game Thursday night between the Mercury and Connecticut Sun, members of both teams linked arms in the center of the court and held a 42-second moment of silence for Griner, who wears 42 on her jersey. After it ended, people in the crowd started chanting, “Bring her home! Bring her home!”", "authors": ["Elizabeth Wolfe Anna Chernova Masha Angelova Zahra Ullah", "Elizabeth Wolfe", "Anna Chernova", "Masha Angelova", "Zahra Ullah"], "publish_date": "2022/08/05"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/wnba/mercury/2022/07/20/brittney-griner-timeline-russia-detainment-trial/10061213002/", "title": "When was Brittney Griner detained? Full timeline from arrest to release", "text": "Brittney Griner is free.\n\nThe 10-month saga ended Thursday with President Joe Biden announcing her return to the United States in a prisoner swap with Russia. Griner attempted to enter Russia in February and instead wound up facing drug charges that carried a nine-year prison sentence in a penal colony.\n\nThe two-time Olympic gold medal winner and eight-time WNBA All-Star was \"wrongfully detained,\" according to the United States government, by Russia on charges of bringing vape cartridges filled with hashish oil in her luggage while returning to play for her professional team there.\n\nGriner remained in pre-trial detention for more than three months prior to her trial. On Aug. 4, she was officially convicted for drug possession and smuggling. Four months later, she was free.\n\nFREE: Brittney Griner released from Russian prison as part of prisoner exchange for Viktor Bout\n\nOPINION:The power of love: Cherelle Griner is biggest hero in Brittney Griner's release\n\nSPORTS NEWSLETTER:Sign up now for daily updates sent to your inbox\n\nHere is a timeline of events from Griner's arrest to the day she was released.\n\nFeb. 17: Griner stopped at airport\n\nAlthough the public would not know for more than two weeks, Griner is stopped by Russian authorities. Images later released showed her going through security at Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport while returning to play for her Russian professional basketball team, UMMC Ekaterinburg.\n\nGriner's arrest would not be made public for nearly three weeks. Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas) later said on March 9 that the arrest took place on Feb. 17.\n\nGRINER:Convicted on drug charges, sentenced to nine years in Russian prison\n\nVOICE TO THE VOICELESS:Mural features Brittney Griner, wrongfully detained Americans\n\nFeb. 24: Russia invades Ukraine\n\nAfter weeks of ramped up troop activity near the country's shared border, Russia begins a bloody invasion of Ukraine. In response, the U.S. has provided Ukraine with military support and levied economic sanctions on Russia.\n\nMarch 5: News breaks about Brittney Griner's arrest\n\nThe Russian Federal Customs Service says that they detained a \"professional basketball player, a member of the U.S. National Basketball Association, a two-time Olympic basketball champion in the U.S. team.\" Russian state news agency TASS identified the player as Griner.\n\nThe Russian Federal Customs Service maintains Griner carried vape cartridges filled with \"cannabis oil.\"\n\nThe WNBA, the Phoenix Mercury and USA Basketball all said they are monitoring the situation.\n\n'HOSTAGE DIPLOMACY':Potential Brittney Griner prisoner swap with Russia is promising and dangerous\n\nOPINION:Don't forget Brittney Griner, the WNBA star and Russian prisoner, is a person, too\n\nMarch 6: US government speaks about Griner\n\nAt a press briefing, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is asked about Griner's arrest for the first time.\n\n\"We have an embassy team that’s working on the cases of other Americans who are detained in Russia,\" Blinken said alongside Moldova President Maia Sandu. \"We’re doing everything we can to see to it that their rights are upheld and respected.\n\nWhen asked about Griner's case since, Blinken has referred generally to \"all detained Americans abroad.\"\n\nWHO IS VIKTOR BOUT?:Arms dealer and 'Merchant of Death' freed in exchange for Brittney Griner\n\nWHO IS PAUL WHELAN?:American remains imprisoned in Russia\n\nMarch 7: Cherelle Griner speaks out\n\nCherelle Griner, the wife of Brittney Griner, posts an emotional Instagram message thanking supporters and confirming Brittney Griner has been in Russia for weeks.\n\n\"My heart, our hearts, are all skipping beats every day that goes by,\" Cherelle Griner wrote. \"I miss your voice. I miss your presence. You’re our person! There are no words to express this pain. I’m hurting, we’re hurting. We await the day to love on you as a family.\"\n\nMarch 17: Pre-trial detainment extended\n\nRussian state media reported earlier in the day that Griner's pre-trial detention had been extended until May 19. A U.S. State Department official told USA TODAY Sports the embassy in Moscow was being denied consular access.\n\nMarch 23: Griner allowed to meet U.S. officials\n\nConsular access is finally granted and State Department spokesman Ned Price said Griner was \"in good condition.\"\n\n'BG IS FREE':Emotional reactions to Brittney Griner's release\n\nApril 27: Trevor Reed freed\n\nAn American considered \"wrongfully detained\" in Russia, ex-Marine Trevor Reed, is freed in a prisoner exchange. Griner and Paul Whelan remain in custody.\n\nReed appeared at a rally for Griner on June 9 in her hometown of Houston and advocated for the release of her and Whelan.\n\nMay 3: U.S. classifies Griner as 'wrongfully detained'\n\nThe U.S. State Department says that it has reclassified Brittney Griner as being \"wrongfully detained\" by the Russian government. Thus, Griner's case transfers to the Office of the Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs within the State Department.\n\nMay 6: WNBA season begins\n\nThe WNBA season begins on a bittersweet note. Teams display \"BG 42\" decals on courts and players wear \"We are BG\" shirts throughout the season.\n\nMay 25: Cherelle Griner on 'Good Morning America'\n\nCherelle Griner goes on \"Good Morning America\" and tells Robin Roberts she wants President Joe Biden to act and bring her wife home.\n\n\"I just keep hearing, 'He has the power,' 'she's political pawn,'\" Cherelle Griner said. \"If they're holding her because they want you (Biden) to do something then I want you to do it.\"\n\nMay 27: Brittney Griner detained 100 days\n\nThe 100th day of Brittney Griner's detention in Russia.\n\nJune 13: State Dept. officials meet with Mercury\n\nState Department officials, including those from the hostage affairs office, met with members of the Mercury concerning the Biden administration's efforts to secure her release.\n\nJune 27: Pre-trial detention extended 6 months\n\nA judge sets Griner's trial to begin that Friday. The charges Griner faces could carry a 10-year sentence.\n\nJuly 1: Trial begins\n\nRussian legal experts characterized the trial as a \"sham,\" but Griner's trial opened with two witness testimonies and the absence of two others.\n\nJuly 4: Griner's letter to Biden released\n\nRepresentatives for Griner shared a few lines from the hand-written note to Biden, including:\n\n″…As I sit here in a Russian prison, alone with my thoughts and without the protection of my wife, family, friends, Olympic jersey, or any accomplishments, I’m terrified I might be here forever,” Griner wrote.\n\nJuly 6: Biden, Harris call Cherelle Griner\n\nBiden and Vice President Kamala Harris speak by phone with Cherelle Griner.\n\n\"The president called Cherelle to reassure her that he is working to secure Brittney’s release as soon as possible,\" the White House said in a statement.\n\nJuly 7: Griner pleads guilty\n\nGriner pleaded guilty to the drug charges, saying she had accidentally packed the cartridges into her luggage.\n\n\"I'd like to plead guilty, your honor. But there was no intent. I didn't want to break the law,\" Griner said in English, per Reuters.\n\nThe guilty plea was also a tool to secure a more lenient sentence, according to experts.\n\nJuly 14: Griner receives support in courtroom\n\nIn court again, Griner at one point held up a photo of fellow WNBA players wearing her name and No. 42 on their uniforms in tribute during part of the 2022 All-Star Game.\n\nThe captain and general manager of UMMC Ekaterinburg also testified on behalf of Griner's character.\n\nJuly 15: Lawyer argues Griner allowed to use marijuana\n\n“The attending physician gave Brittney recommendations for the use of medical cannabis,” said her lawyer, Maria Blagovolina. “The permission was issued on behalf of the Arizona Department of Health.”\n\nJuly 26: Brittney Griner's lawyers argue for cannabis use\n\nGriner's lawyers questioned a narcologist who said cannabis could be used to treat chronic pain. Her team did not dispute that she should not have brought the vape cartridges and that they were accidentally packed.\n\nJuly 27: U.S. makes 'substantial' offer for prisoner swap\n\nSecretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States made a proposal to bring home Griner and Paul Whelan, an American who has been in Russian custody since 2018 and is serving a 16-year sentence on espionage charges the U.S. disputes.\n\nCNN reported that the U.S. offered Viktor Bout, a Russian arms dealer nicknamed \"The Merchant of Death,\" for the prisoner swap.\n\n\"There is utility in sending clear, direct messages to the Russians on key priorities for us,\" Blinken said. \"These include the return of Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan, and following through on the grain agreement.\"\n\nJuly 29: Blinken speaks with Russian Foreign Minister\n\nFor the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine, Blinken connected with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. It was a \"frank and direct conversation\" regarding the release of Griner and Whelan. Lavrov and Russia responded by suggesting the U.S. keep the negotiations private.\n\nAug. 2: Prosecutors call narcotics expert\n\nGriner's defense has pointed to a doctor's recommendation for medicinal cannabis use as to why Griner accidentally packed the cartridges. However, the state responded by calling on a narcotics expert who analyzed a sample of what authorities said they discovered.\n\nAug. 4: Griner convicted of drug possession and smuggling\n\nGriner's six-month saga came to an end on Aug. 4 when she was officially convicted of drug possession and smuggling following a trial that lasted a little over a month. Russian prosecutors asked that she receive 9½ years in prison, and she was sentenced to nine years behind bars.\n\nSept. 5: Day 200 of detention\n\nGriner filed an appeal after her sentencing and remains in her pre-trial detention facility in Moscow.\n\nOct. 25: Appeal denied\n\nGriner's appeal of a nine-year prison sentence for drug possession was rejected by a Russian court. Griner did not appear in court, but appeared via video link from a penal colony where she is now housed.\n\nNov. 3: Griner meets with U.S. Embassy Officials\n\nThe White House says that that Griner met with U.S. embassy officials and that the government \"made a significant offer to the Russians to resolve the current unacceptable and wrongful detentions of American citizens.\"\n\n“We are told she is doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said.\n\nNov. 9: Griner's move to penal colony announced\n\nGriner's legal team announced Russia began moving Griner to a remote penal colony where she will begin serving her nine-year sentence while the U.S. continues to work for her release.\n\nU.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken tweeted, “We strongly protest the movement of Brittney Griner to a remote penal colony and the Russian government’s use of wrongful detentions. I am committed to bringing home Brittney Griner and Paul Whelan as soon as possible.”\n\nDec. 8: Brittney Griner freed\n\nCBS News first reported that Russia and the U.S. had agreed to a prisoner swap, and President Biden later announced that Griner was freed and on her way back to the U.S.\n\nIn exchange, the U.S. released Bout back to Russia.\n\nFrom the White House, Cherelle Griner said: “Today I’m just standing here overwhelmed with emotion. But the most important emotion I have right now is sincere gratitude for President Biden and his entire administration.”\n\n\"We never forgot about Brittney,\" Biden said. \"I'm glad to be able to say Brittney is in good spirits. She's relieved to finally be heading home, and the fact remains that she's lost months of her life, experienced a needless trauma. She deserves space, privacy and time with her loved ones to recover and heal from her time being wrongfully detained.\"\n\nContributing: Scooby Axson.\n\nFollow Chris Bumbaca on Twitter @BOOMbaca.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/07/20"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/18/sport/brittney-griner-birthday-russia-prison-appeal-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "Brittney Griner releases message on her 32nd birthday: 'All the ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nEight months on from her detainment in Moscow, Brittney Griner is celebrating her 32nd birthday in a Russian jail instead of with her family.\n\nThe American basketball star released a message on Tuesday, saying she had been buoyed by the support she has received, according to a statement shared by Maria Blagovolina, a partner at Rybalkin, Gortsunyan, Dyakin and Partners law firm.\n\n“Thank you everyone for fighting so hard to get me home. All the support and love are definitely helping me,” Griner said in her message, according to the statement.\n\nGriner’s attorneys, Maria Blagovolina and Alexander Boykov, spent a few hours with Griner on Tuesday and relayed numerous birthday wishes to her, the statement said.\n\nThe basketball player’s wife Cherelle Griner and others close to the basketball player have launched the #WeAreBG campaign to put pressure on the US governement and other parties to bring her home.\n\nIn a video released as part of the campaign Cherelle said, “I’ve felt every moment of the grueling seven months without her.”\n\nShe thanked those who have supported the cause as well as specifically mentioning Joe Biden saying, “I want to thank President Biden for the Administration’s efforts to secure her release.”\n\nCherelle Griner has met with US President Joe Biden in her attemps to free her wife. Nam Y. Huh/AP\n\nGriner was detained in February when entering Russia for possession of cannabis oil. The center pleaded guilty to drug charges, saying that she accidentally packed vape cartridges containing cannabis oil when in a hurry.\n\nIn August, the eight-time WNBA All-Star was convicted and sentenced to nine years in prison. Next week her legal team will appeal the decision to the Moscow region court.\n\nAfter her arrest, U.S. State Department classified Griner as wrongfully detained, meaning that regardless of her legal status in Russia, the US government will seek to negotiate her release.\n\nIn July, it was announced by the US government that they had made a “substantial proposal” to bring Griner and Paul Whelan, a former US marine serving a 16-year sentence in Russia, back to the US.\n\nBut since that announcement there has been little information on moves made to release the two-time Olympic gold medalist and the US Embassy in Russia has not had consular access to Griner since early August, State Department spokesperson Ned Price confirmed last week.\n\nEuropean teams reportedly pay upwards of $1 million per season, far more than what they make in the WNBA Stacy Revere/Getty Images\n\nGriner’s friends and family have sought to renew the support and pressure to bring her home with the #WeAreBG campaign.\n\nHer USA teammate Breanna Stewart wrote on Twitter, “We are not a family without #BrittneyGriner. It’s time to BRING HER HOME. #WeAreBG. Today marks eight months of her Wrongful Detention. She needs her family now more than ever. BG - we have not forgotten you, and we will not rest until you’re home.”\n\nThe tweet followed a FIBA World Cup victory that, if she was not in prison, Griner would have been a part of.\n\nStewart, along with Griner’s USA teammates and other WNBA players have also shown solidarity with the Pheonix Mercury player by boycotting playing in Russia during the WNBA offseason.\n\nPlayers regularly ply their trade for European teams during the offseason to supplement their WNBA salaries, with many like Griner and Stewart having played for teams in Russia.\n\nBut this year, players have instead opted to play in different European countries.\n\nCourtney Vandersloot who has previously played with Griner at the Russian club team Yekaterinburg said: “The whole situation with BG makes it really hard to think that it’s safe for anyone to go back there right now.”\n\nOther American athletes such as Alex Morgan have shown their support on social media by posting images of them wearing an image of Griner on her shirt.\n\nIn addition to asking people to join the movement and petition to free Griner, the #WeAreBG campaign has also asked people to write notes for Griner as they hope that this will be the last birthday she celebrates in prison.", "authors": ["Alasdair Howorth"], "publish_date": "2022/10/18"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/11/us/brittney-griner-us-arrival-sunday/index.html", "title": "As Brittney Griner visits a medical facility in Texas, one of the Citgo 6 ..."}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_4", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:39", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_5", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:39", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/16/politics/title-42-blocked-whats-next-explainer-cec/index.html", "title": "What is Title 42 and what happens next at the border? | CNN Politics", "text": "This story has been updated. An earlier version was published in November.\n\nCNN —\n\nThe future of Title 42, and the situation at the US-Mexico border, remains in limbo for now.\n\nThe Supreme Court said Tuesday that the controversial Trump-era border restriction will remain in effect while legal challenges play out, a move that ensures federal officials will be able to continue to swiftly expel migrants at US borders at least for the next several months.\n\nThe high court stepped in days before Title 42 was set to end earlier this month after an emergency appeal filed by a group of Republican-led states.\n\nThat means the public health restrictions remain in effect – for now – as the court weighs arguments from the states and responses from the Biden administration and the American Civil Liberties Union.\n\nHere’s a look at some of the key questions and answers about Title 42’s history, what the court is weighing, what’s happening on the ground and what could happen next.\n\nWhat is Title 42?\n\nIn the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a public health order that officials said aimed to stop the spread of Covid-19. The order allowed authorities to swiftly expel migrants at US land borders. The policy is widely known as Title 42, for the portion of US code that allowed the CDC director to issue it.\n\nMigrants encountered under Title 42 are either expelled to their home countries or into Mexico. Under the policy, authorities have expelled migrants at the US-Mexico border nearly 2.5 million times in less than three years, according to US Customs and Border Protection data.\n\nIn a ruling last month, US District Judge Emmet Sullivan ordered the government to end the “arbitrary and capricious” policy. He granted a request for a five-week reprieve, setting a deadline of December 21.\n\nNow after an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court from 19 GOP-led states, that deadline is on hold pending further legal review.\n\nThe Biden administration is continuing to prepare for the policy’s end, a White House official said earlier this month.\n\n“While this stage of the litigation proceeds, we will continue our preparations to manage the border in a safe, orderly, and humane way when the Title 42 public health order lifts,” the Department of Homeland Security said.\n\nHow could lifting Title 42 change what’s happening at the border?\n\nOfficials predict that lifting Title 42 is likely to spur a significant increase in the number of migrants trying to cross into the US.\n\nLast month the Department of Homeland Security was projecting between 9,000 to 14,000 migrants may attempt to cross the US southern border daily when Title 42 ends, more than double the current number of people crossing, according to a source familiar with the projections.\n\nThere’s no doubt Title 42 has become a policy officials frequently turn to at the border, but it’s not the only way migrants’ cases are handled. A CNN analysis of 10 months of data earlier this year found that the public health restrictions were applied in about 50% of migrant encounters at the southwest border.\n\nImmigrants from Haiti, who crossed through a gap in the US-Mexico border barrier, wait to be processed by the U.S. Border Patrol on May 20, 2022, in Yuma, Arizona. Mario Tama/Getty Images\n\nIf Title 42 is lifted, the way migrants are processed at the border would go back to how it was before 2020. Under that system, migrants are either removed from the country, detained or released into the US while their cases make their way through immigration court.\n\nBut officials have also been weighing the possibility of implementing additional policies. Among them: a proposal that would bar migrants from seeking asylum at the US-Mexico border if they could have received refuge in another country they passed through on their journey, mirroring Trump-era asylum limits.\n\nIs there a connection between Title 42 and what’s been happening in El Paso?\n\nEl Paso Deputy City Manager Mario D’Agostino told reporters two weeks ago that about 2,500 migrants were crossing the border there daily.\n\nAt this point there isn’t any known connection between the rise in crossings there and the looming end of Title 42.\n\nBut El Paso officials say they’re worried what they’re seeing now at the border will only intensify once the policy is lifted.\n\nMigrants warm themselves by a fire next to the US-Mexico border fence in El Paso, Texas, on Thursday, December 22. John Moore/Getty Images Children from Colombia camp with their family alongside the El Paso border fence on December 22. John Moore/Getty Images Migrants run into the street after crossing into the United States through a hole in an El Paso fence on December 22. Allison Dinner/AFP/Getty Images Clothes are left behind on the razor wire of an El Paso border fence on December 22. Carlos Barria/Reuters A member of the Texas National Guard walks along the Rio Grande on December 22. Carlos Barria/Reuters A group of migrants wait on the US side of the Rio Grande after the Texas National Guard blocked access to parts of the border on December 20. David von Blohn/CNN Venezuelan immigrant Yaneisi Martinez weeps while embracing her three children after the Texas National Guard and state police blocked a popular border crossing area in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, on December 20. John Moore/Getty Images The Texas National Guard and state troopers line the bank of the Rio Grande on December 20. John Moore/Getty Images Members of the Texas National Guard stand along the bank of the Rio Grande on December 20. David von Blohn/CNN A US Border Patrol agent in El Paso instructs immigrants who had crossed the Rio Grande on December 19. John Moore/Getty Images A group of migrants cross the Rio Grande into the United States on December 19. David von Blohn/CNN Migrants sleep in the cold outside a bus station in El Paso on December 18. John Moore/Getty Images Migrants wait to enter a shelter at the Sacred Heart Church in El Paso on December 17. John Moore/Getty Images Migrants wait in line to be taken in by US Border Patrol on December 15. Adriana Zehbrauskas for CNN Carlos Pavon Flores, with 1-year-old daughter Esther, stands outside a shelter that turned them away for not having bus tickets in downtown El Paso on December 14. Adriana Zehbrauskas for CNN A group of migrants from Venezuela and Nicaragua rest at a shelter in downtown El Paso on December 14. Adriana Zehbrauskas for CNN Migrants, mostly from Nicaragua, are seen from Ciudad Juarez, along the shore of the Rio Grande and below the US border wall on December 13. Paul Ratje/The New York Times/Redux After crossing the Rio Grande, migrants line up near the border wall to turn themselves in to US Border Patrol agents on December 13. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters Migrants walk near the border wall between Ciudad Juarez and El Paso on December 13. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters A member of the Mexican army watches migrants on December 12. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters Migrants line up at the entrance of a bus station in El Paso on December 12. Paul Ratje/The New York Times/Redux \"Look at the vast numbers increased in the past couple of weeks, especially the last three to four days,\" El Paso Deputy City Manager Mario D'Agostino told the city council there. \"Those numbers are unsustainable, and that's with Title 42 in place. So we can only imagine what that Title 42 lift is going to do on top of everything else.\" Ivan Pierre Aguirre/Reuters A migrant from Venezuela and his daughter look out the window after arriving at a federal shelter in Ciudad Juarez on December 11. Omar Ornelas/El Paso Times/USA Today Network Migrants cross the Rio Grande on December 11. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters Migrants ride a bus on their way to the United States to request asylum on December 11. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters Migrants keep warm next to fires while waiting in line in El Paso on December 11. Paul Ratje/The New York Times/Redux A young migrant girl carries a doll on a bus in Jimenez, Mexico, while she tries to reach the United States to request asylum on December 10. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters Migrants ride aboard a box trailer as they travel to the US border on December 10. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters In pictures: El Paso sees surge in border crossings Prev Next\n\nD’Agostino said already what his city is seeing is different than past surges of migrants across the border\n\nBefore, D’Agostino said, increases in migrant populations crossing the border were gradual and over a series of months. This time, he said, it has been rapid and over a few days.\n\n“Our infrastructure cannot keep up,” he said.\n\nWhy is Title 42 controversial?\n\nThe border restrictions were controversial from the moment the Trump administration announced them. Immigrant rights advocates argued officials were using public health as a pretext to keep as many immigrants out of the country as possible. Public health experts also slammed the policy, saying it wasn’t justified by the circumstances.\n\nIn April, the policy became a political lightning rod and a topic of fierce debate as the Biden administration announced plans to end it. But ultimately, the policy remained in place after a federal judge in Louisiana blocked the administration’s plans to roll it back.\n\nDebate resurged after Sullivan’s November ruling, and again several weeks later as word spread of the increasing number of migrants crossing in El Paso.\n\nMigrants cross the Rio Grande near El Paso, Texas, on Sunday. Officials say the city is bracing for the end of Title 42 next week. Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuters\n\nThose who support Title 42 point to border arrests as they argue how essential the pandemic policy has been for blocking illegal immigration. Those who oppose the policy argue official statistics about encounters at the border inflate the severity of the situation, because the data include people crossing the border multiple times. They argue Title 42 has actually caused more border crossings.\n\nThe GOP-led states trying to block the lower court from ending the policy argue they’ll suffer “irreparable harm” and be forced to spend more money on law enforcement, education and healthcare if Title 42 is lifted. They told the Supreme Court that a “crisis of unprecedented proportions” would unfold at the border if the court failed to issue a stay while justices considered the case.\n\nThe DC Circuit US Court of Appeals on Friday had denied the states’ request to intervene, ruling that they waited an “inordinate” amount of time before trying to wade into the case. Now the Supreme Court will weigh those states’ claims and responses from the government and the American Civil Liberties Union, which is representing migrant families in the case.\n\nWho has been subjected to Title 42?\n\nEarlier this year, Title 42 drew attention when authorities at first were using it to turn away Ukrainians at the border, then largely started granting exceptions that allowed thousands of Ukrainians seeking refuge to cross.\n\nAdvocates argued a racist double standard was at play as many migrants from Central America and Haiti continued to be turned back under the policy. Federal officials denied that accusation and said each exemption is granted on a case-by-case basis.\n\nIn August, CNN’s analysis found that migrants from outside Mexico and the Northern Triangle countries of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador were far less likely to be subjected to Title 42.\n\nBut for some migrants, that’s started to change in recent months. Nearly 6,000 Venezuelan migrants were expelled under Title 42 in October after the Biden administration announced a new policy toward migrants from the South American nation.\n\nAdvocates say for many of those who are expelled, the situation is dire.\n\nSince Biden took office, Human Rights First says it’s identified more than 13,000 incidents of kidnapping, torture, rape or other violent attacks on people blocked or expelled to Mexico under Title 42.\n\nWhere does the Biden administration stand on Title 42?\n\nThe Biden administration has sent mixed messages on Title 42. It has criticized Title 42 and vowed to end its use at the border, but more recently came to rely on the policy.\n\nMany advocates expected President Biden would lift the order as soon as he took office, given his campaign promises to build a more humane immigration system. Instead, his administration extended the policy more than a year into his presidency and defended it for months in court.\n\nIn April 2022, the administration announced plans to end the policy, stating that it was no longer necessary given “current public health conditions and an increased availability of tools to fight Covid-19.”\n\nAfter the federal judge in Louisiana blocked that effort, the Justice Department vowed to appeal.\n\nBut in October, facing mounting political pressure over a marked increase in migrants crossing the border, the administration announced it was expanding the use of Title 42 to expel Venezuelans into Mexico.\n\nNow once again officials say they’re preparing for the policy to end. But they’re also appealing the federal judge’s recent ruling, arguing that public health restrictions limiting migration are legal.\n\nWhatever happens next is sure to face intense political scrutiny.\n\nAlready the increasing number of migrants crossing in El Paso in recent weeks are intensifying debate over the border once again.", "authors": ["Catherine E. Shoichet"], "publish_date": "2022/11/16"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/01/politics/immigration-title-42-repeal-cdc/index.html", "title": "Title 42: Biden administration announces official end to restrictions ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe Biden administration will end Trump-era pandemic restrictions that effectively blocked migrants from entering the United States on May 23, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Friday.\n\nFormer President Donald Trump invoked a public health authority, known as Title 42, at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, a move that was immediately met with skepticism by immigrant advocates, public health experts, and even officials within the administration who believed it to be driven by political motivations. Yet the Biden administration continued to lean on Title 42 despite objections from its allies.\n\n“In consultation with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), this termination will be implemented on May 23, 2022, to enable DHS time to implement appropriate COVID-19 mitigation protocols, such as scaling up a program to provide COVID-19 vaccinations to migrants and prepare for resumption of regular migration under Title 8,” the CDC said in a highly anticipated announcement.\n\n“After considering current public health conditions and an increased availability of tools to fight COVID-19 (such as highly effective vaccines and therapeutics), the CDC Director has determined that an Order suspending the right to introduce migrants into the United States is no longer necessary,” the agency added.\n\nMigrant families and single adults will continue to be turned away at the US-Mexico border until that date, barring exceptions.\n\nThe lifting of the pandemic-restrictions is expected to have immediate ramifications and would mean a return to traditional immigration protocols that have been in place for decades.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security is preparing for a worst-case scenario of up to 18,000 people trying to cross the border daily, a number sure to overwhelm the already full border facilities.\n\nThe department is preparing temporary facilities to handle an increase of people, deploying hundreds of officers to assist, and leveraging partnerships with other federal agencies, among other measures. This week, DHS also began offering Covid-19 vaccines to migrants encountered at the US-Mexico border and is expected to grow that program in the coming weeks.\n\nWith the lifting of Title 42, migrants might be detained or removed if they don’t have an asylum claim. Migrants may also be released into the US while they go through their immigration proceedings, and if released, might be enrolled in alternative detention programs for continued monitoring.\n\n“Once the Title 42 Order is no longer in place, DHS will process individuals encountered at the border pursuant to Title 8, which is the standard procedure we use to place individuals in removal proceedings,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement Friday.\n\n“Nonetheless, we know that smugglers will spread misinformation to take advantage of vulnerable migrants. Let me be clear: those unable to establish a legal basis to remain in the United States will be removed,” he added.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional background information and reaction.", "authors": ["Priscilla Alvarez"], "publish_date": "2022/04/01"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/27/politics/supreme-court-title-42/index.html", "title": "Supreme Court says Trump-era border restriction will remain in ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe Supreme Court said Tuesday that the controversial Trump-era border restriction known as Title 42 will remain in effect while legal challenges play out, a move that ensures that federal officials will be able to continue to swiftly expel migrants at US borders at least for the next several months.\n\nThe 5-4 order is a victory for Republican-led states that urged the Supreme Court to step in and block a lower court opinion that ordered the termination of the authority. The Biden administration has said it was prepared for the authority to end and had put in place precautions to guard against confusion at the border and any potential surge of migrants.\n\nIn its order, the court also agreed to take up the states’ appeal this term. The court said it would hear arguments on the case during its argument session that begins in February 2023.\n\nJustices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan said they’d deny the application, but they did not explain their thinking. Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch also dissented and explained his thinking in an order joined by liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.\n\nGorsuch said he does “not discount the States’ concerns” about border security. But Gorsuch noted that Title 42 was put in place to combat Covid-19, and “the current border crisis is not a Covid crisis.”\n\n“Courts should not be in the business of perpetuating administrative edicts designed for one emergency only because elected officials have failed to address a different emergency,” Gorsuch wrote.\n\nSince March 2020, Title 42 has allowed US border agents to immediately turn away migrants who have crossed the southern border in the name of Covid-19 prevention.\n\nImmigrant advocates and public health experts have long denounced use of the public health authority along the US southern border, arguing it was an inappropriate pretext for barring migrants from entering the United States. In nearly three years, the authority has been used over 2 million times to turn migrants away, according to US Customs and Border Protection.\n\nAt the border, migrants have been waiting in encampments in Mexico for months, anticipating the end of the authority so they can make their claim of asylum in the US. Immigrant advocates have tried to disseminate updates and information to migrants, but desperation has grown, especially as temperatures drop.\n\nEl Paso, Texas, has been at the center of the crisis as thousands of migrants have crossed that region of the border. The city opened government-run shelters at its convention center, hotels and several unused schools to care for migrants, though some have still had to sleep on the streets in cold temperatures.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security has been putting in place a plan for the end of the authority that includes surging resources to the border, targeting smugglers and working with international partners.\n\n“We will continue to manage the border, but we do so within the constraints of a decades-old immigration system that everyone agrees is broken. We need Congress to pass the comprehensive immigration reform legislation President Biden proposed the day he took office,” the department said in a statement.\n\nThe White House said it would comply with the order.\n\n“Today’s order gives Republicans in Congress plenty of time to move past political finger-pointing and join their Democratic colleagues in solving the challenge at our border by passing the comprehensive reform measures and delivering the additional funds for border security that President Biden has requested,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.\n\nAsked to respond to the ruling, President Joe Biden told reporters his administration will enforce the Trump-era immigration restriction, even if he thinks it’s past time to revoke it.\n\n“The court is not going to decide until June apparently, and in the meantime we have to enforce it – but I think it’s overdue,” Biden told reporters on the White House South Lawn.\n\nSolicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar acknowledged to the Supreme Court last week that returning to traditional protocols along the border will pose a challenge, but said there’s no longer a basis to keep the Covid-era rules in place.\n\n“The government in no way seeks to minimize the seriousness of that problem. But the solution to that immigration problem cannot be to extend indefinitely a public-health measure that all now acknowledge has outlived its public-health justification,” Prelogar wrote in a filing with the Supreme Court.\n\nLawyers for the American Civil Liberties Union, who are representing families subject to Title 42, had in arguments underscored the dangers faced by asylum seekers subject to the authority and sent back to Mexico.\n\nLee Gelernt, the lead counsel for the plaintiffs in the case, told CNN in a statement that they are “deeply disappointed” by the ruling, but will continue to fight to end the policy.\n\n“We are deeply disappointed for all the desperate asylum seekers who will continue to suffer because of Title 42, but we will continue fighting to eventually end the policy,” Gelernt said.\n\nSteve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at the University of Texas School of Law, called the order “procedurally bizarre.”\n\n“This order is procedurally bizarre, in that it agrees to a request to freeze a district court ruling by states that weren’t even parties to that decision solely to decide whether they should have been allowed to intervene and defend that ruling on appeal,” Vladeck said. “Title 42 aside, that has enormous potential consequences for the ability of states going forward to fight to keep the current president from rescinding policies of her predecessors.”\n\nThe GOP-led states had argued that they’d be harmed by the lifting of the authority because of the influx of migrants entering the United States.\n\n“The border crisis that Respondents bizarrely and eagerly seek to cause would also inflict enormous harms to the States,” a filing, submitted last Wednesday, reads.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional reporting.", "authors": ["Ariane De Vogue Priscilla Alvarez", "Ariane De Vogue", "Priscilla Alvarez"], "publish_date": "2022/12/27"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/14/politics/biden-administration-prepares-surge/index.html", "title": "Biden administration prepares for surge of migrants ahead of the ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nAs administration officials considered a border proposal reminiscent of the Trump era this month, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer called Ron Klain, President Joe Biden’s chief of staff, with concerns, according to three sources with knowledge of the call.\n\nThe call – one of many that have come in from lawmakers to the White House – was indicative of the politically precarious position for Biden as officials try to fend off Republicans pounding the administration over its handling of the border and appease Democrats concerned about barring asylum seekers from the US.\n\nThe Biden administration now faces a December deadline to terminate a public health authority, known as Title 42, that was invoked at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic and allowed officials to turn away migrants encountered at the US southern border – putting immigration back at the forefront.\n\nThe termination of the authority is expected to lead to an increase in border crossings since authorities will no longer be able to quickly expel them as has been done since March 2020.\n\nDuring the call between Schumer and Klain, the Senate majority leader raised concerns about the administration’s preparation for the looming termination and whether officials were indeed considering a new asylum policy, according to two sources with knowledge of the call.\n\nSchumer and Klain speak regularly and often daily or more in critical moments like the year-end legislative sprint currently underway. But the border issue’s emergence in discussion provides a window into a complex policy and political moment.\n\nSchumer, a New York Democrat who has long pressed the administration to terminate Title 42, is far from alone. Administration officials have received a steady stream of calls from lawmakers as well as state and local officials, reflecting often sharply divergent views on the merits of the authority, people familiar with the matter said. The calls, however, all echoed consistent concerns about the termination of Title 42 and what it will mean along the border in recent weeks.\n\nIt’s a dynamic that has played out as the Biden administration intensively prepares for a moment officials have long grappled with how to navigate. To some degree, it’s the latest phase of an effort that has long been underway, with officials keenly aware since the opening days in office that at some point the pandemic-era policy would come to an end. Personnel and technology infrastructure have been directed to key entry points, with increased levels and resources expected to be announced in the days ahead.\n\nAsked about concerns inside the administration about the potential for a surge at the border once Title 42 goes away, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre listed off a series of personnel, processing and infrastructure efforts that have been put into place.\n\n“We’re going to do the work, we’re going to be prepared, and we’re going to make sure we have a humane process moving forward,” Jean-Pierre told reporters Tuesday at the White House briefing.\n\nStill, the cross-cutting viewpoints on border policy have converged with the significant diplomatic component tied to managing a rapid shift in the countries of origin of the migrants apprehended at the border, one that has added a new layer of difficulty for the administration.\n\nThroughout, administration officials have stressed that the only viable long-term solution will come from congressional action, noting encouragement with a bipartisan framework released in the Senate last week.\n\nAccording to sources familiar with the discussions, however, the long-shot bipartisan immigration deal led by Sens. Thom Tillis, a North Carolina Republican, and Kyrsten Sinema, who recently announced that she is leaving the Democratic party and registering as an independent, is essentially dead this Congress.\n\nThe framework, which would have extended protections for Dreamers and extended Title 42, was unlikely to build momentum in the brief lame-duck session.\n\nCNN has reached out to Tillis’ and Sinema’s offices for comment.\n\nDespite a legal process that remains up in the air, officials are deep into preparation as they stare down ominous signs of what may come next.\n\nAlready, over the weekend, more than 2,400 migrants crossed into the United States each day in only one section of the border, according to a senior Border Patrol official, marking what he described as a “major surge in illegal crossings” in the El Paso, Texas, sector.\n\nHomeland Security officials have described the mood within the administration as concerned and worried about an influx in the near term.\n\nBorder planning underway\n\nIn the face of losing Title 42 and amid concerns of a surge, officials have weighed what immigrant advocates have described as a draconian approach by creating hurdles for migrants seeking asylum in the United States. The asylum proposal was included in a memo sent from the Department of Homeland Security to the White House, one source told CNN.\n\nWhite House officials have also been in daily conversations with DHS officials about planning, sources told CNN. The National Security Council, which has been heavily involved in migration management amid mass movement across the Western hemisphere, has also played a critical role, sources said.\n\n“The team has been working really hard to ensure we’re taking steps to manage the expiration of Title 42 and put in place a process that’s orderly and humane. And we believe in doing so, we can protect our security concerns,” national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Monday.\n\nIf adopted, the asylum proposal would be reminiscent of a policy put in place during the Trump administration that dramatically limited the ability of migrants to claim asylum in the US if they resided or traveled through other countries prior to coming to the US. No decision has been made on the proposal.\n\nAdministration officials have also set other plans in motion in anticipation of a surge of migrants when Trump-era Covid restrictions are lifted this month following a court order blocking the use of Title 42. The legal fight intensified this week when 19 Republican-led states asked a federal appeals court to rule on their request to suspend the termination of the policy by Friday, according to a court filing.\n\nSince March 2020, when the authority was invoked, border officials have turned away migrants at the US-Mexico border more than two million times.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security is preparing temporary facilities to process migrants, including in El Paso, as well as discussing ways to return non-Mexican migrants to Mexico through existing legal mechanisms aside from Title 42, according to two Homeland Security officials who stressed there’s been hourslong meetings daily to plan for an influx of migrants.\n\nIn a document outlining border security preparedness and obtained by CNN, DHS broke down its six-pillar plan, which was released in the spring and has since been updated. It includes scaling up ground and air transportation capabilities to transport migrants for processing and remove them, leaning on a CBP One mobile application to process asylum seekers, and increasing referrals for prosecutions for repeat border crossers, the document said.\n\nIn it, DHS also stressed the need for congressional action to update outdated statutes and help create a functioning asylum system, as the current one is under immense strain.\n\nBut just days away from the anticipated end of Title 42, plans are still being sorted out.\n\n“The 21st (is) going to be a disaster. There are so many things in the pipeline, but nothing is ready (to) go,” one official said, referring to December 21 when Title 42 is set to end.\n\nHomeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas underscored the whole of government approach in a statement, noting that mass movement of people around the globe has posed a uniquely difficult challenge.\n\n“Despite our efforts, our outdated immigration system is under strain; that is true at the federal level, as well as for state, local, NGO, and community partners. In the absence of congressional action to reform the immigration and asylum systems, a significant increase in migrant encounters will strain our system even further,” he said.\n\n“Addressing this challenge will take time and additional resources, and we need the partnership of Congress, state and local officials, NGOs, and communities to do so,” he added.\n\nDemocratic Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, however, has called Title 42 critical and criticized what he called a “whack a mole” approach to the issue.\n\n“If there’s a surge in the valley, they’ll move people down there. If there is more people crossing let’s say, Del Rio, Eagle Pass they’ll move agents over there. Now they’re moving agents to El Paso. This is not the way to secure the border,” Cuellar said Wednesday on “CNN This Morning,” adding a call for Biden to visit the border and see the situation for himself.\n\n“I don’t know why they keep avoiding the border and saying there’s other things more important than visiting the border,” he said. “If there’s a crisis, show up. Just show up.”\n\nMajor surge in arrivals expected\n\nOfficials have already been contending with thousands of migrants crossing the border daily and expect those numbers to increase in the coming days and weeks, overwhelming already-strained resources.\n\nCNN previously reported that DHS is preparing for multiple scenarios, including projections of between 9,000 to 14,000 migrants a day, more than double the current number of people crossing.\n\nOver the weekend, US border authorities apprehended more than 16,000 people, US Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz said on Twitter. Among the cities seeing an influx in migrants is El Paso, which has previously grappled with a surge of migrants.\n\nEl Paso city officials said Tuesday they’re monitoring the situation and are in ongoing discussions with federal, state, and local partners. Mayorkas also visited El Paso on Tuesday where he met with the Customs and Border Protection workforce and local officials.\n\nThe Biden administration is also asking Congress for more than $3 billion as it prepares for the end of Title 42, according to a source familiar with the ask.\n\nThe request is intended to shore up resources for border management and technology and is part of broader funding discussions. It is not specific to the end of Title 42, the source said.\n\n“If Republicans in Congress are serious about border security, they would ensure that the men and women of the Department of Homeland Security have the resources they need to secure our border and build a safe, orderly, and humane immigration system,” White House spokesperson Abdullah Hasan said in a statement.\n\nOther border cities are also bracing for an influx of arrivals, including Laredo, Texas.\n\nCuellar, who represents Texas’ 28th District, told CNN he’s in close touch with the city of Laredo about preparations, adding that the city may bus migrants to other locations as they’ve done in the past if nonprofits can’t handle the influx of arrivals.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional developments.", "authors": ["Priscilla Alvarez Phil Mattingly", "Priscilla Alvarez", "Phil Mattingly"], "publish_date": "2022/12/14"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/10/politics/title-42-joe-biden-white-house-migration-concerns/index.html", "title": "White House officials growing anxious over anticipated surge of ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nWhite House officials are increasingly anxious about an expected migrant surge at the end of May coinciding with the repeal of a restrictive Trump-era border policy that has let them turn people away.\n\nThe political fallout over the Biden administration’s decision to terminate a Trump-era pandemic restriction, known as Title 42, on the US-Mexico border has put into sharp focus the precarious position for the White House – between its goals to welcome immigrants and weighing using drastic Trump-era policies to try to stem the flow of migrants arriving at the border.\n\n“People are worried about where this is going and weathering the storm,” a source familiar with discussions told CNN.\n\nOne source who is in regular contact with senior-most administration officials about immigration policy said concern at the White House about the situation at the border has only grown as the midterm elections approach – and all the more so in recent days after the announcement that Title 42 will officially end in May.\n\n“It was always going to be hard,” the person said, “and now they’re closer to the midterms.”\n\nAnother source close to the White House described a “high level of apprehension” in recent weeks.\n\n“They watch the border numbers every day,” the person said. “They’re very aware of what the situation is at the border.”\n\nWhite House chief of staff Ron Klain and President Joe Biden’s domestic policy adviser Susan Rice – two powerful political voices in the administration – are among the top administration officials who have been intimately involved in discussing the situation.\n\nA political minefield\n\nIssues related to the US-Mexico border and the entry of migrants into the country have long been politically fraught for both Republican and Democratic administrations.\n\nBiden, who campaigned against Trump-era immigration policies, has received heated criticism from Republicans for his handling of border enforcement. But he’s also faced pushback from inside his own party for continuing to implement some of his predecessor’s policies that are unpopular with progressives.\n\nWhite House press secretary Jen Psaki highlighted the administration’s plans in a Thursday press briefing, saying: “I would note the Department of Homeland Security also put together a preparedness plan to continue addressing irregular migration that involves surging personnel and resources to the border, improving border processing, implementing mitigation measures and working with other countries in the hemisphere to manage migration.”\n\nIn the span of a year, Biden has already grappled with a record number of unaccompanied migrant children at the US southern border and thousands of primarily Haitian migrants who camped in deplorable conditions under a bridge in Del Rio, Texas. Those incidents – which were used as fodder for Republicans looking to criticize the administration – are still fresh on the minds of officials bracing for busy weeks ahead.\n\n“We can’t have another Del Rio happen to us,” US Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz said last month.\n\nAvoiding that, though, might include the continued use of policies the administration has repeatedly criticized, like the Trump-era “remain in Mexico” policy that requires non-Mexican migrants to stay in Mexico until their US immigration court date. The policy, which restarted late last year after a court ruling, marked an unprecedented departure from previous protocols. Even so, the end of one Trump-era policy may give away to another growing in numbers.\n\n“We will employ much greater numbers post-Title 42,” a Homeland Security official recently told reporters, referring to the “remain in Mexico” policy, which is formally called Migrant Protection Protocols.\n\n“We are under a court order to reimplement MPP in good faith and as part of those good faith efforts, we have been systematically increasing our enrollment under MPP,” the official added.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security has twice issued a memo trying to terminate the “remain in Mexico” policy, outlining its shortcomings and arguing it puts migrants in harm’s way, but the court ruling forced the administration to restart the policy. The administration is appealing the ruling.\n\nAs of April 3, nearly 2,000 people have been sent back to Mexico under the policy, according to the International Organization for Migration. That number is expected to grow, though given long-processing times and numerous other safeguards the administration has tried to implement, it’s unlikely to expand enough to stem the flow of migrants\n\nTens of thousands of migrants could surge to the border once restrictions lift\n\nStill, Republicans and some Democrats have expressed concern over the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s decision to revoke Title 42 next month, arguing that it’s a reckless decision amid pent-up demand to come to the US among migrants who are facing deteriorating conditions at home.\n\nIntelligence assessments have found that people are in a “wait and see” mode and trying to determine when they have the best likelihood of entry into the US, according to a federal law enforcement official, adding that some of the 30,000 to 60,000 people could seek entry within hours if the CDC rule is repealed.\n\nThe White House has held interagency meetings about the intelligence and the situation more broadly, the official said.\n\nBy pulling back Title 42, the administration is returning to the usual operating procedures that have been in place for decades for processing migrants. That includes releasing migrants who claim asylum into the US, sometimes under an alternative form of detention, or detaining migrants and deporting them back to their home country.\n\nBut given conditions in Latin America, which was hit particularly hard by the coronavirus pandemic, more migrants may want to journey to the US southern border.\n\n“As a result of the CDC’s termination of its Title 42 public health order, we will likely face an increase in encounters above the current high levels. There are a significant number of individuals who were unable to access the asylum system for the past two years, and who may decide that now is the time to come,” US Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Chris Magnus said in a statement.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security released detailed plans for varying scenarios that could unfold at the US-Mexico border in the coming weeks.\n\nThree planning scenarios have been devised to trigger what resources might be needed. The first scenario is where current arrest figures are, the second scenario is up to 12,000 people a day and the third scenario is up to 18,000 people a day, according to a planning document.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security has set up a “Southwest Border Coordination Center” to coordinate a response to a potential surge among federal agencies. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas appointed FEMA Region 3’s regional administrator, MaryAnn Tierney, in March to head the center.\n\nAs part of the preparation, CBP has deployed 400 agents from other parts of the US border to assist operations on the southern border, increased number of Immigration and Customs Enforcement personnel to assist in processing migrants, called on volunteers in the DHS workforce, and contracted to move thousands of migrants if need be.\n\nCBP is also preparing to add new temporary facilities to alleviate any overcrowding. According to the DHS planning document, CBP holding facilities can hold over 16,000 migrants and expand to 17,000 with additional facilities opening in early April. Existing contracts can also be expanded to meet needs if there are up to 30,000 migrants in custody in a worst-case scenario.\n\nBut despite those plans, some Democrats are wary about moving forward with a return to the usual protocols on the border. Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, who is up for reelection, doubled down on his opposition to reversing Title 42.\n\n“Senator Warnock believes in protecting the humanity of migrants at the border, but before this policy is rescinded, the Administration should present a plan for how it will ensure our border security has the manpower, infrastructure, humanitarian and legal resources they need to prevent this policy change from making an already dire humanitarian situation worse,” a spokesperson for Warnock said in a statement.", "authors": ["Priscilla Alvarez Mj Lee", "Priscilla Alvarez", "Mj Lee"], "publish_date": "2022/04/10"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/border-issues/2023/01/01/what-is-title-42-border-immigration-policy/69764253007/", "title": "What is Title 42? The US border policy, explained", "text": "Leer en español\n\nThe pandemic-era border restriction known as Title 42, which has been used to rapidly expel migrants more than 2 million times, continues to be in place after nearly three years and two failed attempts to rescind the policy.\n\nThe U.S. Supreme Court recently blocked the Biden administration from lifting the controversial health policy that was first invoked under the Trump administration in March 2020. The restriction allows border officials to swiftly expel migrants seeking asylum at the nation's borders and shutter ports of entry.\n\nHere are some answers to your questions about Title 42.\n\nWhat is the Title 42 policy at the border?\n\nTitle 42 is a rarely used section of the U.S. Code dating back to 1944 that relates to public health and welfare. Under section 265 of the code, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is allowed to prohibit the entry of non-citizens into the country if they believe there’s a “serious danger” of the introduction of the communicable disease into the U.S.\n\nTitle 42 was first invoked under the Trump administration during the pandemic in March 2020, with the reasoning it would mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in immigration facilities.\n\nThe policy, however, has continued to be used under the Biden administration as a tool to manage migration flows at the southern border even as the public health emergency has subsided.\n\nIs Title 42 still in effect?\n\nYes, Title 42 continues to be enforced at the country's borders.\n\nThe policy will remain in place until the Supreme Court issues a final ruling, which could come in early summer. The high court will hear arguments in the case in February.\n\nWhat does it mean for Title 42 to be lifted?\n\nIn the meantime, the extension of the policy buys the Biden administration more time to prepare for Title 42's eventual expiration. Administration officials stressed that preparations were underway in the weeks leading up to the Dec. 21 deadline but failed to release any official plans.\n\n“We are advancing our preparations to manage the border in a secure, orderly, and humane way when Title 42 eventually lifts and will continue expanding legal pathways for immigration,\" White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a written statement.\n\nPotential end: Title 42 limits on migration could be ending. What could happen next?\n\nOn Dec. 27, the high court ruled that the border restriction must continue as it weighs the arguments in the case.\n\nTitle 42 was set to lift on Dec. 21 but was allowed to remain in use by a last-minute order by Chief Justice John Roberts. The order stemmed from a request by an Arizona-led coalition of 19 conservative states that asked the court to intervene in the case.\n\nIn the ruling, the justices announced they would limit their review to whether the coalition of states was allowed to intervene in the case.\n\nHow did Title 42 get to the Supreme Court?\n\nOn Nov. 15, U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan in Washington, D.C., vacated the policy and gave the Biden administration five weeks to prepare for the end of the restriction, slating the restriction for a Dec. 21 end.\n\nThe Biden administration subsequently appealed Sullivan's order, focusing on the authority of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to issue orders regulating migration.\n\nFederal judge blocks Title 42: Judge blocks border health policy, expulsion of migrants\n\nAfter Sullivan's ruling, Arizona, alongside a coalition of other Republican-led states, filed a motion to intervene in the case in an effort to delay the end of Title 42. In the motion, the states argued that the Biden Administration had \"abandoned their defense\" of Title 42 by only asking for a five-week stay.\n\nA federal appeals court then rejected a bid from the group of Republican states to intervene in the case, clearing a path for the litigation to head to the Supreme Court.\n\nOn Dec. 19, two days before Title 42 was set to expire, the Arizona-led coalition of states filed an emergency appeal to the Supreme Court, asking the high court to keep Title 42 in place.\n\n“Getting rid of Title 42 will recklessly and needlessly endanger more Americans and migrants by exacerbating the catastrophe that is occurring at our southern border,” Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich, a Republican, said in a news release announcing the emergency request.\n\nThat same day, the Supreme Court then issued a temporary stay on the restriction before ordering the policy to remain in place on Dec. 27,\n\nHow does Title 42 affect the Arizona border?\n\nTitle 42 has been applied differently in Arizona's two Border Patrol sectors.\n\nIn the Tucson sector, which covers 262 miles between New Mexico and Yuma County, about 60% of encounters ended with a Title 42 expulsion thus far in fiscal year 2023, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection data.\n\nIs Border Patrol ready?Is Border Patrol ready? US officials offer few details on plans when Title 42 policy lifts\n\nIn the Yuma sector, fewer than 5% of encounters ended with a Title 42 expulsion.\n\nThe differences are mainly related to the nationality of the migrants apprehended.\n\nThe number of migrants Border Patrol agents must process will “likely be double or greater” once Title 42 is lifted, placing further strain on the agency, according to a September U.S. Department of Homeland Security Office of Inspector General report.\n\nThe report documented that “guidance to agents on when Title 42 goes away is scarce” and there are no plans for what processing alternatives could be used when the border restriction ends. The report found that Border Patrol is “unprepared” to meet the increase in processing and placement burdens.\n\nWho does Title 42 apply to?\n\nThe order has been used more than 2.4 million times in encounters with migrants. The restriction has bottled up tens of thousands of migrants in Mexican border communities who are waiting for their chance to request asylum in the U.S.\n\nFor nearly three years, the policy has been used to rapidly expel migrants and asylum seekers to Mexico or their home countries.\n\nPorts of entry have turned away asylum-seeking migrants for nearly three years, with few exceptions granted through humanitarian parole. With official ports closed, many migrants have resorted to requesting asylum between ports of entry, often taking more remote and dangerous routes.\n\nThis has led to hundreds of asylum seekers presenting themselves to Border Patrol agents daily on the Cocopah Reservation near Yuma where the border wall ends.\n\nWhy are some migrants not expelled under Title 42?\n\nTitle 42 has been primarily applied to migrants from Mexico, Venezuela and the Northern Triangle countries of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. Under agreements with Mexican government authorities, nationals from these countries can be can be sent back across the land border to Mexico.\n\nAll other nationalities, except for Ukrainians, are subject to be sent back to their home country or to a country that has agreed to receive them.\n\nBorder rhetoric: 'Border invasion' becomes talk of GOP candidates. Here's what to know\n\nStill, migrants from other countries are less likely to be rapidly deported under Title 42 because of frosty U.S. relations with their home countries, such as Cuba and Nicaragua.\n\nIn October, the Biden administration expanded the scope of Title 42 to include Venezuelan migrants, a population that had been exempt from the restriction. The announcement included plans for a humanitarian program that would allow up to 24,000 Venezuelans into the country, given they have a supporting sponsor in the U.S. and after completing a rigorous application process.\n\nSometimes border officials cannot immediately expel migrants to Mexico or their countries of origin under the policy, such as unaccompanied children who are exempt from the restriction.\n\nHow does Title 42 affect asylum seekers?\n\nMigrants have decried Title 42 as it has impeded their ability to seek asylum in the U.S. while they’re fleeing violence, threats and economic instability in their home countries. Advocates have criticized the policy that has forced asylum seekers to wait in Mexican border communities for months, facing discrimination and dangerous conditions at the hands of organized crime.\n\nUncertainty remains:Migrants remain in limbo as border health restriction’s future remains uncertain\n\nMexican cartels and criminal organizations have repeatedly preyed on the vulnerable migrant population that is stranded in Mexico to fuel their lucrative profits. If migrants are expelled under Title 42, they’re swiftly thrust back into the clutches of the awaiting cartels and coyotes, sometimes, in a matter of hours.\n\nThe nonprofit Human Rights First has documented more than 13,000 reports of “murder, torture, kidnapping, rape” and other violent attacks against migrants expelled to Mexico under Title 42 since Biden first took office.\n\nThe continuation of Title 42 has forced asylum seekers to remain in a limbo of perilous conditions as they await their opportunity to seek asylum.\n\nWhat have Arizona leaders said about Title 42?\n\nMost of Arizona's local and state leaders have opposed the lifting of the policy without a comprehensive plan in place as they've all emphasized the need for long-term immigration reforms.\n\nArizona Sens. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., and Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., have detailed worries about how the expiration of the policy would strain humanitarian organizations and border officials. Incoming Gov.-elect Katie Hobbs has criticized the Biden administration for planning to lift the restriction without any official preparations in place.\n\n'Overwhelming':As Title 42 policy winds down, community leaders on border detail preparations\n\nThe border-area mayors of Yuma, Douglas and Nogales, Ariz., have echoed the state leaders and urged the federal government to bring them to the table to discuss viable solutions at the border.\n\nSanta Cruz County Sheriff David Hathaway, whose county includes Nogales, has long been critical of Title 42 and has described the policy as \"ridiculous.\" Still, Hathaway stressed that reforms to the country's immigration system are needed to address the underlying issues.\n\nWhat happened when Title 42 was ending in May?\n\nIn April, the CDC determined that the public health order was no longer necessary after considering the array of mitigation measures and the low community levels of COVID-19 nationwide. Their public health assessment found that 97% of the U.S. population lives in counties with low levels of COVID-19.\n\nTitle 42 repeal blocked in May:Judge's ruling blocking the repeal of Title 42 divides Arizona politicians, communities\n\nCDC officials announced Title 42 would be terminated on May 23 to \"enable the Department of Homeland Security to implement appropriate COVID-19 protocols.\"\n\nIn May, a federal judge in Louisiana blocked the Biden administration from rescinding Title 42, leaving the policy in place.\n\nU.S. District Judge Robert Summerhays, from the Western District of Louisiana, placed the temporary restraining order to stop the administration from moving forward. His decision stemmed from a lawsuit filed by Brnovich, along with 20 other Republican attorneys general, in April.\n\nHave a news tip or story idea about the border and its communities? Contact the reporter at josecastaneda@arizonarepublic.com or connect with him on Twitter @joseicastaneda.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/01/01"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/19/politics/title-42-supreme-court-gop-states/index.html", "title": "Title 42 to remain in place for now as Chief Justice John Roberts ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nSupreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts on Monday put a temporary hold on the termination of a controversial Trump-era immigration policy known as Title 42 that was set to end on December 21, leaving it in place for now.\n\nBut in a brief order Roberts signaled that the court wants to act quickly and asked the Biden administration to respond by 5 p.m. ET Tuesday to an emergency appeal filed by a group of Republican-led states.\n\nThe brief order from Roberts means the policy that allows officials to swiftly expel migrants at the US border will stay in effect at least until the justices decide the emergency application. The order does not necessarily reflect the final outcome of the case.\n\nThe states had raced to the Supreme Court earlier in the day in an emergency bid to keep in place a Trump-era immigration policy that is set to go off the books Wednesday.\n\nA federal district court judge had vacated the policy last month, calling Title 42 “arbitrary and capricious.” The judge said the program could remain in effect until December 21.\n\nAlready, federal officials and border communities have been bracing for an expected increase in migrant arrivals as early as this week, as the issue of immigration continues to ignite both sides of the political divide. The Department of Homeland Security has been putting in place a plan for the end of the program that includes surging resources to the border, targeting smugglers and working with international partners.\n\n“As required by the Supreme Court’s administrative stay order, the Title 42 public health order will remain in effect at this time and individuals who attempt to enter the United States unlawfully will continue to be expelled to Mexico,” the department said in a statement following Roberts’ order. “While this stage of the litigation proceeds, we will continue our preparations to manage the border in a safe, orderly, and humane way when the Title 42 public health order lifts.”\n\nArizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich – who took the lead for the states – said in a statement earlier Monday that “getting rid of Title 42 will recklessly and needlessly endanger more Americans and migrants by exacerbating the catastrophe that is occurring at our southern border,” adding: “Unlawful crossings are estimated to surge from 7,000 per day to as many as 18,000.”\n\nBrnovich had told the justices in court papers that they should put the lower court ruling on hold. As an alternative, he said that the justices should grant an “immediate” temporary injunction to maintain the status quo and also consider whether to skip over the appeals court and agree to hear arguments on the merits of the issue themselves.\n\n“Failure to grant a stay here will inflict massive irreparable harms on the States, particularly as the States bear many of the consequences of unlawful immigration,” Brnovich argued.\n\nLate Friday night, the DC Circuit US Court of Appeals ruled against the states, holding that they waited an “inordinate” amount of time before trying to get involved in the case. That order triggered the emergency application at the high court, which was addressed to Roberts, who oversees the DC-based appellate appeals court that ruled in the case.\n\nRoberts is likely to refer the matter to the full court.\n\n“This is a longstanding problem, more people are fleeing persecution, gang violence, failed states and climate change than ever before,” said Stephen Yale-Loehr of Cornell Law School, who has been critical of the policy. “Even without Title 42, we would have more people than ever before trying to enter the United States,” he added.\n\n“Title 42 is not an effective way to manage our borders, instead, we need to both enact immigration reform in the United States and work with other countries so that people don’t feel so desperate to leave in the first place,” Yale-Loehr said.\n\nIn the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a public health order that officials said aimed to stop the spread of Covid-19. The border restrictions were controversial from the moment the Trump administration announced them.\n\nIn the case at hand, six families that unlawfully crossed the US-Mexico border and were subject to the Title 42 process brought the original challenge.\n\nIn court papers, their lawyers at the American Civil Liberties Union argue that Covid-19 was always a thinly veiled pretense to increase immigration control. “There is no legal basis to use a purported public health measure to displace the immigration laws long after any public health justification has lapsed,” said Lee Gelernt, an ACLU lawyer representing the migrant families in the suit.\n\nThe Biden administration objects to the states’ attempt to intervene in the ongoing dispute and has said it is prepared to allow the program to end, but stresses it is still appealing the district court opinion to preserve the authority of the government to impose public health orders in the future.\n\nWhite House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said earlier Monday that the administration would have more details Tuesday on its plans ahead of the rule’s planned expiration and reiterated the US would continue to enforce its immigration laws amid the current influx.\n\nInside the White House, the pause on the termination will not have any effect on what have been intensive behind-the-scenes preparations for the end of the authority, according to a White House official.\n\nWhile the Department of Homeland Security serves as the lead agency on the issue, it has been a central focus for the last several weeks inside the West Wing, with senior White House officials playing a significant role in the internal debates over policy options to address an expected surge of migrants at the border. There are no plans to slow the ongoing effort, the official said, given the possibility any delay is only brief in nature.\n\n“We’ve always been aware of the role the courts have in this process, but it’s not something that changes the approach,” the official said.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional details.", "authors": ["Ariane De Vogue"], "publish_date": "2022/12/19"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/13/politics/title-42-biden-us-mexico-border/index.html", "title": "Judge hears arguments on Biden administration ending Covid ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nA federal judge in Louisiana grappled on Friday with whether the Biden administration can end a controversial Trump-era pandemic restriction, known as Title 42, later this month.\n\nThe public health authority at the center of the case allows officials on the US-Mexico border to turn migrants back to Mexico or their home countries because of the public health crisis – an unprecedented move invoked at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.\n\nSince taking office, President Joe Biden’s administration has continued to rely on the authority, but in early April the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced plans to terminate the order. The CDC said it’s no longer necessary given current public health conditions and the increased availability of vaccines and treatments for Covid-19. The policy is scheduled to end on May 23.\n\nIn a more than two-hour hearing on Friday morning, states that brought a lawsuit against the decision to terminate the authority emphasized the costs, such as health care, to states if the authority ends and potentially more migrants are released into the US. They also argued the administration didn’t go through notice and comment, a regulatory procedure.\n\n“They have no idea what the harms are to the states,” said Arizona Deputy Solicitor General Drew Ensign, who argued on behalf of the more than 20 states.\n\nThe Justice Department, meanwhile, stressed the emergency nature of the order and the CDC’s authority to invoke or terminate it.\n\n“States don’t seriously challenge the public health determination,” said Justice Department attorney Jean Lin, adding that there’s no basis to use Title 42 as a safety valve.\n\nJudge Robert Summerhays, who presided over the hearing, occasionally jumped in during arguments and largely focused his questions on the harm to the states and whether the administration followed proper procedures, noting that emergency conditions have changed, potentially allowing for outside input.\n\nLin argued the CDC must have the ability to stay flexible and respond promptly.\n\nSummerhays said he’d take the matter under consideration and rule before May 23, when the administration intends to end Title 42.\n\n“Today was a great day,” Louisiana Deputy Solicitor General Scott St. John said following the hearing. “The judge asked very thoughtful questions.”\n\nStates push back\n\nThe CDC’s decision to wind down Title 42 received fierce criticism from Republicans and Democrats alike over whether ending the authority is justified and whether officials are prepared to handle an expected increase in migrants at the border. On Capitol Hill, Democrats are grappling with whether to allow a vote on Title 42 as they try to pass stalled Covid-19 aid.\n\nArizona, Louisiana and Missouri – whose lawsuit was before the judge on Friday – took the fight over Title 42 to court last month, arguing proper procedures hadn’t been followed when the administration announced an end to the policy and that the administration hadn’t provided a satisfactory explanation for ending it.\n\nMore than a dozen states, mostly GOP-led, joined the suit, all similarly arguing that ending the authority and potentially releasing more migrants into the US would strain state resources.\n\nLate last month, Summerhays issued a temporary restraining order in the lawsuit against the Biden administration’s decision to end the authority. The states asked for an extension in light of that order expiring.\n\nSummerhays granted the extension this week, meaning the Biden administration is prevented from winding down the public health order until the court’s decision on the case or May 23, when the administration planned to end Title 42.\n\nThe Biden administration has argued the pandemic landscape has given way to ending the public health authority and that the order was an extraordinary measure.\n\nThe end of the authority would mean a return to traditional immigration protocols that have been in place for decades. Under that system, migrants are either removed from the country, detained or released into the US while their cases make their way through immigration court.\n\nChildren play as families live in tents at a shelter in in Tijuana, Mexico, that houses refugee migrants seeking asylum in the US. Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images\n\nHomeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas recently told House lawmakers that the Biden administration’s preparations for the US-Mexico border when pandemic restrictions lift are ongoing, conceding that there’s likely to be an influx of migrants when that happens.\n\n“With the Title 42 public health order set to be lifted, we expect migration levels to increase, as smugglers seek to take advantage of and profit from vulnerable migrants,” Mayorkas said during a House panel hearing. “We will continue to enforce our immigration laws.”\n\nHe outlined the six pillars of those plans, ranging from surging resources to the southern border to cracking down on transnational criminal organizations.\n\nArizona and Texas bus migrants to DC\n\nStill, Republicans have slammed the administration. Arizona’s Republican Gov. Doug Ducey announced on Wednesday that the state will bus migrants encountered at the Arizona-Mexico border to Washington, DC, following the lead of Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.\n\nArizona, like Texas, has been grappling with an influx of migrants at the shared border with Mexico and has criticized the Biden administration for wanting to terminate Title 42.\n\nDucey cited a strain of resources as among the reasons for offering voluntary transportation to Washington.\n\n“With Arizona community resources under all-time demand, and little action or assistance from the federal government, individuals who entered Arizona seeking asylum have the opportunity to voluntarily be transported to Washington, D.C. The transportation will include meals, and onboard staffing and support,” according to a news release.\n\nLast month, Texas began busing migrants arrested at the border and released pending their immigration court proceedings to Washington on a voluntary basis. Migrants who spoke to CNN said they planned to continue to other cities in the US upon arriving in Washington and were grateful for the transportation.\n\nLocal organizations have been assisting migrants dropped off at Union Station by helping them to their next destinations or providing any services they may require.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional developments Friday.", "authors": ["Priscilla Alvarez"], "publish_date": "2022/05/13"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/20/politics/supreme-court-title-42/index.html", "title": "Title 42: Biden administration wants Supreme Court to allow Trump ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe Biden administration told the Supreme Court Tuesday that the justices should reject an emergency bid by a group of GOP-led states to keep the controversial Trump-era border restriction known as Title 42 in effect while legal challenges play out.\n\nBut it also asked for the court to delay the ending of Title 42 until at least December 27, citing ongoing preparations for an influx of migrants and the upcoming holiday weekend.\n\nThe administration said that the states, led by Arizona, do not have the legal right to challenge a federal district court opinion that had vacated the program and ordered its termination by Wednesday.\n\nChief Justice John Roberts temporarily froze that deadline on Monday, and asked the parties involved in the lawsuit, the Justice Department and the American Civil Liberties Union, to weigh in.\n\nUntil the Supreme Court issues an order – which can come at any time, although the court has no deadline – the authority will remain in place.\n\nSince March 2020, Title 42 has allowed US border agents to immediately turn away migrants who have crossed the southern border illegally, all in the name of Covid-19 prevention. There have been nearly 2.5 million expulsions – mostly under the Biden administration, which has been bracing for an influx of arrivals if the authority lifts.\n\nThe last-minute legal wrangling comes as federal officials and border communities have been bracing for an expected increase in migrant arrivals as early as this week as the issue of immigration continues to ignite both sides of the political divide. The Department of Homeland Security has been putting in place a plan for the end of the program that includes surging resources to the border, targeting smugglers and working with international partners.\n\nIn court papers Tuesday, Solicitor General Elizabeth Prelogar stressed that it would be highly unusual for the court to allow the states to step in at the last minute when they had not been an official party in the dispute at hand.\n\n“The government recognizes that the end of the Title 42 orders will likely lead to disruption and a temporary increase in unlawful border crossings,” Prelogar wrote.\n\nVideo Ad Feedback Large group of migrants cross into El Paso 02:46 - Source: CNN\n\n“The government in no way seeks to minimize the seriousness of that problem. But the solution to that immigration problem cannot be to extend indefinitely a public-health measure that all now acknowledge has outlived its public-health justification,” she wrote.\n\nLawyers for the ACLU, who are representing families subject to Title 42, also urged the justices to deny the states’ appeal.\n\n“The record in this case documents the truly extraordinary horrors being visited on noncitizens every day by Title 42 expulsions,” Lee Gelernt, a lawyer for the families, wrote.\n\n“The States’ argument effectively boils down to an assertion that Title 42 – with no hearings and no access to asylum – is a better immigration control system from their perspective than the actual immigration statutes that Congress has enacted,” Gelernt added. “But again, that is a choice for Congress.”\n\nPreparing for end of Trump-era authority\n\nThe White House has been preparing for Title 42 to end, expecting a flow of migrants crossing the US-Mexico border. In the Del Rio sector, for example, officials predicted that the number of migrant encounters could double from 1,700 a day to 3,500 a day when Title 42 ends, straining overwhelmed resources in a remote area of the border.\n\nDespite the freeze from Roberts’ Monday decision, the administration is moving forward with planning, CNN has reported.\n\n“We’re going on as if nothing’s changed,” a senior US Customs and Border Protection official told CNN, adding that policy discussions are still underway to provide other legal pathways to Nicaraguans, Haitians and Cubans who make up a large number of encounters.\n\nA group of migrants are waiting on the US side of the Rio Grande as the Texas National Guard blocked access to parts of the border with barbed wire and vehicles as seen from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico con 20 December 2022. David von Blohn/CNN\n\nA DHS spokesperson told CNN in an email that officials along the southern border have moved over 9,000 migrants out of El Paso over the last week. US Border Patrol has also moved nearly 6,000 other migrants through to other sectors, the spokesperson said, and migrants have been placed in immigration proceedings “in addition to several measures that have been put in place over the last six months as part of the DHS Plan for Southwest Border Security and Preparedness.”\n\nCNN’s Ed Lavandera, reporting from El Paso on Tuesday, described soldiers from the Texas National Guard deploying fence and barbed wire in areas where migrants have been crossing. The city’s Democratic mayor has declared a state of emergency and the city is looking for warehouse space to use as temporary shelter.\n\nJust across the border from El Paso in Ciudad Juarez, CNN’s David Culver has spoken with migrants who spent weeks traveling hundreds of miles, often on foot, and are now confused as they hope for asylum in the US.\n\nAs for what happens on Wednesday if the expiration is still on hold, one official said there may be a “mini surge.”\n\n“I think there’s some that probably haven’t gotten the message and won’t until they cross,” the official said. “There are some already committed who will cross.”\n\nLate Friday night, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled against the states, holding that they waited an “inordinate” amount of time before trying to get involved in the case. That order triggered the emergency application at the high court, which was addressed to Roberts.\n\nArizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich – who took the lead for the states – said Monday that “getting rid of Title 42 will recklessly and needlessly endanger more Americans and migrants by exacerbating the catastrophe that is occurring at our southern border,” adding: “Unlawful crossings are estimated to surge from 7,000 per day to as many as 18,000.”\n\nVideo Ad Feedback A Texas shelter works overtime trying to keep up with the surge in migrants crossing the U.S. border 04:07 - Source: CNN\n\nBrnovich had told the justices in court papers that they should put the lower court ruling on hold. As an alternative, he said that the justices should grant an “immediate” temporary injunction to maintain the status quo and also consider whether to skip over the appeals court and agree to hear arguments on the merits of the issue themselves.\n\n“Failure to grant a stay here will inflict massive irreparable harms on the States, particularly as the States bear many of the consequences of unlawful immigration,” Brnovich argued.\n\nIn the case at hand, six families that unlawfully crossed the US-Mexico border and were subject to the Title 42 process brought the original challenge.\n\nIn court papers, the ACLU previously argued that Covid-19 was always a thinly veiled pretense to increase immigration control. “There is no legal basis to use a purported public health measure to displace the immigration laws long after any public health justification has lapsed.”\n\nMeanwhile, although the Biden administration objects to the states’ attempt to intervene in the ongoing dispute and has said it is prepared to allow the program to end, it is still appealing the district court opinion to preserve the authority of the government to impose public health orders in the future.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional details.", "authors": ["Ariane De Vogue"], "publish_date": "2022/12/20"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/16/politics/biden-immigration-crisis-title-42/index.html", "title": "Everyone can now agree -- the US has a border crisis | CNN Politics", "text": "CNN —\n\nA pointless argument battered Washington for much of this year over whether the southern US border is in crisis. But no one is now doubting the chaos and potential migrant surge that could be triggered by an imminent policy shift next week.\n\nThe expiry on Wednesday of a Trump-era order that exploited public health justifications during the pandemic to turn away thousands of migrants is expected to severely strain an already stretched border, immigration and asylum system.\n\nThe Department of Homeland Security unveiled Thursday an emergency six-point plan to tackle the crisis as Republicans preparing to take over the House brandished the potential chaos as proof of their claims of gross White House negligence over the border.\n\nEven some Democrats are warning that an huge influx of immigrants next week could cause multiple adverse consequences. Critics say the administration took too long to engage on the issue and hasn’t done enough, though they also fault Congress for failing for decades to reform the immigration system and border enforcement – a goal that polls repeatedly show the public supports.\n\n“We have a leak,” Hidalgo County Judge Richard Cortez said on “CNN This Morning” Thursday. “We need a plumber to come and stop the leak. And instead, what we’re doing is we’re sending us more buckets to hold the water.”\n\nCalifornia Gov. Gavin Newsom meanwhile told ABC News this week that the expiry of the policy known as Title 42 could overburden his state’s capacity to cope. “The fact is, what we’ve got right now is not working, and it’s about to break in a post-(Title) 42 world unless we take some responsibility and ownership,” he said.\n\nDeputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco told CBS News she was worried about an increase in “illegal migration” and drug smuggling. Some Democratic jurisdictions, like New York City for instance are already struggling to cope with immigrants who have already arrived as they brace for more.\n\nA pandemic-era band aid on a broader problem\n\nTitle 42 was introduced early in the Covid-19 emergency and allowed officials to turn away certain categories of migrants. But critics say it not only abused the principles of public health, especially by being in force so long, but that it was a cruel and unfair infringement of the human right to make an asylum claim. A federal judge in Louisiana blocked a previous bid by the Biden administration to cancel the order, but a federal judge in Washington struck it down in November, declaring it “arbitrary and capricious.”\n\nAmid growing concerns that large groups of migrants waiting in Mexico could cross over the border next week, Biden’s team said Thursday it was surging resources to the area, improving processing efficiency for immigration claims, imposing consequences for unlawful entry, bolstering nonprofit capacity, targeting smugglers and working with international partners.\n\nBut it has often seemed like the White House wanted to talk about anything but the border to avoid political blowback and that the administration lacked urgency in tackling immigration as a whole – one of the most nettlesome issues for this president and his predecessors. Republicans have demanded Biden visit the border, though the political theatrics surrounding such a trip might now cloud any attempt by the president to offer clarity on a deeply complicated problem. Still, Democratic Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas said on CNN “This Morning” Wednesday that the president should go anyway.\n\n“I don’t know why they keep avoiding the border and saying there’s other things more important than visiting the border,” he said. “If there’s a crisis, show up. Just show up,” Cuellar said.\n\nAnd in another setback to Biden’s efforts to end some of Trump’s controversial immigration policies, a federal judge in Texas has paused the administration’s most recent attempt to end the so-called “Remain in Mexico” program, which sends certain non-Mexican citizens who entered the US back to Mexico – instead of detaining them or releasing them into the United States – while their immigration proceedings played out.\n\nGOP prepares relentless scrutiny on border\n\nIt is well within the new GOP majority’s right to investigate the administration’s failure to stem a rise in encounters with border crossers in Biden’s term and the intensity of its immigration policy as a whole. US border authorities encountered more than two million migrants in fiscal 2022, according to US Customs and Border Protection figures released in October – up from 1.7 million in 2021. Conservatives say this is proof of an “open border” that means many more migrants get through in a scenario that endangers national security. Many Democrats argue that large numbers of migrants encounter border agents in multiple attempts to cross into the US after they are repeatedly sent back.\n\nBut more broadly, the expiry of Title 42 is also a microcosm of a toxic debate over immigration, demagogued by conservative media and distorted by some Republicans for a political jolt that has made a multi-layered international and domestic issue impossible to solve for decades. Former President Donald Trump’s extreme rhetoric and chaotic hardline approach further poisoned the well over this issue and left the immigration system in chaos.\n\nSome members in the new GOP House majority that will take over next month seem more determined to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for a so-far unspecified high crime and misdemeanor, in revenge for Trump’s double impeachment, than in working to find a comprehensive solution to one of the nation’s worst problems.\n\nAnd by shipping migrants to places like Manhattan, Washington and Martha’s Vineyard, Republican governors like Florida’s Ron DeSantis and Greg Abbott of Texas meanwhile seem keener to score points with potential Republican presidential primary voters by using migrants as political pawns than to draw attention to the burden borne by states in this crisis.\n\nRepublicans are right to highlight the epidemic of deaths from fentanyl in the United States that is coming across the border from Mexico often using precursor chemicals from China. But they also spent four years indulging Trump’s obsession with a border wall that does little to stem the influx of the narcotics that mostly comes through border checkpoints, concealed in vehicles by drugs cartels.\n\nAnother tragedy highlighted over Title 42’s expiration is rooted in the plight of migrants fleeing crime, persecution, economic and social repression in central and South America who make a perilous journey to the United States, often at the mercy of ruthless human traffickers and with no certain outcome.\n\nBiden assigned Vice President Kamala Harris to address the root causes of immigration from nations in the Western Hemisphere. Her task is a fraught one, considering the corruption, unstable states and tensions between nations like Guatemala, Honduras, Venezuela and El Salvador and the United States – not to mention troubled relations in recent years between Mexico and Washington.\n\nShe argued at the Summit of the Americas in Los Angeles in June that no migrant wanted to leave home but that many were forced out by dire conditions. Harris has also sought to drum up private investment to mitigate the poverty that forces people to flee. But at the same time, there hasn’t been much public evidence recently that her efforts are bearing fruit or a sense that an issue that brings substantial political peril is her overwhelming priority.\n\nAny permanent solution to border issues would involve a massive investment to secure the frontier, with barriers where it makes sense but also with new tracking technology and manpower where walls don’t help. It would address the plight of undocumented migrants brought to the US as children who are known as Dreamers. It would also provide a long-term path to legal status for millions more undocumented migrants, expand asylum courts to expedite claims and reform the system of legal immigration and visas for migrant workers needed to address economically damaging labor shortages in agriculture and catering industries, for instance.\n\nBut the political tradeoffs and goodwill required for such a reform defied Congress during the presidencies of George W. Bush and Barack Obama. A last-ditch effort by Republican North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis and newly independent Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema that would have led to the protections of Dreamers and new measures to halt border crossings in this Congress just fizzled.\n\nIt was the latest sign that a broken Washington can’t fix one of America’s most intractable problems – a failure that repeatedly leads to situations like the one that will unfold at the border next week.", "authors": ["Stephen Collinson"], "publish_date": "2022/12/16"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_6", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:39", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/27/business/southwest-airlines-service-meltdown/index.html", "title": "Flight cancellations: Why Southwest Airlines is melting down | CNN ...", "text": "New York CNN —\n\nA punishing winter storm that dumped multiple feet of snow across much of America led to widespread flight cancellations over the Christmas holiday. By Monday, air travel was more or less back to normal – unless you booked your holiday travel with Southwest Airlines.\n\nMore than 90% of Wednesday’s US flight cancellations were Southwest flights, according to flight tracking website FlightAware. Southwest canceled more than 2,500 flights. The next highest: SkyWest, with 77.\n\nSouthwest warned that it would continue canceling flights until it could get its operations back on track. The company’s CEO said this has been the biggest disruption he’s seen in his career. The Biden administration is investigating.\n\nWhat gives? Southwest had a combination of bad luck and bad planning.\n\nThe storm hit Chicago and Denver hard, where Southwest has two of its biggest hubs – Chicago Midway airport and Denver International airport.\n\nMore bad luck: The storm hit just as the so-called tripledemic surged across America, leaving people and their families sick with Covid, the flu and RSV. Although Southwest says it was fully staffed for the holiday weekend, illness makes adjusting to increased system stress difficult. Many airlines still lack sufficient staff to recover when events like bad weather cause delays or flight crews max out the hours they’re allowed to work under federal safety regulations.\n\nUnderinvestment\n\nBut Southwest (LUV) also hurt itself with an aggressive schedule and by underinvesting in its operations.\n\nSouthwest’s schedule includes shorter flights with tighter turnaround times, which are causing some of the problems, Kathleen Bangs, a FlightAware spokesperson, told CNN.\n\n“Those turnaround times bog things down,” Bangs said.\n\nStranded customers have been unable to get through to Southwest’s customer service lines to rebook flights or find lost baggage.\n\nEmployees also said they have not been able to communicate with the airline, the president of the union that represents Southwest’s flight attendants told CNN Monday.\n\n“The phone system the company uses is just not working,” Lyn Montgomery, President of TWU Local 556, told CNN’s Pamela Brown. “They’re just not manned with enough manpower in order to give the scheduling changes to flight attendants, and that’s created a ripple effect that is creating chaos throughout the nation.”\n\nOn a call with employees Monday, Southwest Chief Operating Officer Andrew Watterson explained that the company’s outdated scheduling software quickly became the main culprit of the cancellations once the storm cleared, according to a transcript of the call that was obtained by CNN from an aviation source.\n\nThe extreme cold, ice and snow grounded planes and left some crew members stranded, so Southwest’s crew schedulers worked furiously to put a new schedule together, matching available crew with aircraft that were ready to fly. But the Federal Aviation Administration strictly regulates when flight crews can work, complicating Southwest’s scheduling efforts.\n\n“The process of matching up those crew members with the aircraft could not be handled by our technology,” Watterson said.\n\nSouthwest ended up with planes that were ready to take off with available crew, but the company’s scheduling software wasn’t able to match them quickly and accurately, Watterson added.\n\n“As a result, we had to ask our crew schedulers to do this manually, and it’s extraordinarily difficult,” he said. “That is a tedious, long process.”\n\nWatterson noted that manual scheduling left Southwest building an incredibly delicate house of cards that could quickly tumble when the company encountered a problem.\n\n“They would make great progress, and then some other disruption would happen, and it would unravel their work,” Watterson said. “So, we spent multiple days where we kind of got close to finishing the problem, and then it had to be reset.”\n\nIn reducing the company’s flights by two thirds, Southwest should have “more than ample crew resources to handle that amount of activity,” Watterson said.\n\nA lack of tools\n\nThe problems Southwest faces have been brewing for a long time, said Captain Casey Murray, the president of the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association.\n\n“We’ve been having these issues for the past 20 months,” he told CNN. “We’ve seen these sorts of meltdowns occur on a much more regular basis and it really just has to do with outdated processes and outdated IT.”\n\nHe said the airline’s operations haven’t changed much since the 1990s.\n\n“It’s phones, it’s computers, it’s processing power, it’s the programs used to connect us to airplanes – that’s where the problem lies, and it’s systemic throughout the whole airline,” he said.\n\nSouthwest CEO Bob Jordan, in a message to employees obtained by CNN, acknowledged many of Murray’s concerns, and promised the company will invest in better systems.\n\n“Part of what we’re suffering is a lack of tools,” Jordan told employees. “We’ve talked an awful lot about modernizing the operation, and the need to do that.”\n\nHe said the airline is “committed to and invested in” improving its systems, but “we need to be able to produce solutions faster.”\n\nPresident Joe Biden on Tuesday urged consumers to check if they’re eligible for compensation as cascading airline delays have disrupted holiday travel across the country.\n\n“Our Administration is working to ensure airlines are held accountable,” Biden tweeted.\n\nThe US Department of Transportation said it is investigating.\n\n“USDOT is concerned by Southwest’s unacceptable rate of cancellations and delays & reports of lack of prompt customer service,” the agency tweeted. “The Department will examine whether cancellations were controllable and if Southwest is complying with its customer service plan.”\n\nTo recover, Jordan told the Wall Street Journal the company plans to operate just over a third of its schedule in upcoming days to give itself the ability for crews to get into the right positions.\n\nNot Southwest’s first rodeo\n\nIf this is all ringing a bell, that’s because this isn’t the first time Southwest’s service melted down in epic fashion. In October 2021, Southwest canceled more than 2,000 flights over a four-day period, costing the airline $75 million.\n\nSouthwest blamed that service meltdown on a combination of bad weather in Florida, a brief problem with air traffic control in the area and a lack of available staff to adjust to those problems. It has admitted it was having service problems caused by short staffing even before the thousands of canceled flights stranded hundreds of thousands of passengers.\n\nSimilar to this month’s service mayhem, Southwest fared far worse than its competitors last October. While Southwest canceled hundreds of flights in the days following the peak of October’s disruption, competitors quickly returned to normal service.\n\nLater that month, on a call with Wall Street analysts, then-CEO Gary Kelly said the company had made adjustments to prevent a similar meltdown in the future.\n\n“We have reined in our capacity plans to adjust to the current staffing environment, and our ontime performance has improved, accordingly,” said Kelly on October 21. “We are aggressively hiring to a goal of approximately 5,000 new employees by the end of this year, and we are currently more than halfway toward that goal.”\n\nAnd, just like the latest disruption, the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association claimed the cancellations were due to “management’s poor planning.”\n\n– CNN’s Ross Levitt contributed to this report", "authors": ["David Goldman"], "publish_date": "2022/12/27"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/28/business/memorial-day-flight-cancellations/index.html", "title": "Hundreds more flights canceled Monday, disrupting the holiday ...", "text": "Editor’s Note: This is an updated version of a story that originally ran Sunday.\n\nNew York CNN —\n\nIt’s another chaotic holiday weekend for those traveling by air this Memorial Day.\n\nUpwards of 6,000 global flights have been canceled since Friday with hundreds more fights delayed, according to flight tracking website FlightAware.\n\nSome 1,640 flights were canceled on Sunday alone, FlightAware data indicates, with more than 500 of those flying within, into or out of the US. On Monday morning there were already 1,228 cancellations, including more than 300 flights traveling within, into or out of the US.\n\nDelta Air Lines (DAL) is heavily affected by the cancellations, with more than 500 domestic and international flights flights axed on Saturday, Sunday and Monday.\n\nThe carrier blamed Saturday’s cancellations on bad weather and “air traffic control actions” that took place on Friday, saying it is trying to preemptively cancel flights at least 24 hours in advance.\n\nDelta canceled 121 flights on Monday, representing 4% of its operations. American Airlines canceled 117 flights on Monday, or 3% of its operations.\n\nDelta said in an online post that it will issue travel waivers for those affected by bad weather in the Southeast and Northeast this weekend. The most affected airports, which include the New York City and Washington, DC areas, are listed on the company’s website.\n\nAAA estimated 3 million Americans would be traveling by air over the weekend.\n\nOn Thursday, Delta announced it was decreasing its summer flight schedule. From July 1 through August 7, the airline said, it would cut around 100 daily flights primarily in the US and Latin America.\n\n“More than any time in our history, the various factors currently impacting our operation — weather and air traffic control, vendor staffing, increased COVID case rates contributing to higher-than-planned unscheduled absences in some work groups — are resulting in an operation that isn’t consistently up to the standards Delta has set for the industry in recent years,” said Chief Customer Experience Officer Allison Ausband in an online post.\n\nSeparately, JetBlue said it would cut 8% to 10% of its summer schedule. Alaska Airlines reduced its schedule by about 2% through June to match “pilot capacity.”\n\n– CNN’s Marnie Hunter and Catherine Thorbecke contributed to this report.", "authors": ["Ramishah Maruf"], "publish_date": "2022/05/28"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/23/weather/christmas-arctic-winter-storm-poweroutages-friday/index.html", "title": "Winter storm's icy cold and wind knocks out power to over a million ..."}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/21/business/thursday-flight-cancellations/index.html", "title": "Thursday flight cancellations top 2,400 nationwide, disrupting ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nSnow, rain, ice, wind and frigid temperatures are disrupting air travel plans across the United States as well as bus and Amtrak passenger train service.\n\nAirlines canceled more than 2,400 US flights by 9 p.m. ET Thursday and proactively canceled more than 2,200 flights for Friday, according to the flight tracking site FlightAware. Even for Saturday, more than 125 flights were already canceled.\n\nDelays were even more extensive on Thursday: More than 9,300 as of 9 p.m. ET.\n\nThe impacts are being felt hardest in Chicago and Denver, where around a quarter of arrivals and departures – hundreds of flights at each airport – were canceled on Thursday, FlightAware data show.\n\nAt one point Thursday at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, delays averaging 159 minutes – almost three hours – were being caused by snow and ice, according to a notice from the Federal Aviation Administration.\n\nTemperatures at the O’Hare dropped to 5 degrees Fahrenheit (-15 Celsius) around 6:45 p.m. local time. Light snow and fog/mist were reported by the National Weather Service.\n\nThe FAA said departing aircraft at Dallas Love, Dallas-Fort Worth, Denver and Minneapolis airports require a spraying of de-icing fluid for safe travel.\n\nNew York braces\n\nIn the busy New York City metro area, the FAA warned that Newark flights should expect delays because of visibility issues.\n\nThe region’s three large airports are all warning travelers that the incoming winter weather front may disrupt their travels.\n\n“Flight activity at #LaGuardiaAirport may be disrupted by heavy rain and strong winds later today and Friday. Travelers, please confirm flight status with your airline before heading to the airport,” LaGuardia Airport posted on Twitter. John F. Kennedy and Newark Airport also posted similar notices.\n\nAirlines offer no-fee flight changes\n\nMany airlines have issued weather waivers allowing travelers to change their itineraries without penalty during a short window.\n\nFor those whose flights are still scheduled to fly, the Transportation Security Administration is recommending that passengers arrive at the airport earlier than usual.\n\nJohn Busch, Reagan National Airport’s TSA federal security director, told reporters that all airports “expect to be busier this holiday season than we’ve been in several years coming out of the pandemic. We’ve already seen some of our busiest days, yesterday and today and we expect maybe Friday 30th ahead of the New Year’s holiday can be also a very busy day.”\n\nBut Busch added that TSA is “very well prepared to handle additional volume and throughput for our security checkpoints.”\n\nTravelers adjusting their plans\n\nMaria Ihekwaba, who was traveling from Chicago to Clear Lake, Iowa, with her granddaughter on Thursday morning, told CNN she was trying to depart as soon as possible.\n\n“Especially when you’re traveling from Chicago, you never know what could happen in Chicago because it’s the Windy City,” Ihekwaba said.\n\nTraveler Kari Lucas, from San Diego, told CNN she was visiting her sister and brother-in-law, but cut the trip short as she didn’t want to get caught in the impending weather.\n\n“I was worried because San Diego, we don’t get these snowstorms,” she said. “So I don’t like it to be trapped in the airport for long periods of time.”\n\n“It seemed like the best choice to make right now,” she said.\n\nBus service disrupted\n\nIt’s not just flights that are being affected by the bomb cyclone.\n\nGreyhound issued a service alert on Thursday warning customers that those traveling in the Midwest over the next two days may have their trips delayed or canceled altogether.\n\nGreyhound, the largest provider of intercity bus service, listed more than a dozen cities from West Virginia to Minnesota that are among those impacted. They include:\n\n• Charleston, West Virginia\n\n• Chicago\n\n• Cleveland\n\n• Dallas\n\n• Danville, Illinois\n\n• Davenport, Iowa\n\n• Denver\n\n• Detroit\n\n• Indianapolis\n\n• Kansas City\n\n• Minneapolis\n\n• St. Louis\n\n• Wichita, Kansas\n\nGreyhound said riders can call 1-833-233-8507 to reschedule.\n\nAmtrak train service hit, too\n\nAmtrak has also been forced to delay or cancel passenger service for some lines in the Midwest and Northeast.\n\nClick here for disruptions the rail service posted as of 5 p.m. Thursday.\n\nIn its notice, Amtrak said that “customers with reservations on trains that are being modified will typically be accommodated on trains with similar departure times or another day.\n\n“Amtrak will waive additional charges for customers looking to change their reservation during the modified schedule by calling our reservation center at 1-800-USA-RAIL.”\n\n\n\nImpact on Christmas deliveries\n\nFedEx says it is watching the winter weather and has “contingency plans in place to help keep our team members safe and lessen any impact” on Christmas deliveries.\n\n“In anticipation of severe weather, we have been repositioning assets so we can provide service where and when it is safe to do so,” FedEx told CNN in a statement.", "authors": ["Greg Wallace Paul P. Murphy Carol Alvarado", "Greg Wallace", "Paul P. Murphy", "Carol Alvarado"], "publish_date": "2022/12/21"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2013/03/04/cancellations-ahead-of-new-winter-storm/1962939/", "title": "Storm still snarling flights, cancellations top 5,700", "text": "Ben Mutzabaugh, USA TODAY\n\nU\n\npdated Friday at 10 a.m. ET.\n\nFlight schedules are gradually improving today (March 8), though problems still remain in the Northeast.\n\nAs of 9:30 a.m. ET, more than 330 flights have been canceled nationwide, according to flight-tracking service FlightStats. Most of those come at airports serving New York City and New England, places that are still feeling the effects of a winter storm that snarled flights from the Dakotas to the Atlantic as it moved across the USA this week.\n\nOf today's cancellations, nearly two thirds of those come from just three airports: Boston Logan, New York LaGuardia and Newark Liberty.\n\nConditions are expected to improve later today as the storm pulls offshore, taking its strong winds and precipitation with it.\n\nBut that's after nearly 5,700 flights have been canceled across the USA since Monday, when the storm first began disrupting flights in the upper Midwest. Thousands of other flights have suffered long storm-related delays during the same period.\n\nThe biggest daily disruption from this week's storm came on Wednesday, when more than 2,400 U.S. flights were canceled. Most of those cancellations came at Washington Dulles and Washington Reagan National, where airlines preemptively scrapped more than 1,200 the day before in anticipation of heavy snow.\n\nBut the storm was a bust for large parts of the D.C. area, with downtown and the eastern suburbs seeing mostly rain or wet, non-accumulating snow. About 5 inches accumulated at Washington Dulles, but it was mostly a rain event at Reagan National and BWI.\n\n\"There have been incidents like this before where weather forecasts and reality are divorced,\" Henry Harteveldt, travel industry analyst for Hudson Crossing, says in an e-mail to Today in the Sky.\n\n\"It's a no-win scenario for airlines,\" Harteveldt adds. \"Ignore the forecasts and carriers risk having aircraft and crew stuck and unable to efficiently recover. Heed the warnings, and airlines risk inconveniencing passengers with preemptive cancellations, along with routing aircraft and crews out of the storm's path. In each scenario, airlines run the risk of losing revenue and absorbing extra costs.\"\n\n\"In this case, airlines rolled the dice, and lost. The good news is that the lack of snow and bad weather may speed up their operational recovery,\" he says.\n\nThe storm first began affecting flights Monday, with about 370 flights canceled nationwide, according to FlightStats. More than 1,800 were canceled Tuesday as the storm snarled flights in Minneapolis and moved into the Chicago area. Then came Wednesday's 2,400 cancellations, mostly in D.C. and the Northeast, followed by about 790 for Thursday and the 330 so far today.\n\nAs has become common, most big airlines issued flexible rebooking policies for fliers with flights to, from or through the airports in the storm's path.\n\nThe fine print varies by airline, but most allow customers to make one change within a certain rebooking window without paying additional fare or change fees.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/03/04"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/todayinthesky/2014/01/28/tuesday-2500-flights-axed-as-winter-chaos-spreads/4955931/", "title": "7,100 flights axed since Monday; airlines eye recovery", "text": "Ben Mutzabaugh\n\nUSA TODAY\n\nLast update: 9:45 p.m. ET.\n\nAir travelers faced a third consecutive day of disruptions on Wednesday, with carriers waiving rebooking fees for fliers scrambling to make alternative plans.\n\nMore than 2,325 flights had been canceled nationwide as of 9:45 p.m. ET on Wednesday, according to flight-tracking service FlightAware.com. That follows about 3,260 flight cancellations b on Tuesday and another 1,030 on Monday.\n\nAnd, with more than 520 flights already grounded for Thursday, that put the week's cumulative cancellation tally at about 7,100 flights since Monday, according to FligthAware's count.\n\nThe hardest hit airport on Wednesday was Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson International, the world's busiest airport and the top hub for Delta Air Lines.\n\nAbout 40% of the airport's flight schedule today — more than 530 departures and more than 547 arrivals -- had been canceled there as of 9:45 p.m. ET. That's partly fallout from Atlanta's problems on Tuesday, when more than 930 combined arrivals and departures were canceled. Many of Wednesday morning's cancellations resulted from planes or crew being out of position from Tuesday's disruption.\n\nBut it also came as the Atlanta metro area struggled to get going Wednesday after 2 to 3 inches of snow fell there on Tuesday. Many highways remained coated with ice as of mid-day and mass transit systems were running at reduced capacity. That was complicating efforts of airport workers attempting to get to the airport.\n\nDelta and other airlines hoped to begin a recovery in Atlanta later today, working to get planes and crews back into their regular schedules. Still, especially with Wednesday's lingering problems, it could take airlines 24 to 72 hours, perhaps longer, to accommodate all of the fliers whose plans have been disrupted by this week's wintry weather.\n\nThat also was true nationwide, where delays and cancellations snarled thousands of flights at other key airports as well.\n\nChicago O'Hare and Houston Bush Intercontinental each had about 18% of their Wednesday flights grounded as of 9:45 p.m. ET, according to FlightAware. At Charlotte, the figure was about 13% All three airports are among the nation's biggest airline hubs.\n\nSome smaller airports in the south, had 50% or more of their departures grounded in the fallout of the wintry weather. Among those: Norfolk, Va.; Charleston, S.C., Birmingham; Pensacola, Fla.; Savannah, Ga.; Lafayette, La.; Mobile, Ala.; and the Northwest Florida Regional Airport near Fort Walton Beach.\n\nMany of the USA's busiest airports also were hit hard by delays and cancellations on Monday and Tuesday, including Houston Bush Intercontinental, Chicago O'Hare, Chicago Midway, Cleveland and others. Dozens of other, smaller airports from Nebraska to Texas to Florida and the Carolinas had substantial portions of their schedules scrubbed as a result of the storm.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2014/01/28"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/airline-news/2022/12/27/southwest-flights-canceled-delayed-ailrine-policy/10955159002/", "title": "Southwest flights back on track Friday after slew of cancellations", "text": "Southwest resumed normal operations Friday after canceling more than 15,000 flights in just over a week, according to FlightAware, which tracks flight status in real time.\n\n\"We appreciate the dedicated work of the Southwest team to restore our schedule, and we anticipate minimal disruptions for the weekend,\" the airline said in a statement Friday. \"We look forward to the opportunity to address any needs of our customers over the coming days as we strive to return to our previous level of Southwest hospitality and reliability.\"\n\nAbout 1% of Southwest's flight are canceled Friday, compared to roughly two-thirds of flights in days prior, according to FlightAware. Many customers are still trying to track down luggage, rebook travel or get money back for ruined trips.\n\n\"We know even our deepest apologies – to our customers, to our employees, and to all affected through this disruption – only go so far,\" Southwest said Thursday. \"We have much work ahead of us, including investing in new solutions to manage wide-scale disruptions.\"\n\nHere's what Southwest customers should know.\n\n'They had beaten me down':How Southwest's mass flight cancellations forced passengers to improvise\n\n'There's nothing we can do':Southwest woes leave thousands of bags lost and left in piles at airports\n\nWhat happens if Southwest cancels my flight?\n\nCustomers whose flights are canceled may rebook or request a refund for their flights on Southwest's website.\n\nAdditionally, all Southwest customers who were scheduled to fly through Jan. 2 may rebook without paying additional charges or fly standby within 30 days of their original travel date between previously booked cities.\n\n\"You shouldn't need to get on a call or stand in a line, and you can make a flight changes you need to at Southwest.com,\" the airline's Chief Commercial Officer Ryan Green said in a video Wednesday.\n\nCustomers who opt to call 1-800-I-FLY-SWA should expect long wait times.\n\nIs there any way to get refunds on Southwest?\n\nCustomers whose flights were canceled may fill out a form on Southwest's website to request a refund if they choose not to rebook.\n\nThe Department of Transportation requires all airlines to offer refunds when a flight is canceled for any reason. Rules about delays are more complicated and vary widely. The DOT's dashboard for travelers lists policies by airline.\n\nCan I be reimbursed for extra expenses?\n\nSouthwest customers who experience cancellations or a \"significant flight delay\" between Dec. 24 and Jan. 2 may submit receipts by email or through its website\n\nfor reimbursement consideration.\n\nFrom Southwest's Email Us page, customers are directed to click on Complaint, then Flight, then Cancellation and then Next to get to a support page where they can describe their situation and upload receipts.\n\n\"We will honor reasonable requests for reimbursement for meals, hotel, and alternate transportation (such as rental cars or tickets on other airlines),\" the airline said on its website.\n\nFlight delayed or canceled? What you need to know and what airlines owe travelers\n\nMy flight was canceled: How I got most of my costs covered (after 3 months)\n\nWhere is my luggage?\n\nUnclaimed bags belonging to Southwest customers who didn't make it as far as their checked luggage have piled up at airports across the country.\n\nThe airline has created an online form travelers can fill out to help reunite with their bags. Luggage will be delivered free of charge.\n\nWhy did Southwest Airlines cancel flights?\n\nSouthwest said it was \"fully staffed and prepared\" heading into the holiday weekend, but severe weather forced operational changes from which it struggled to recover.\n\n“With our large fleet of airplanes and flight crews out of position in dozens of locations, and after days of trying to operate as much of our full schedule across the busy holiday weekend, we reached a decision point to significantly reduce our flying to catch up,” Southwest CEO Bob Jordan said in a video Tuesday, in which he also apologized.\n\nAfter meeting with Southwest's leadership, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg told CNN's \"The Situation Room With Wolf Blitzer\" that \"they indicated a number of issues that they're having with systems, legacy systems for managing their schedule and where their crews are.\"\n\n\"Due to the magnitude and scale of the disruptions, our technology could not align our resources,\" Southwest Airlines told USA TODAY. \"As a result, our crew schedulers are tackling the issue manually and that is a tedious, long process that takes time and trained resources to accomplish.\"\n\nJordan noted that the airline's tools work 99% of the time, \"but clearly, we need to double down on our already existing plans to upgrade systems for these extreme circumstances so that we never again face what's happening right now.\"\n\nRandy Barnes, president of Transport Workers Union of America Local 555, which represents Southwest ground crews, cast additional blame. \"If airline managers had planned better, the meltdown we’ve witnessed in recent days could have been lessened or averted,\" Barnes said in a statement.\n\nHow many flights did Southwest cancel?\n\nSouthwest canceled 15,716 flights between between Thursday, Dec. 22 and Thursday, Dec. 29, according to FlightAware.\n\n'Nightmare' flight cancellations:1,000 Southwest flyers sleep overnight at Denver airport\n\nSouthwest stock rise:Southwest may be hated by stranded consumers, but Wall Street still likes it\n\nWhat is Southwest doing about cancellations?\n\nSouthwest has been reaching out to travelers and asking other customers who aren't scheduled to fly within the next 72 hours to delay calling to avoid tying up busy phone lines. The airline is also apologizing for \"falling short,\" saying \"our heartfelt apologies for this are just beginning.\"\n\n\"We always take care of our customers,\" Southwest's CEO said. \"And we will lean in and go above and beyond as they would expect us to. Teams are working on all of that: processing refunds, proactively reaching out and taking care of customers who are dealing with costly detours and reroutes, as just a few examples.\"\n\nSome lawmakers want more. In a joint statement, Sens. Edward Markey, D-Mass., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., called for \"not only rebooked tickets, ticket refunds, and hotel, meal, and transportation reimbursement, but significant monetary compensation for the disruption to their holiday plans.”\n\nBiden:'Administration is working to ensure airlines are held accountable'\n\n'Unacceptable':DOT launching review of Southwest cancellations\n\nWhat is the government doing about Southwest's 'meltdown'?\n\nThe Department of Transportation and the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation are looking into the cancellations, and President Joe Biden said his administration would hold airlines accountable.\n\n\"What we did, especially over the course of the problems we saw this year, was press the airlines to increase their customer service commitments. They did that. They did that in writing, and now that we have that in hand, we are able to hold them accountable to a higher standard than what was possible last year,\" Buttigieg told \"NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt.\"\n\nHe added, “This has clearly crossed the line from what's an uncontrollable weather situation to something that is the airline's direct responsibility.\"\n\nContributing: Rebecca Morin and Kathleen Wong, USA TODAY", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/12/27"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/airline-news/2022/06/18/canceled-flights-delayed-saturday/7668549001/", "title": "Why are flights being canceled on Saturday? Weather and demand ...", "text": "For a third day in a row, travelers across the country are facing high numbers of flight delays and cancellations.\n\nAs of 4 p.m. ET on Saturday, more than 3,300 U.S. flights were delayed and 775 U.S. flights were cancelled, according to FlightAware, which tracks flights in real time.\n\nFriday reported a whopping total of over 8,940 U.S. flight delays and 1,470 U.S. flight cancellations, according to FlightAware. More than 1,750 U.S. flights were also canceled on Thursday.\n\nThe thousands of flight delays and cancellations come as U.S. airlines try to recover from severe storms that barreled through much of the country this week, while also working to accommodate the growing number of travelers on summer vacation.\n\nFriday:Thousands of US flights canceled or delayed Friday after one of worst summer air travel days yet\n\nNationwide, Delta and American Airlines reported some of the highest numbers of cancellations both Friday and Saturday morning – with their schedules reduced by 7% and 5%, respectively, for Saturday as of 4 p.m. ET.\n\nThose numbers do not include flights on their regional affiliates, which operate as American Eagle and Delta Connection.\n\n\"The vast majority of that is weather-related,\" Curtis Blessing, spokesman for American Airlines, said on Friday.\n\nThis week's numbers aren't the first time U.S. flights have seen thousands of delays and cancellations this year. Between Friday and Monday on Memorial Day Weekend, FlightAware reported nearly 2,800 U.S. flight cancellations and delays for more than 20,000 U.S. flights.\n\nIn May:Memorial Day air travelers face thousands of cancellations, delays over holiday weekend\n\nAnd this weekend's issues weren't limited to the U.S.: FlightAware reported more than 12,700 delays and over 2,400 cancellations around the globe for Saturday by 4 p.m. ET. The site logged over 21,800 flight delays and almost 3,330 cancellations worldwide on Friday.\n\nWhat travelers need to know\n\nIf your flight is canceled, the U.S. Department of Transportation requires airlines to rebook you on their next available service with space. If that will not work for you, the carrier is required to offer you a refund, even if you bought a nonrefundable ticket.\n\nSummer travel:What airlines owe you when flights are canceled, delayed\n\nIn the event of a delay, an airline's responsibility is a little less clear. DOT does require compensation for \"significant delays\" but has no official definition for what counts as \"significant.\"\n\nMany airlines updated their policies during the pandemic to give travelers more flexibility in rebooking or altering plans. Delta Air Lines, for example, automatically rebooks passengers whose flights were canceled and sends them their new itineraries via email, text and the Fly Delta App. Customers are free to change their rebooked flight online or via Delta's digital messaging platform if the new itinerary doesn't work.\n\nWhat's everyone talking about?:Sign up for our trending newsletter to get the latest news of the day\n\nContributing: The Associated Press", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/06/18"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/25/weather/weather-climate-snowstorm-greece-turkey-intl/index.html", "title": "Snow blankets Greece and Turkey as wild weather system creates ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nA rare and severe snowstorm has blanketed parts of Greece and Turkey, causing chaos on the streets of major cities and forcing the evacuation of thousands of people.\n\nStorm Elpida swept across Greece on Monday, covering Athens with heavy snow, which rarely falls in the Greek capital but has now occurred in a second consecutive year.\n\nAthens has only seen six snow events since 2000, and while it usually experiences average snowfall of 1.3 centimeters (0.5 inches) annually, Elpida has already brought around 8 centimeters (3.1 inches), the most since February 2021, when 10 centimeters (3.9 inches) fell. The islands of Mykonos and Santorini also experienced rare snowfalls.\n\nParts of Athens were hit by power cuts, and the grid operator said crews were working to restore electricity.\n\nRescue crews, including the army, worked through the night to assist thousands of people stranded in their cars on a motorway in the Greek capital after the snowstorm swept through the country on Monday.\n\nAs temperatures fell overnight, soldiers handed out food, water and blankets to drivers, some of whom were stranded for more than 10 hours. TV footage showed the road and vehicles covered in snow.\n\nMore than 3,500 people had been evacuated by early Tuesday, some abandoning their cars on foot; around 1,200 cars remained stuck on the Attiki Odos, the capital’s main ring-road, government spokesperson Giannis Oikonomou said.\n\n“We had a very difficult night and a superhuman evacuation effort is underway on Attiki Odos,” Oikonomou told Greek television.\n\n“We are still in a very difficult phase, as the forecasts indicate that we will face [weather] difficulties again in a while,” he said.\n\nSnow falling in the center of Athens, Greece on Monday. Nikolas Kokovlis/NURPHO/Associated Press\n\nThe Parthenon temple atop the ancient Acropolis hill, seen covered with snow on Monday. Thanassis Stavrakis/AP\n\nAuthorities declared Tuesday a public holiday, shutting public offices and private businesses except supermarkets, pharmacies and petrol stations in the greater Athens area and on some islands.\n\nFifteen passengers were injured when a rail transport vehicle tried to pull a train carrying about 200 passengers which had halted in heavy snow in central Greece.\n\nThe erratic winter weather comes after a summer of high temperatures and wildfires in Greece, which scientists linked to the climate crisis.\n\nMonday’s storm also triggered a rare ‘snownado,’ a tornado-like funnel traveling over a snow-covered landscape, after a waterspout moved onshore, swirling snow around the base of the twister.\n\nA rare waterspout seen on Greece's Skopelos island on Monday. Spyros Patsis/Reuters\n\nSnow covered the capital from the Acropolis hill to the coast in the south and brought Covid-19 vaccinations to a halt, forced schools to close and disrupted flights.\n\nGreek carrier Aegean Airlines canceled all but five flights on Monday and said it expected schedules to be disrupted on Tuesday and possibly Wednesday.\n\nFlights were also suspended for a second day at Istanbul Airport in Turkey, and private vehicles were barred from city streets on Tuesday, as heavy snowfall there also snarled traffic and left people stranded in the country’s biggest city and beyond.\n\nIstanbul Airport said on its website that flight operations had been suspended until 10 a.m. GMT (5 a.m. ET) on Tuesday due to adverse weather conditions. Flag-carrier Turkish Airlines said on Monday it had canceled all flights from the airport.\n\nSnowfall in Istanbul began late last week and has picked up in recent days in the city of 16 million people. Footage from the airport – among the world’s largest – showed runways covered in a thick blanket of snow with aircraft and vehicles barely visible.\n\nChildren play in the snow in the Kucukcekmece district of Istanbul on January 24, 2022. Yasin Akgul/AFP/Getty Images\n\nVehicles stuck on a snow-covered road after heavy snowfall hit Istanbul. Muhammed Enes Yildirim/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images\n\nIstanbul Governor Ali Yerlikaya took the rare step of temporarily banning private cars from the streets until emergency teams are able to clear them, while many public workers were granted administrative leave to keep the number of people commuting to a minimum.\n\nFootage shared by the governor showed trucks and cars stranded along highways in and around the city.\n\nA video posted on social media showed a man skiing through city streets late on Monday, with people waving as he passed.\n\nFar away in Turkey’s south, snow fell on the beaches of the resort city of Antalya for the first time in 29 years.\n\nIstanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu said 55,000 tons of salt had been used on the roads; he called on Turks to clear the snow in front of homes and shops to help emergency teams.\n\n“We hope that if we overcome tonight with measures as well, we won’t have any problems left. May God protect everyone,” he said while visiting a salt facility.\n\nPlanes grounded at Istanbul's airport on Tuesday. Umit Bektas/Reuters\n\nPeople walk in front of Istanbul's snow-dusted Blue Mosque. Erdem Sahin/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock\n\nAcross the country some 4,600 people were left stranded on roads and elsewhere, and thousands had been placed in temporary housing, the Disaster and Emergency Authority said.\n\nWhile scientists have not yet analyzed the link between this particular storm and climate change, global warming has pushed average temperatures in the Mediterranean up by more than 1 degree Celsius since the early 1990s, according to the EU’s Copernicus environmental monitoring program.\n\nSea surface temperatures in the Eastern Mediterranean and Black Sea were around 2 degrees Celsius above average in the lead-up to the snowfall, and that increase in heat would have provided additional energy to the storm as well as added moisture to the air, increasing snowfall.", "authors": ["Reuters Robert Shackelford", "Robert Shackelford"], "publish_date": "2022/01/25"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/airline-news/2023/01/11/faa-notam-outage-experts-technology/11033533002/", "title": "What caused the FAA's NOTAM outage? Experts say old tech played ...", "text": "More than 10,000 flights in the U.S. were delayed or canceled as a technical failure forced the Federal Aviation Administration to pause departures nationwide for about 90 minutes Wednesday morning.\n\nAccording to the agency, an outage affecting the Notice to Air Missions (NOTAM) system, which alerts pilots to safety issues at and around the nation's airports, was behind the disruption.\n\nThe FAA has not yet identified a specific cause of the failure, but experts told USA TODAY that the U.S. air traffic control system often relies on outdated technology to keep things moving, and a computer glitch of some kind probably was responsible.\n\nThe latest: Thousands of flights delayed, canceled across US after FAA computer outage\n\n'A huge vulnerability':Lawmakers vow probe of FAA outage grounding thousands of flights\n\nWith the FAA up for reauthorization in Congress this year, those same experts said they hope the government uses the opportunity to fund needed upgrades to the agency's IT systems.\n\nWhat is the NOTAM system?\n\nA Notice to Air Missions provides pilots and other flight personnel with real-time safety information on flight operations and airports.\n\nNOTAMs list potential hazards and conditions that can affect flights – from runway construction or possible icing to a change in an aeronautical facility or flight service.\n\nPilots are required to consult NOTAMs before starting every flight.\n\nThe FAA notes that a NOTAM \"states the abnormal status of a component of the National Airspace System (NAS) – not the normal status,\" adding that NOTAMs are \"not known far enough in advance to be publicized by other means.\"\n\nWhat is the NOTAM system? The FAA outage causing flight delays across the US, explained.\n\n\"It's a safety issue,\" Ahmed Abdelghany, associate dean for research at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University's David B. O’Maley College of Business, told USA TODAY. \"God forbid if the pilots are not updated with abnormal conditions – it might lead to some serious problems like accidents or something like that.\"\n\nThe NOTAM system used to be telephone-based, with pilots calling flight service stations for the information, but that process moved online.\n\nWhat caused the NOTAM failure on Wednesday?\n\nThe FAA said it's investigating the problem but hasn't determined an official cause. But experts told USA TODAY that IT issues are a likely culprit.\n\nTransportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said he directed \"an after-action process to determine root causes\" and make recommendations for how to address them.\n\n\"Similar to what Southwest saw last month with difficulties in using an antiquated system to handle a major weather disruption to the system, it’s highly likely that the FAA saw this problem exacerbated because they were running on older technologies,\" said Laurie Garrow, a professor of civil engineering that specializes in aviation at Georgia Tech.\n\nMark Dombroff, an aviation lawyer and partner at Fox Rothschild who formerly worked with the FAA and Department of Justice, compared the NOTAM system to the computers we all use every day.\n\nFlight delayed or canceled? What you need to know and what airlines owe travelers\n\n\"Our systems still crash,\" he said. \"You shut your system down, and you reboot it. ... The system comes back, and you continue to work it.\"\n\nBut, he said, the FAA will investigate the cause to ensure it doesn't happen again.\n\nAnother expert said Wednesday's failure highlights a need to make the NOTAM system more redundant.\n\n\"It wouldn't matter whether somebody kicked the cord or whether they failed the server for some reason. If it's a single point of failure, there's a probability of it (happening) again,\" said Robert W. Mann, an aviation consultant in Port Washington, New York. \"I would say the same thing about Southwest's crew reassignment system, but it's easier said than it is done. ... In both cases, it's going to require FAA validation of the replacement system while you chug along using the steam gauge version of that system.\"\n\nHow can the FAA prevent a similar failure in the future?\n\nThe experts who spoke to USA TODAY all agreed that the FAA's back-end technology needs an upgrade.\n\n\"I hope it’s a call for more funding from Congress that’s desperately needed to modernize the air traffic control system,\" Garrow said.\n\nArjun Garg, a partner at the Hogan Lovells law firm and former FAA chief counsel, said the agency's technology is typically complicated and often outdated as a result of funding and implementation cycles in government\n\n\"The lack of stable consistent funding when you’re on the budget appropriations cycle of the federal government, it significantly hampers the ability to conduct that kind of upgrade,\" he said. \"The FAA has an added hamper” because its system has to run all day every day reliably, and you need to be able to do those upgrades while it’s still running.\n\nWith the upcoming FAA reauthorization, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a news briefing Wednesday, the administration welcomes \"the attention from Congress\" on how to help the agency address any problems with NOTAM.\n\nMaria Cantwell, chairwoman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, said Wednesday that the committee \"will be looking into what caused this outage and how redundancy plays a role in preventing future outages.\"\n\nStory continues below.\n\nWhat travelers need to know\n\nThough the delays and cancellations that resulted from the outage are obviously frustrating for flyers, experts say, the FAA prioritizes safety above all, and grounding flights was the right move.\n\n\"I suspect they've got a pretty good idea of what happened,\" Dombroff said. \"If they didn't know what happened, I've got a feeling the system would not be in the process of returning to normal.\"\n\nLearn from my mistakes:My flight was canceled but I got most of my costs covered (after 3 months)\n\nHe emphasized that travelers should feel safe getting on planes today, even if those planes are delayed.\n\n\"The FAA is first in line to want to figure out what happened and ensure it doesn't happen again,\" he said. \"We should revel in the quality and safety of the system we have and understand it isn't always going to work the way we want it to.\"\n\nMany airlines have issued waivers to allow passengers whose flights were affected to adjust their travel plans without paying fare differences or change fees.\n\nContributing: Wyatte Grantham-Philips, USA TODAY; The Associated Press", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/01/11"}]}
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{"question_id": "20230224_8", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:39", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/16/politics/donald-trump-war-chest-presidential-campaign/index.html", "title": "Questions about Donald Trump's campaign money, answered | CNN ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nWith his formal announcement of a third presidential bid, Donald Trump now will face new limits on raising and spending money ahead of the 2024 election.\n\nBut election lawyers and campaign finance experts said loopholes in federal election rules – and lax enforcement by federal regulators of existing laws – still offer the former president several potential routes to capitalize on the massive fundraising operation he and his aides have built since his 2020 loss.\n\nHow much money does Trump have?\n\nA lot. Trump’s political operation, led by his leadership PAC Save America, is sitting on more than $100 million, according to the most recent filings with federal regulators.\n\nSave America has been at the heart of Trump’s post-presidential fundraising. Leadership PACs are generally established as a way to allow political figures to support other candidates. But they also serve as campaigns-in-waiting for presidential contenders – funding travel and polling and paying the staff members who ultimately join a White House campaign.\n\nLeadership PACs also can underwrite personal expenses.\n\nSave America, for instance, has spent more than $8.5 million on legal expenses since the start of 2021 – with some of it going to firms defending Trump in personal legal matters, such as the sweeping lawsuit that New York Attorney General Letitia James brought in September, alleging fraud in the Trump Organization’s business practices. Trump has denied wrongdoing.\n\nThe former president’s close allies also recently established a super PAC, which can raise and spend unlimited sums but is barred from coordinating its activities with the candidates it supports.\n\nLast month, Save America transferred $20 million to the new Trump-aligned super PAC, MAGA Inc., with the goal of aiding Trump’s favored candidates in the midterms.\n\nPolitical observers say that transfer might foreshadow one way Save America’s big war chest could benefit Trump’s candidacy in the months ahead.\n\nWhen does Trump become a candidate for fundraising purposes?\n\nShortly before announcing his bid at his waterfront Mar-a-Lago estate Tuesday, Trump filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission formally establishing his candidacy and the Donald J. Trump for President 2024 campaign committee.\n\nCampaign finance watchdogs argue that Trump has been skirting campaign finance laws for some time by talking and acting like a candidate without formally registering as one. (As far back as July 2021, for instance, Trump told Fox News that he had made up his mind about another presidential bid. And he repeatedly hinted at his intentions in public statements in the months after.)\n\nBut with Tuesday’s formal declaration, Trump must comply with limits on the size and sources of his contributions. A federal candidate cannot accept money directly from a corporation or a labor union, for instance.\n\nAnd, currently, an individual can only contribute $2,900 to a federal candidate for the primary or general election. (That contribution limit, indexed to inflation, will rise for the 2023-2024 election cycle. Federal regulators will announce the new contribution limits early next year.)\n\nAnd, as a candidate, any money Trump spends to advance his White House ambitions – whether it’s for travel to an early primary state or ads touting his achievements – becomes official campaign expenditures and needs to come out of his campaign account.\n\n“He can’t use any of his PACs to fly around the country and give speeches,” said Richard Briffault, an expert on campaign finance regulation and a professor at Columbia Law School.\n\nAnd in stark contrast to leadership PACs, campaign committees cannot underwrite personal expenses.\n\nSo, is Trump cut off from using the funds he’s raised?\n\nYes and no, experts say.\n\nTrump can’t simply dump all the money raised by his leadership PAC or an affiliated super PAC into his campaign account. That’s because his campaign committee is subject to strict fundraising limits that don’t apply to those PACs.\n\nBut there are other ways the money Trump has amassed can still advance his candidacy.\n\nLarry Noble, a former top lawyer with the Federal Election Commission, thinks federal law is pretty clear: Candidates aren’t allowed to take a big pot of so-called soft money – funds that exceed the candidate contribution limits – and plow it into an entity that’s set up to help them get elected.\n\nBut he says the FEC – whose six members often deadlock along partisan lines – has set a high bar for even opening an investigation into potential violations.\n\nAs a result, Noble said, there’s probably little to stop a leadership PAC such as Save America from transferring money to a third party – such as a super PAC or a political “dark money” nonprofit group – to run what would look like an independent effort to help Trump, Noble said.\n\nUnder the standard set by some commissioners, “you’d have to show evidence that the money was transferred at the candidate’s direction with the idea that it would be spent to help his campaign and show his involvement in the ads and that type of thing,” he added.\n\nOn Monday, the nonpartisan watchdog Campaign Legal Center said it had filed a complaint with the FEC, alleging that Trump already has violated campaign finance law by transferring $20 million last month from Save America into the MAGA Inc. super PAC. The group argues the super PAC’s spending is likely to benefit Trump’s 2024 campaign.\n\nTrump’s aides did not respond to CNN’s inquiries about the complaint. And an FEC spokesman declined to comment, citing the agency’s standard policy of not discussing pending legal matters.\n\nIt’s far from clear whether the complaint will gain any traction within the FEC. In addition to frequent deadlocks, the agency moves at a slow pace, often ruling years after a complaint is first lodged.\n\nIn July, the Democratic group American Bridge sued the commission in an attempt to force the agency to take action on its complaint against Trump. The group had filed an FEC complaint four months earlier, alleging that Trump had broken federal law by raising and spending large sums to promote a likely presidential bid without formally declaring his candidacy.\n\nGiven the FEC inaction on many enforcement matters, some election lawyers said Trump would run little risk of trouble if Save America transferred another big sum into MAGA Inc. or into another super PAC actively supporting his candidacy.\n\n“If I were in his position, I’d give the money to a super PAC and have the super PAC spend it,” said one Republican election lawyer, who asked not to be identified because of his ongoing work with GOP political committees. Given that the leadership PAC already has transferred $20 million, “what difference would it make if you give $50 (million) more?”\n\n“Even if the FEC were to find that it’s not permissible – which I don’t believe they will, but even if they did – they aren’t going to fine him millions of dollars,” the lawyer added.\n\nHow else could Trump use his existing political operation?\n\nPolitical observers also said the operation Trump has built since leaving the White House can aid his 2024 candidacy in other ways.\n\nThe former president’s relentless fundraising over the last two years has established a small-dollar donor list that’s “constantly updated,” said Doug Heye, a Republican strategist and former spokesman for the Republican National Committee.\n\nThe new campaign has established a Save America joint fundraising committee, its filings show – giving it access to Trump’s established donor contact list.\n\n“It’s the largest political donor list in the world,” Heye said. “It gives him the ability to raise a lot of money very quickly.”\n\nAnd because Trump is launching a new campaign, it allows donors who already have contributed the maximum amount to his Save America leadership PAC to start fresh with donations to his 2024 bid.\n\nThe Trump campaign began to ask for those contributions before he had left the announcement stage Tuesday night, with a text message blasted out to supporters, urging them to “Become a 2024 Presidential Founder.”\n\nThis story has been updated with additional reporting.", "authors": ["Fredreka Schouten"], "publish_date": "2022/11/16"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/20/politics/trump-save-america-pac-legal-payments-surge/index.html", "title": "Spending by Trump's Save America PAC surges amid legal battles ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nSpending by Donald Trump’s Save America PAC surged in August to more than $6.3 million – its highest monthly total of the year – as the former President waged court battles over the FBI’s search of his waterfront Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida.\n\nMore than $3.8 million of that money – or more than $6 out of $10 spent by Trump’s leadership PAC last month – went to legal fees, according to filings Tuesday night with the Federal Election Commission. The largest legal expense was a single payment of $3 million to the trust account of a West Palm Beach, Florida, law firm.\n\nCNN has previously reported that the PAC advanced Trump’s attorney Chris Kise a $3 million upfront payment to cover the former Florida solicitor general’s legal fees.\n\nThe PAC’s post-election fundraising has come under intense scrutiny in recent weeks. CNN reported earlier this month that a federal grand jury had issued subpoenas that seek information related to the formation, fundraising and expenditures of Save America.\n\nLeadership PACs, fundraising tools to help politicians support other candidates, operate under looser rules than committees tied to active candidates – giving Trump the leeway to use donors’ money for personal expenses if he chooses. The PAC’s spending on legal fees in August was four times what it spent on legal expenses the previous month – as the former President, who has not been charged with a crime, faces increasing legal concerns.\n\nThe new filings show Save America made one large federal contribution last month, sending $150,000 on August 3 to Wyoming Values – a super PAC that worked to defeat a top Trump target, Wyoming GOP Rep. Liz Cheney.\n\nCheney, one of Trump’s fiercest critics on Capitol Hill, lost the Republican primary to Trump-backed Harriet Hageman on August 16.\n\nTrump’s PAC entered September with more than $92 million in cash reserves, according to the new filings – one of the healthier bank accounts in GOP politics. By comparison, the National Republican Senatorial Committee – the GOP fundraising arm charged with flipping the Senate – started September and the sprint to Election Day with just $16 million remaining in the bank.\n\nTrump has faced public pressure to provide more financial help to Republican Senate candidates, some of whom are struggling to compete financially with their Democratic rivals ahead of November’s general election. In Arizona, for instance, Trump-endorsed political newcomer Blake Masters had raised nearly $5 million through the end of June, the most recent candidate filings show, while Sen. Mark Kelly, the Democrat he’s trying to unseat, had collected $54 million.\n\nIn an email to CNN on Tuesday night, Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich said the former President “has been completely invested in seeing his endorsed candidates win.”\n\nAnd he said Trump’s frequent rallies for candidates “serve as the most powerful political weapon in American politics” and “bring out new voters and invaluable media attention that propel candidates to victory on Election Day.”\n\nTrump is scheduled to hold a rally Friday in Wilmington, North Carolina, to support his slate of endorsed candidates there.\n\nBut some Republican strategists are questioning the value of those events after a recent rally in Ohio, where Trump crudely mocked the candidate he had endorsed in the US Senate contest, GOP nominee J.D. Vance, as desperate for his support.\n\nMost candidates would “much rather have somebody come in with a lot of money to drive home your message, rather than a one-day event where you can’t control what the main attraction is going to say,” said Doug Heye, a veteran Republican strategist and former spokesman for the Republican National Committee.\n\nWith control of the Senate on the line, deep-pocketed Republican groups have stepped up to fill the gap, including the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC affiliated with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. It has committed to spending more than $185 million on Senate contests. (The McConnell-aligned super PAC announced Tuesday that it was pulling its remaining ad reservations for the month of October out of Arizona, citing increased spending by other Republican groups, including Our American Century.)\n\nNew filings with the Federal Election Commission show Las Vegas casino mogul Steve Wynn donated $10 million to Our American Century last month.\n\nThat committee has spent nearly $7 million in key states – including advertising to aid Republican Mehmet Oz’s Senate bid in Pennsylvania and to oppose several Democratic senators seeking reelection.", "authors": ["Fredreka Schouten"], "publish_date": "2022/09/20"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/21/politics/trump-pacs-2-million-law-firms-jan-6-witnesses/index.html", "title": "Trump PACs paid $2 million this year to law firms representing ...", "text": "Washington CNN —\n\nFormer President Donald Trump’s political committees have paid nearly $2.2 million this year to six law firms whose attorneys have represented witnesses before the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection, a CNN review of new campaign filings shows.\n\nThe biggest recipient of payments from Trump’s political committees is Elections, LLC, a firm that employs several former Trump campaign lawyers and former White House lawyer Stefan Passantino, who at one point represented a key hearing witness, Cassidy Hutchinson. Passantino hasn’t answered CNN’s previous questions about his representation of Hutchinson.\n\nElections LLC has received more than $1.6 million this year, including $1 million that Trump’s Make America Great Again PAC paid in May to an entity called, E LLC Iolta, which shares a Washington, DC, address with the firm, a recent filing shows.\n\nThe Daily Beast first reported the $1 million May payment to E LLC Iolta. CNN has requested comment from Elections, LLC.\n\nThe CNN tally examined legal fees paid in this calendar year by the Make America Great Again PAC and Trump’s main political vehicle, Save America PAC. The filings do not show which specific lawyers in the firm received payments, and the filings don’t explain what the law firms did for the Trump committees beyond the broad description of “legal consulting” or “legal expenses.”\n\nIt’s impossible to tell from the filings with the Federal Election Commission whether payments to these firms specifically covered work representing witnesses before the January 6 committee.\n\nLaw firms represent key players\n\nOther firms paid by Trump-aligned committees include Abel Bean Law, which has represented current Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich, and JPRowley Law, which has represented conservative lawyer and Trump ally Cleta Mitchell, as well as former White House adviser Peter Navarro, one of the President’s fiercest supporters.\n\nNavarro has been indicted on contempt of Congress charges for failing to comply with the January 6 committee’s subpoena. He pleaded not guilty.\n\nAbel Bean has been paid more than $241,000 this year by Trump’s leadership PAC, Save America.\n\nIn a statement to CNN, Abel Bean Law co-founder Michael Abel would not confirm or deny that the money was used for January 6 witnesses.\n\n“In circumstances in which a third party may pay all or some of the legal fees on behalf of a client we are representing, we provide independent legal advice to our client, we are loyal to our client, and we always serve our client’s best interests,” Abel told CNN.\n\nCNN has confirmed that the work of one firm, Garber Group, is tied to the January 6 committee. According to federal records, that firm got more than $91,000 from Trump’s political groups this year.\n\n“The PACs are paying The Garber Group for the legal fees of witnesses who have cooperated with the committee’s investigation,” a source familiar with the matter told CNN.\n\nThe law firm of Timothy Parlatore, who represents Bernard Kerik, the former New York City police commissioner who has been deposed by the committee, has been paid $25,000 by Trump’s Save America PAC. Parlatore told CNN that the payments to his firm were not used to pay for legal services connected to the panel’s investigation, but declined to say what they were used for.\n\n“I am a private lawyer and I get paid for doing legal work,” Parlatore said in an interview. “This is not on behalf of me representing anybody before the January 6 committee.”\n\nCNN also has requested comment from JPRowley Law, which has received more than $97,000 in payments this year from the Trump committees.\n\nThe moves by Trump’s political organization to open his substantial post-presidency war chest to witnesses involved in the January 6 probe have raised questions about the former President’s ability to influence testimony as the panel delves into his conduct.\n\nJan. 6 panel members raise questions\n\nCNN has previously reported that Trump’s team also has been involved in discussions about a legal defense fund, created by the nonprofit arm of the American Conservative Union, to support aides targeted by the House panel. ACU chairman Matt Schlapp said he has worked with the former President’s aides to determine which individuals subpoenaed by the select committee should receive help from the fund.\n\n“We talked about the hundreds of millions of dollars that the former President raised,” California Rep. Zoe Lofgren, a Democrat who sits on the committee, told CNN recently. “Some of that money is being used to pay for lawyers for witnesses. And it’s not clear that that arrangement is one that is without coercion potential for some of those witnesses.”\n\nSome January 6 committee members have singled out the legal representation of Hutchinson, a former White House aide who changed lawyers in early June. After the switch, Hutchinson ramped up her cooperation with the panel and delivered bombshell testimony about the former President’s conduct on January 6 at an in-person hearing.\n\nMaryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, a member of the committee, called Hutchinson “an important example of one who decided to get a new lawyer and then to come back and to testify.”\n\n“If there are witnesses out there who believe that their lawyer is working cross-purposes with their obligation to tell the truth, they should work to rectify it,” the Maryland Democrat told CNN’s Jake Tapper.", "authors": ["Fredreka Schouten Marshall Cohen Devan Cole Hannah Rabinowitz Zachary Cohen", "Fredreka Schouten", "Marshall Cohen", "Devan Cole", "Hannah Rabinowitz", "Zachary Cohen"], "publish_date": "2022/07/21"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/10/politics/republican-reaction-midterm-results/index.html", "title": "'That certainly didn't help': GOP blame game spreads after midterm ..."}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/23/politics/donald-trump-allies-super-pac/index.html", "title": "Trump allies launch new super PAC to bolster GOP candidates in ...", "text": "Washington CNN —\n\nSeveral top allies of Donald Trump will launch a new super PAC to buoy Republican candidates who have earned the former President’s support in the midterm elections, CNN has learned, following months of minimal spending by Trump-aligned groups that has frustrated party strategists left to fill the void.\n\nCalled MAGA, Inc., the new group will meld with an existing Trump-sanctioned super PAC that has been mostly overseen by former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and former US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell. As of last month, that group had spent slightly more than $2 million to boost Trump-backed Senate and House candidates in their primary races earlier this year.\n\n“President Trump is committed to saving America, and Make America Great Again, Inc. will ensure that is achieved at the ballot box in November and beyond,” Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich said in a statement Friday.\n\nBudowich has been charged with running the new super PAC, along with former Trump campaign aide Steven Cheung, who will serve as its communications director; longtime Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio; veteran GOP operative Chris LaCivita, who will become the group’s chief strategist; and Sergio Gor, whose conservative publishing outfit released Trump’s first post-presidential book last year (a collection of White House and campaign trail photographs) and will serve as a senior adviser to MAGA, Inc. Alex Pfeiffer, a former producer for Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, will also join the operation.\n\nThe newest Trump fundraising vehicle was first reported by Politico.\n\nWith the November elections fast approaching, Trump has been under pressure to dip into his own mountain of cash to support candidates who he helped prevail in competitive primaries but who are now trailing or running close to their Democratic opponents. The former President, who has complained to allies in recent weeks about the Senate contests in Pennsylvania, Ohio and Arizona, had around $103 million in his coffers at the end of August, according to campaign finance reports from his leadership PAC, Save America, and the Bondi-run group.\n\nPeople familiar with the matter said most of those funds will be transferred to MAGA, Inc., which is expected to start spending as soon as next week in key midterm races.\n\n“He’s very concerned about Pennsylvania,” said a person who spoke to Trump recently and requested anonymity for fear of retribution. “We were talking about Pennsylvania and [GOP Senate hopeful Mehmet] Oz had been quoted as saying he would have voted to certify the 2020 election and the President is saying, ‘Now, why would he have done that?’ ”\n\nThis same person said Trump has also expressed concern about Senate candidate J.D. Vance, who is facing an unexpectedly competitive challenge from Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan in Ohio. “He really likes J.D. but Ohio is a little too close for comfort.”\n\nUntil now, Trump has refused to open the spigots much to help his handpicked candidates in their general election contests. While Save America gave $1 million to a pro-Oz PAC just before the Pennsylvania primary, the former President has not contributed financially to the Republican Senate hopeful since then. In Ohio, Save America wrote a $5,000 check to the Vance campaign in June.\n\nTrump aides have long insisted that his spending is supplemented by the campaign rallies and fundraisers he has held to benefit various Republicans – including recent rallies in both Pennsylvania and Ohio – along with his coveted endorsement, which helped many of his chosen candidates prevail in contested primaries earlier this year. But others say the lack of financial assistance from the former President shouldn’t be discounted.\n\n“Trump never went out of his way to help candidates – unless he sees a way that it helps him. His camp says, ‘Well, he’s helping them by doing these events,’ which I would say aren’t actually that helpful because you never know whether Trump is going to insult the candidate,” said Doug Heye, a GOP strategist and former communications director for the Republican National Committee. At his recent rally in Ohio, Trump told the crowd that Vance “is kissing my ass” to maintain his support.\n\nOverall, federal records show that Trump’s main fundraising vehicle, Save America, has contributed more than $8.4 million to candidates and committees at the federal, state and local level since January 2021 – a significant sum, but virtually nothing compared to what other major Republican groups have committed and only about $1.4 million more than what the former President has spent on legal fees this cycle (nearly $7 million). The pro-GOP Senate Leadership Fund is spending about $205 million on advertisements in Senate races this cycle, per a CNN analysis, which includes what the group has already spent and its ad reservations over the next month. Meanwhile, the Congressional Leadership Fund, which is aligned with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, is planning to spend $141 million this fall on ads alone.\n\nA person familiar with the new Trump group said it will spend “heavily” in key Senate, ​congressional and gubernatorial races this fall. Trump is likely to give preferential treatment to candidates he’s previously endorsed, and the group will focus most of its spending on TV advertising and get-out-the-vote efforts, said a person close to Trump.\n\nThe group had been in the planning stages for several months and could become part of his campaign apparatus if he launches a third presidential bid, as is widely expected.\n\n​”I don’t think anyone’s expecting Trump to spend every single penny he has but there will be a significant investment moving forward,” said the person close to Trump.\n\nAfter months of eyeing a pre-midterm launch date for a 2024 campaign, Trump is now waiting to see how Republicans perform in November – hoping to avoid blame if the party’s overall gains prove disappointing.\n\n“He’s been convinced there’s no upside to doing it before the midterms and plenty of potential downsides. Right now, the goal is Q1 of next year but, of course, once the election has passed, he could really do it at any time,” a Trump adviser said.", "authors": ["Gaborr Dan Merica Fredreka Schouten", "Dan Merica", "Fredreka Schouten"], "publish_date": "2022/09/23"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/11/politics/trump-campaign-fundraising-super-pac/index.html", "title": "What a third White House campaign might mean for Donald Trump ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe stark video that former President Donald Trump shared on his Truth Social platform this week following the FBI search of his Florida estate had all the makings of a traditional presidential campaign ad.\n\nIt melded Trump’s words decrying high inflation and a messy US withdrawal from Afghanistan with videos of violent crime and war.\n\n“But soon, we will have greatness again,” Trump intoned.\n\nThe video is just one recent example of the former President hinting broadly at a 2024 campaign without formally declaring a bid for the White House. But even as Trump’s allies urge him to speed up a campaign announcement in an effort to blunt his deepening legal troubles, moving forward could constrain his ability to tap into the vast war chest he has amassed since leaving the White House, campaign finance experts say.\n\nHere’s a look at Trump’s fundraising operations and some of the regulatory and legal hurdles he could face as he plots a third presidential campaign:\n\nHow is Trump currently raising money?\n\nThe former President controls a well-funded political operation that includes a super PAC – which can raise and spend unlimited sums – along with several traditional political action committees.\n\nAt the heart of Trump’s political operation is Save America, the leadership PAC that he established within days of losing the presidential election in November 2020 that collected massive sums in the waning days of his administration.\n\nAlthough Trump’s fundraising pace has slowed some in 2022, Save America ended June with more than $103 million remaining in its cash reserves, according to its latest filing with the Federal Election Commission (FEC).\n\nThat’s an unprecedented stockpile of political money for a former president and amounts to nearly three times the cash that the Republican National Committee had remaining in its coffers at June’s end.\n\nAs he did during his presidency, Trump has relied on small-dollar donations to fuel his political operation.\n\nAnd he continues to bombard his supporters daily with pleas for cash. One text used the recent FBI search at his Mar-a-Lago estate to ask supporters to “rush in a donation IMMEDIATELY to publicly stand with President Trump against this NEVERENDING WITCH HUNT!”\n\nDeclaring a third run likely would super-charge Trump’s fundraising – although it risks drawing attention and money away from other Republicans on the ballot in this fall’s midterm elections.\n\nRonna McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, has cautioned against any presidential contender stepping on the midterms.\n\n“I would say to any candidate, let’s not skip over what is going to be one of the most important and consequential midterms in our country’s history,” McDaniel said recently on Fox. “We need to get behind these House candidates and these Senate candidates and make sure we win in November.”\n\nHow do leadership PACs and super PACs differ from presidential campaign committees?\n\nSuper PACs can raise unlimited amounts of money from individuals, unions and corporations and must operate independently of the candidates they support. Presidential campaigns, however, are barred from accepting union and corporate money and face strict contribution caps.\n\nLeadership PACs also face contribution limits. They are generally established to allow politicians to support other candidates. But over the years, they’ve become campaigns-in-waiting for presidential contenders – providing a source of political contributions to pay staffers, underwrite travel and other political expenses.\n\nThe rules on spending by leadership PACs are far more relaxed than those for campaign committees. The FEC does not restrict politicians from using donors’ contributions to leadership PACs to pay personal bills.\n\nHow would a campaign affect payments for Trump’s mounting legal expenses?\n\nAs a presidential contender, Trump’s spending would face heightened scrutiny because it is “illegal to convert campaign money to the personal use of the candidate,” said Adav Noti, a former Federal Election Commission lawyer who is senior vice president and legal director of the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center\n\nIt would violate campaign finance laws, for instance, for Trump to use donations to his presidential campaign to pay legal fees for personal or business matters that are not directly related to his candidacy, such as the New York attorney general’s civil investigation into the Trump Organization’s finances, Noti added.\n\nBut money raised by Trump’s presidential campaign could pay legal bills connected to his conduct as a candidate or officeholder, said Richard Briffault, a Columbia Law School professor and an expert on campaign finance law.\n\nThe Republican National Committee has paid some of Trump’s fees related to the New York probe, citing his role as “a leader of our party.” But an RNC official recently told CNN that those payments are expected to end should he become a 2024 candidate, under the party’s “neutrality policy.”\n\nCan Trump use Save America’s money to run a traditional presidential campaign?\n\nFor the most part, no.\n\nSave America cannot transfer unlimited sums directly into his campaign coffers. As a general rule, PACs cannot donate more than $10,000 over a two-year election cycle to any single candidate.\n\n“We’ve never had a former president with a leadership PAC before, much less with nine figures sitting in it,” Noti said. “But the law, at least, is clear that it can’t go to the campaign.”\n\nCould Trump transfer the millions in Save America to a super PAC that backs his candidacy?\n\nNoti argues that rolling Save America’s money into a super PAC also would be prohibited if the super PAC is focused solely on advancing Trump’s presidential ambitions.\n\nBut other election law experts say a candidate might push the envelope.\n\nFor instance, a recent 3-3 deadlock at the FEC – in a case that turned on whether Florida Rep. Byron Donalds had broken campaign laws aimed at keeping big pots of money at the state level out of a federal super PAC – could provide a blueprint for a candidate to move leadership money to a super PAC.\n\nTransferring a candidate’s leadership PAC money into a super PAC that benefits that candidate “clearly violates the intentions” of the law, Briffault said, but “it’s not clear that anyone would blow the whistle on that.”\n\nAnd Fred Wertheimer, of the Democracy 21 watchdog group, said with the FEC’s six-member panel often deadlocked, “There’s no enforcement.”\n\nWhen does Trump become a candidate?\n\nTrump has not declared his candidacy and has not filed any paperwork with the Federal Election Commission to register as a 2024 presidential contender.\n\nBut campaign finance watchdogs argue that Trump has been skirting campaign finance laws for some time by talking and acting like a candidate without formally registering as one and complying with federal fundraising and spending limits.\n\nJust consider his public statements: Back in February at the Conservative Political Action Conference Trump said of another presidential campaign: “We did it twice and we’ll do it again. … We’re going to be doing it again a third time.”\n\nAnd, as CNN’s Melanie Zanona reported, Trump told a group of House Republicans attending a dinner at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club recently that he’s “made up his mind” about launching a 2024 presidential bid and it’s just a matter of “when” he announces it, according to one attendee, Indiana Rep. Jim Banks.\n\n“If you walk like a duck, sound like a duck, are a duck, you are supposed to register as a candidate,” said Stephen Spaulding, a former Federal Election Commission lawyer who is now senior counsel for policy at the watchdog group Common Cause.\n\nTrump has “clearly bent over backwards to hint about what his intentions are,” Spaulding said.\n\nTrump spokesman Taylor Budowich did not answer a question from CNN about the former President’s potential announcement and said he failed “to see the news value of the opinions of leftist campaign finance ‘experts’ or Democrat-funded organizations.”\n\nPoliticians often delay their announcements because they lose their ability to coordinate activities with super PACs and other outside organizations once they formally become a candidate, experts say.\n\n“What we’ve seen over the last several election cycles is candidates basically pretend they are not candidates,” Noti said, “so they can get their super PACs and their outside (groups) up and running.”\n\nA Democratic super PAC, American Bridge 21st Century, has pressed regulators at the Federal Election Commission to take Trump to task for his all-but-declared candidacy, with no success.\n\nLast month, American Bridge filed a federal lawsuit in an effort to force agency action, but it appears unlikely the case will be resolved in time to influence the 2024 election.", "authors": ["Fredreka Schouten"], "publish_date": "2022/08/11"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/06/politics/trump-pac-legal-fees-witnesses/index.html", "title": "Trump's Save America PAC paying legal bills for witnesses in Mar-a ...", "text": "Washingtonn CNN —\n\nDonald Trump’s Save America PAC has been footing the legal bills for additional Trump aides and allies whom federal investigators have subpoenaed for grand jury testimony as part of investigations surrounding the former president, sources familiar with the matter tell CNN.\n\nThe political action committee has paid more than $120,000 to the Brand Woodward Law firm, according to Federal Election Commission filings.\n\nThe firm represents a number of Trump associates who have appeared before a grand jury in Washington, DC, or spoken with investigators as part of the Justice Department’s investigation into the handling of government documents seized from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate after he left the White House.\n\nSave America has helped pay legal bills for Kash Patel, a Trump adviser who testified last month before the federal grand jury, and Walt Nauta, a former military aide in the Trump White House who has been interviewed by federal investigators about the former president’s retention of classified documents, one source said. Nauta is now an aide with the former president at his Palm Beach property, and his salary is paid by Trump’s leadership PAC.\n\nA Patel spokesman said at the time of his grand jury appearance that “his testimony was compelled over his objection through the only legal means available to the government – a grant of limited immunity.” Nauta’s attorney, Stanley Woodward Jr. of the Brand Woodward firm, has declined to comment.\n\nAnother source familiar with the matter tells CNN that other key players in Trump’s orbit who are being represented by Brand Woodward include Will Russell and Beau Harrison. Save America has helped to cover some of their legal bills as well, another source said.\n\nLast week, Russell and Harrison each appeared in front of a grand jury investigating the Mar-a-Lago document matter, sources familiar with the matter told CNN. Their attorney declined to comment at the time.\n\nThe firm declined to comment to CNN about the payments, which were first reported by The Washington Post. Stan Brand, a top lawyer at the firm, told the Post there is nothing wrong with Trump’s PAC paying legal bills for witnesses.\n\n“There’s no bar against third parties paying for legal fees as long as it’s disclosed to the client. The ethical obligation of the lawyer is to the client,” Brand said. “This is a tempest in a teapot and another cheap shot at these people because of who they work for.”\n\nBut Ty Cobb, a former Trump White House attorney, said the arrangement could raise bias questions down the road for any Trump aides whose attorney fees have been covered by Save America PAC.\n\n“There are ways this can be done legally. In fact, it’s a very common practice in corporate America for companies to pay for the outside legal expenses off employees who are called to testify in matters related to the company. But if can always be used on the stand to show bias,” Cobb said. “It’s a very common practice fraught with danger. Let’s say somebody testifies unfavorably for Trump and he cuts them off. That can be brought out at trial as evidence of bias.”\n\nCNN previously reported that the Trump’s political committees have paid more than $2 million this year to a half dozen law firms whose attorneys have represented witnesses before the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection.", "authors": ["Gaborr Kristen Holmes", "Kristen Holmes"], "publish_date": "2022/12/06"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/08/25/trump-save-america-pac-spent-july/7867026001/", "title": "Lawyers, Arizona candidates, Smithsonian portraits: How Trump's ...", "text": "More than $1 million went to a production firm Event Strategies, Inc.\n\nIn the weeks before the Arizona primary, Save America backed a new state-level PAC.\n\nSave America spent nearly $1 million on legal consulting in July.\n\nFormer President Donald Trump’s fundraising machine, his massive fortune used to wield his political influence as he weighs another White House run, spent almost $4 million in the month of July, leaving it with just over $99 million in the bank.\n\nA report filed Saturday night with the Federal Election Commission details how Save America, Trump’s leadership fund with loose spending restrictions, spent its money in the month of July.\n\nSave America registered with the FEC days after Trump lost the 2020 election and has raised more than $100 million. The PAC has received money through fundraising efforts that spread false claims about the election and the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/08/25"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/15/politics/save-america-pac-trump-lawyer/index.html", "title": "Save America PAC pays $3 million to Trump lawyer | CNN Politics", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe Save America PAC has advanced former President Donald Trump’s attorney Chris Kise $3 million in an upfront payment to cover his legal fees, a person familiar with the arrangement told CNN.\n\nKise, a former Florida solicitor general, joined Trump’s legal team last month to help the former President as he waged a court battle following the FBI’s search of Mar-a-Lago, his Florida residence and resort.\n\nThe addition of Kise was viewed as a significant boost to Trump’s legal team. The former President has had difficulty finding high-caliber lawyers to represent him given his history of stiffing attorneys and business partners and not following legal advice.\n\nIt took two weeks before Trump’s lawyers formally waded into the legal fight over the search warrant, despite publicly calling for the warrant and affidavit to be unsealed. And when they finally did, their motion had numerous legal flaws and drew criticism from legal experts on both sides of the aisle.\n\nKise left law firm Foley & Lardner, where he had worked for over a decade, to take on the assignment.\n\nPolitico first reported the $3 million payment.\n\nTrump has previously used the PAC, which was formed days after the 2020 presidential election, to cover some of his legal fees.\n\nThe former President’s legal troubles have only grown as the Justice Department has launched a wide ranking investigation into the election. In the past week, the DOJ sent more than 30 subpoenas to people associated with Trump, the campaign and post-election efforts.\n\nSome of the subpoenas, including one reviewed by CNN, were broad in scope, seeking information on a range of issues, including the fake elector scheme, Trump’s primary fundraising and political vehicle, Save America PAC, the organizing of the Trump rally on January 6, and any communications with a broad list of people who worked to overturn the 2020 election results.\n\nTrump has denied any wrongdoing and said he does not expect to be indicted.\n\nA source close to the former President previously told CNN that Trump has posed questions about a potential indictment to members of his inner circle.\n\nAnother adviser acknowledged that while Trump has certainly been in legal peril before, including while he was president, this seems different and potentially more dangerous, particularly because he no longer has the legal protections afforded to the executive office.", "authors": ["Kara Scannell Paul Leblanc", "Kara Scannell", "Paul Leblanc"], "publish_date": "2022/09/15"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/03/politics/senate-race-rankings-november-elections/index.html", "title": "The 10 Senate seats most likely to flip in 2022 | CNN Politics", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe race for the House is tilting strongly toward the GOP, but the struggle for Senate control is still very much a slog that could go either way, even as late-breaking national winds favor the party out of power.\n\nEvery race will matter on Election Day as Republicans look to win control of the evenly divided chamber and severely curtail the second half of President Joe Biden’s term.\n\nDemocrats have a shot in large part because the battleground states on the Senate map were mostly won by Biden in 2020, albeit narrowly. And even though Biden is deeply unpopular in many of those states two years later, Democratic incumbents and challengers amassed massive sums of money that allowed them to run on their own brands throughout the summer while their Republican opponents limped out of contentious primaries. This is where the nitty-gritty of campaign spending makes a difference: Candidates get more favorable advertising rates than the super PACs and outside groups that have had to come in and make up the difference for some Donald Trump-backed GOP nominees with lackluster fundraising.\n\nMore on key Senate races Herschel Walker allies want more ‘Trumpian response’ to abortion allegation Kelly warns ‘wheels’ could ‘come off our democracy’ while Masters tries to tie him to Biden in Arizona Senate debate Could Republicans lose a Senate race in deep-red Utah? See Senate race ratings by Inside Elections\n\nDemocrats’ challenge in the final days of the midterm elections is getting their base to turn out and persuading those remaining undecided voters – especially those who voted for Biden two years ago but are dissatisfied with him today – to stick with the president’s party. That’ll be easier said than done. Just 41% of US adults approved of Biden’s performance, according to a new CNN poll conducted by SSRS and released Wednesday. And Republican voters expressed greater engagement with this year’s midterms than Democrats across multiple questions gauging voters’ likelihood to vote.\n\nThat president’s party often loses seats in Congress during the first midterms of a new administration, and lower Democratic enthusiasm would suggest we’re on track for history to repeat itself. The enthusiasm gap (favoring Republicans by 14 points) is similar to the partisan gap in CNN’s polling from 2010, when Republicans gained seats in the first midterm of Barack Obama’s presidency.\n\nThis year’s key issues for voters would also seem to advantage Republicans. More than half of likely voters in CNN’s new poll identified the economy and inflation – a central component of GOP attack ads – as the most important factor in their vote for Congress. The Supreme Court’s late June ruling overturning Roe v. Wade injected uncertainty into the political landscape, with a majority of Americans disapproving of that decision. But only 15% of likely voters in CNN’s poll said abortion was the most important issue determining their vote. More broadly, nearly three-quarters of Americans think things in the country are going badly.\n\nAnd yet, what’s keeping this cycle interesting is the unpredictability and relative messiness of the Senate map – with races sometimes moving in different directions. Despite Republicans picking up momentum across the country, for example, the seat most likely to flip is a GOP-held seat, not a Democratic-held one. Pennsylvania – where GOP Sen. Pat Toomey is retiring – tops the list, as it has since CNN first started compiling these rankings at the start of the cycle in early 2021. Rankings are based on CNN’s reporting, fundraising and advertising data, and polling, as well as historical data about how states and candidates have performed. And two other GOP-held open seats – North Carolina and Ohio – have proved to be surprisingly competitive for Democrats this year, even if they’re much less likely to flip.\n\nBut the race that could matter more than any other is a seat Democrats flipped last year. If neither candidate receives a majority of the vote in Georgia on November 8, the race will advance to a December 6 runoff. And if Senate control hinges on the Peach State – as it did in 2020 – we’ll have to wait another month to learn which party holds the majority.\n\n1. Pennsylvania\n\nIncumbent: Republican Pat Toomey (retiring)\n\nSarah Silbiger/Pool/Getty Images\n\nThe Keystone State rounds out the cycle where it began – as the Senate seat most likely to flip. The race to replace retiring GOP Sen. Pat Toomey represents Democrats’ best pickup opportunity. Biden narrowly won the commonwealth in 2020, after Trump had carried it in 2016, making it a pivotal battleground for the midterms and the next presidential contest.\n\nThe Senate race has tightened as Republican Mehmet Oz consolidates support from Republicans after making it through a nasty primary with Trump’s endorsement. Democrat John Fetterman, the current lieutenant governor, held a slim lead over the celebrity surgeon in a recent New York Times/Siena poll. But that was notably conducted in large part before their late October debate, when the visible effects of Fetterman’s May stroke raised some concern, even among his supporters, that he might not be able to win over undecided voters. Still, only 3% of voters in a new Monmouth University poll said the debate had caused them to reconsider their choice in the race. And 39% of registered voters in a Fox News survey taken after the debate said they were concerned Fetterman wasn’t healthy enough to do the job effectively – a 5-point increase since that question was asked in September – compared with 58% who weren’t concerned.\n\nDemocrats, meanwhile, have seized on Oz’s comments during the debate that the discussion over abortion should be left to “women, doctors, local political leaders,” with Senate Majority PAC using it to link him to GOP gubernatorial nominee Doug Mastriano, who’s trailing in his race. Fetterman stood at 50% to Oz’s 46% among likely voters in a CNN Poll of Polls, which averages four most recent surveys that meet CNN’s standards, including the Times/Siena poll and others conducted mostly before the debate.\n\nThe good news for Fetterman, even as his own negatives have gone up, is that Oz’s negatives remain relatively high – 17% of Republicans and more than half of independents had an unfavorable view of the celebrity surgeon in the Times survey – and the Democrat continues to outpace Oz on the question of which candidate understands the concerns of everyday Pennsylvanians, according to the Monmouth survey. Biden and former President Barack Obama are rallying with Fetterman in Philadelphia on the final weekend before Election Day – the rare competitive Senate battleground that’s playing host to the president.\n\n2. Nevada\n\nIncumbent: Democrat Catherine Cortez Masto\n\nCNN\n\nThe supremacy of voters’ economic concerns is bad news for Democrats in Nevada. The state has been hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic and average gas prices remain near $5 a gallon. Furthermore, Nevada’s transient population makes it tough for first-term incumbents to establish a strong brand. That’s complicating Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s key task – winning over voters dissatisfied with Biden and the direction of the country. Her favorability rating stood at 39% among likely voters in the New York Times/Siena poll (the same as GOP challenger Adam Laxalt’s), which was about on par with the percentage of likely voters who approved of Biden’s job performance. However, her share of the vote in recent polling is above Biden’s approval rating, giving Democrats confidence that she has a path to overperform the president. Cortez Masto and Laxalt were tied at 47% in the Times poll – a similar finding to a recent CBS poll and CNN polling from early October, which showed no clear leader.\n\nRepublicans are blaming Cortez Masto, the first Latina senator, for a litany of concerns – from higher inflation to “chaos at the border” – all with the message that she’s a “rubber stamp” for Biden. Cortez Masto and Democrats have attacked Laxalt over abortion – although he says he does not support a national ban and has pointed out that the right to an abortion is settled law in Nevada. They’ve also tried tying Laxalt – a former state attorney general and the grandson of the former governor and senator with the same last name – to Trump and highlighted his efforts, as Trump’s Nevada campaign co-chair, in the filing of lawsuits related to the 2020 election. But perhaps in a recognition that economic concerns outweigh abortion or democracy as issues that are important to voters, Democrats – including Obama, who rallied the party faithful in Nevada on Tuesday – have tried to flip the script on higher gas prices, blaming them on corporations and tying Laxalt to “big oil.”\n\n3. Georgia\n\nIncumbent: Democrat Raphael Warnock\n\nMegan Varner/Getty Images\n\nNo race has seen more drama in the last month than Georgia, where Trump’s hand-picked candidate, Herschel Walker, is facing allegations from two women that he urged them to get abortions, which he has denied. But the accusations, which have played into the Democratic narrative about the retired football star being a hypocrite, don’t seem to have done much damage to his standing in the race against Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock, who’s seeking a full six-year term. After at first steering clear of the allegations, Warnock used them in a recent ad against his opponent. But the New York Times/Siena poll showed no clear leader, which was a tightening from a Quinnipiac University survey conducted after news of the first allegation that had given Warnock a 7-point lead.\n\nWarnock continues to enjoy stronger favorability ratings than his GOP challenger, whose image is underwater. The Democrat’s favorability ratings are also higher than Biden’s approval – a potentially significant separation in a state the president flipped by less than half a point in 2020. But the gubernatorial race in Georgia could help carry Walker across the finish line with GOP Gov. Brian Kemp appearing to have the advantage over Democrat Stacey Abrams in a rematch of their 2018 contest. Where that finish line is, though, remains to be seen – if neither Senate nominee surpasses 50% of the vote on November 8, the top two finishers will advance to a December 6 runoff.\n\n4. Wisconsin\n\nIncumbent: Republican Ron Johnson\n\nLeigh VogelPool/Getty Images\n\nAs the only Republican senator running for reelection in a state Biden won in 2020, Sen. Ron Johnson is the chamber’s most vulnerable GOP incumbent. A Marquette University Law School poll released Wednesday showed no clear leader in the race between Johnson and Democratic Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes – similar to a CNN survey from mid October – which is comparable to the close governor’s race.\n\nThe race seems to have moved in the GOP’s favor since the summer when Barnes emerged from the August primary relatively unscathed after his opponents had dropped out beforehand. Republicans sought to define Barnes after Labor Day with a blitz of advertising, particularly hitting him over crime and his past support for redirecting funding from police. (Barnes has called it a “lie” that he supports defunding the police.) Democrats have tried to turn the crime argument back on Johnson by pointing to some of the statements he has made downplaying the January 6 insurrection and trying to use Johnson’s past remarks on Social Security against him.\n\nBiden only carried Wisconsin by less than half a point in 2020, so it’s still a tough state, with an even tougher national political environment for Barnes. Independents, for example, were breaking for Johnson in the Marquette survey (53% to 46% among likely voters), and 68% of registered voters said they were “very concerned” about an inflation – an issue that favors Republicans. Barnes was polling at 48% in the Marquette poll, slightly lower than Biden’s percentage of the Wisconsin vote in 2020. That’s one reason why Obama, who received a higher 53% in the state in 2012 while winning a second term, rallied with Barnes in the final weeks of the campaign.\n\n5. Arizona\n\nIncumbent: Democrat Mark Kelly\n\nCourtney Pedroza/Getty Images\n\nThe race between Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly and Republican Blake Masters has also narrowed – a Fox News poll released Tuesday shows no clear leader with Masters picking up support from Republicans. But Kelly, who won a 2020 special election and is running for a full six-year term, has proved a much more resilient Democrat to tarnish than some of the GOP’s other targets. That has kept this race – in a purple state Biden won by less than half a point – more competitive for Democrats than it probably should be given the national environment. (A CNN poll and the Times/Siena poll both gave him a 6-point lead over Masters.) A retired astronaut with impressive fundraising totals, Kelly has tried to distance himself from his party on immigration – as he did during their debate last month – and largely had the airwaves to himself to sell that message.\n\nMasters is getting some late help from other Republican spenders – including Trump’s super PAC and the political arm of the Club for Growth – after the Senate Leadership Fund had to cut its spending here to divert resources to other states. A venture capitalist who has the backing of both Trump and Peter Thiel, Masters tried to dial back some of his more extreme rhetoric on abortion and election denialism after winning the GOP primary. But the former president recently urged him to go “stronger” on his unfounded election fraud claims.\n\nMasters may have gotten an assist Tuesday, when the libertarian nominee, who was pulling at 1% in the Times survey, dropped out. But with voters already voting, it’s unclear how much of a difference the move will actually make. This is another state where the governor’s race could affect the Senate contest since Republican gubernatorial nominee Kari Lake is considered a much stronger candidate than Masters. Given their struggles in this race so far, though, Republicans will interpret Masters doing well here on election night as a sign that the environment is even better for them than they had expected.\n\n6. North Carolina\n\nIncumbent: Republican Richard Burr (retiring)\n\nDemetrius Freeman/Pool/Getty Images\n\nThe race to replace retiring GOP Sen. Richard Burr looks closer than many observers had expected at the beginning of the cycle. Democrat Cheri Beasley and Republican Rep. Ted Budd were tied among registered voters in a late October Marist poll. (Budd, a third-term congressman, had a small edge among definite voters.) North Carolina is accustomed to close elections – Trump only won it by about 1 point in 2020. But Democrats haven’t won a Senate race here since 2008, the last time the state went blue at the presidential level.\n\nBudd, Trump’s first nonincumbent Senate endorsee of the cycle, has been outraised by Beasley. And even though he’s benefited from outside spending that attacks Beasley on crime, the Democrat’s campaign has been able to take advantage of the more favorable advertising rates that candidates get. A former state Supreme Court chief justice, who would be the state’s first Black senator, Beasley has been trying to run as the outsider. “Washington politicians like Ted Budd aren’t listening,” she says in a recent spot about high prices and stagnant wages. Her ads don’t mention that she’s a Democrat – or that her party holds power in Washington. Besides hitting Budd on abortion, Democrats are also trying to make an economic counterargumen. Budd “voted against lowering drug prices for people like us,” one senior says in a Beasley ad, referring to a provision in Democrats’ health care, climate and tax package that allows Medicare to negotiate certain prescription drug prices.\n\nDemocrats have long hoped that Beasley could help energize parts of their base that don’t usually turn out in midterms – like rural Black voters and young voters. But national Democrats haven’t been able to pour as much money into this race given the number of incumbents they’re defending. Still, the Senate Majority PAC did up its spending in the state this fall, suggesting Democrats think Beasley has a shot.\n\n7. New Hampshire\n\nIncumbent: Democrat Maggie Hassan\n\nErin Scott/Getty Images\n\nThis race’s position on the rankings continues to be one of the biggest surprises of the 2022 cycle. Democrats and Republicans alike expected this contest to jump near the top of the list if and when GOP Gov. Chris Sununu got into the race. But he decided late last year not to run. Instead, retired Army Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc, who had raised virtually no money, is taking on first-term Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan after making it through the September primary. That doesn’t mean this isn’t still a competitive race – especially given the national environment. But Bolduc cuts a very different profile than Sununu, a Trump critic who supports abortion rights, in a state that Biden carried by 7 points and that’s been trending blue in federal elections.\n\nAnd yet, Sununu, who previously called Bolduc a “conspiracy theory type candidate,” is now supporting the GOP nominee, who’s repeatedly pushed election falsehoods. (Asked about that choice, the governor told CNN this week that no one should be a “one-issue voter.”) Bolduc also recently picked up an endorsement from Trump. Despite some Republicans coming to his side, both the Senate Leadership Fund and the National Republican Senatorial Committee have cut funding here as they’ve diverted resources to higher-priority races. That’s accentuated the resource disparity between Bolduc, who had raised about $1 million at of the end of the Federal Election Commission’s pre-general reporting period on October 19, compared with Hassan’s $39 million.\n\nStill, Hassan’s closing ad, in which she talks about “standing up to the president – whatever it takes,” speaks to her vulnerability this year given the national environment, which even her massive fundraising advantage may not be able to erase.\n\n8. Ohio\n\nIncumbent: Republican Rob Portman (retiring)\n\nTING SHEN/AFP/POOL/Getty Images\n\nThe race for retiring GOP Sen. Rob Portman’s seat wasn’t supposed to be competitive – Trump won the state by 8 points and, with the exception of Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown’s success, it’s been trending red over the past decade. Given those fundamentals and the national mood, Republicans still very much have the edge here, which is why it’s in the second half of this list.\n\nBut there’s no denying that Trump’s hand-picked Republican candidate, J.D. Vance, struggled to raise money and consolidate GOP support after a divisive primary. The diversion of Republican super PAC spending from more reliable battlegrounds to shore him up in Ohio speaks to his weaknesses as a candidate. After Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan had the airwaves mostly to himself over the summer, the Senate Leadership Fund has been trying to poke holes in his moderate image by tying him to Biden. Still, Ryan’s vast fundraising advantage has allowed him to run plenty of ads in which he says he has sided with Trump on trade and takes on his own party.\n\nThe candidates were essentially tied in a late October Marist survey, which likely speaks to this particular matchup given that the same survey showed the gubernatorial contest not even close. But Republicans are confident, given the makeup of the state, that the remaining undecided voters in the Senate race, who made up 8% of registered voters in that Marist survey, will break late for Vance. It’s probably no accident that Trump is holding a rally in Ohio the day before Election Day.\n\n9. Florida\n\nIncumbent: Republican Marco Rubio\n\nDREW ANGERER/AFP/POOL/Getty Images\n\nFlorida voted for Trump by a smaller margin than Ohio, but for the second month in a row, the Sunshine State has ranked lower on the list of seats most likely to flip. That’s because Republican Sen. Marco Rubio – although he’s been outraised by a strong challenger in Democratic Rep. Val Demings – is a two-term incumbent who seems to be doing everything he needs to do to win in this environment.\n\nDemings, a former Orlando police chief, has leaned heavily into her law enforcement experience. “The Senate could use a cop on the beat,” she says in one spot in which she explains her opposition to defunding the police. But that hasn’t been enough to blunt Republican attacks that she’s prioritized Washington over the police by siding with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.\n\n10. Colorado\n\nIncumbent: Democrat Michael Bennet\n\nDEMETRIUS FREEMAN/AFP/POOL/Getty Images\n\nDemocratic Sen. Michael Bennet is used to close races – he won his last reelection in 2016 by just 6 points against a GOP challenger whom the national party had abandoned. He’s facing a much more formidable opponent this time in businessman Joe O’Dea, who has expressed support for abortion in the early stages of pregnancy and has criticized Trump. He told CNN’s Dana Bash last month that he would “actively” campaign against the former president, which inspired Trump to lash out at the GOP nominee.\n\nThat might actually help O’Dea in a state Biden carried by more than 13 points in 2020. And in a sign of the GOP’s brewing divisions ahead of 2024, the race has become a point of divergence between Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has backed O’Dea. The Senate Leadership Fund gave $1.25 million to a pro-O’Dea super PAC – the same amount it gave to a group supporting Republican challenger Tiffany Smiley in Washington state. But Biden’s smaller margin in Colorado (he won Washington by 19 points) makes it more likely to flip if the national environment gives Republicans a chance to pick up a seat in a state seen as safely blue.", "authors": ["Simone Pathe"], "publish_date": "2022/11/03"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_9", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:39", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2021/10/27/starbucks-pay-raise-hourly-wage-increase-2022/8567718002/", "title": "Starbucks to raise average pay up to $17 an hour as it faces a labor ...", "text": "All Starbucks hourly pay workers will make at least $15 an hour and average $17 an hour in summer.\n\nStarbucks said barista hourly rates will range based on market and tenure from $15 to $23 per hour.\n\nStarting in January 2022, employees with two or more years of service could receive up to a 5% raise\n\nFacing twin pressures of a union challenge and a labor shortage, Starbucks announced Wednesday it is hiking wages for U.S. employees.\n\nAll hourly pay workers will make at least $15 an hour and average nearly $17 an hour in summer 2022. Some of the pay increases will start before the summer, the Seattle-based coffee giant said.\n\nStarting in late January 2022, employees with two or more years of service could receive up to a 5% raise and those with five or more years could receive up to a 10% raise, Starbucks said.\n\nIncluding wage and benefit increases throughout the pandemic, the company estimates the increases total \"approximately $1 billion in incremental investments in annual wages and benefits over the last two years.\"\n\n►Save better, spend better: Money tips and advice delivered right to your inbox. Sign up here\n\n►Taco Bell's World Series freebie:Taco Bell to give away free tacos Nov. 4 after Braves' Ozzie Albies steals base in World Series\n\nStarbucks said barista hourly rates will range based on market and tenure from $15 to $23 per hour across the country in summer.\n\nThe wage hike comes as Starbucks fends off a unionization effort in New York. None of its corporate-owned shops in the U.S. are unionized. In August, Starbucks workers from three Buffalo, New York locations petitioned the National Labor Relations Board for a vote on whether to unionize.\n\nThe company is seeking to persuade the labor board to require that workers at all 20 Buffalo-area stores take part in the election instead of allowing stores to vote individually, the New York Times reported.\n\nAmazon workers in New York also are trying to unionize. The organizing drives are happening during a moment of reckoning across corporate America as the pandemic and ensuing labor shortage has given employees more leverage to fight for better working conditions and pay.\n\nWorkers have staged strikes at Kellogg’s U.S. cereal plants as well as at Deere & Co., Frito-Lay and Nabisco facilities nationwide.\n\nAbout 4.3 million Americans quit their jobs in August, the Labor Department said last week, the most on records dating back more than two decades.\n\nMany large corporations criticized for underpaying their staff are now upping their offerings in hopes of attracting more workers. That means hourly-wage jobs are being boosted to pay levels never seen before. Walmart and Bank of America are among businesses that announced recent pay hikes.\n\nStarbucks announced that it was investing in training, which is one of the complaints the New York workers have. The company said it is completely redesigning its \"Barista Basics\" guide and adding training time.\n\nThe union organizing campaign, if successful, could upend Starbucks’ labor model. Employees say chronic understaffing has long caused frustration.\n\nStarbucks said Wednesday it has also “invested in forecasting capabilities to improve store staffing” and is testing a “shifts app” to make it easier for employees to work available shifts. Other tests include a “Cold Beverage Station in select stores around the country.”\n\n►Halloween 2021:Chipotle cancels in-restaurant Boorito deal for $1 million free burrito giveaway, $5 Halloween meals\n\n►Christmas shipping deadlines:FedEx, UPS and USPS say these are the last days to ship gifts\n\nContributing: Associated Press; Paul Davidson, USA TODAY\n\nFollow USA TODAY reporter Kelly Tyko on Twitter: @KellyTyko. For shopping news, tips and deals, join us on our Shopping Ninjas Facebook group.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/10/27"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/local/michigan/2014/06/22/michigan-spends-1b-on-charter-schools-but-fails-to-hold/77155074/", "title": "Michigan spends $1B on charter schools but fails to hold them ...", "text": "Jennifer Dixon\n\nDetroitFreePress\n\nMichigan taxpayers pour nearly $1 billion a year into charter schools — but state laws regulating charters are among the nation’s weakest, and the state demands little accountability in how taxpayer dollars are spent and how well children are educated.\n\nA yearlong investigation by the Detroit Free Press reveals that Michigan’s lax oversight has enabled a range of abuses in a system now responsible for more than 140,000 Michigan children. That figure is growing as more parents try charter schools as an alternative to traditional districts.\n\nIn reviewing two decades of charter school records, the Free Press found:\n\nWasteful spending and double-dipping. Board members, school founders and employees steering lucrative deals to themselves or insiders. Schools allowed to operate for years despite poor academic records. No state standards for who operates charter schools or how to oversee them.\n\nAnd a record number of charter schools run by for-profit companies that rake in taxpayer money and refuse to detail how they spend it, saying they’re private and not subject to disclosure laws. Michigan leads the nation in schools run by for-profits.\n\n“People should get a fair return on their investment,” said former state schools Superintendent Tom Watkins, a longtime charter advocate who has argued for higher standards for all schools. “But it has to come after the bottom line of meeting the educational needs of the children. And in a number of cases, people are making a boatload of money, and the kids aren’t getting educated.”\n\nAccording to the Free Press’ review, 38% of charter schools that received state academic rankings during the 2012-13 school year fell below the 25th percentile, meaning at least 75% of all schools in the state performed better. Only 23% of traditional public schools fell below the 25th percentile.\n\nAdvocates argue that charter schools have a much higher percentage of children in poverty compared with traditional schools. But traditional schools, on average, perform slightly better on standardized tests even when poverty levels are taken into account.\n\nIn late 2011, Michigan lawmakers removed limits on how many charters can operate here —opening the door to a slew of new management companies. In 2013-14, the state had 296 charters operating some 370 schools — in 61% of them, charter boards have enlisted a full-service, for-profit management company. Another 17% rely on for-profits for other services, mostly staffing and human resources, according to Free Press research.\n\nMichigan far exceeds states like Florida, Ohio and Missouri, where only about one-third of charters were run by a full-service, for-profit management company in 2011-12, according to research by Western Michigan University professor Gary Miron, who has studied charters extensively.\n\nWhile the Free Press found disclosure issues with both for-profit and nonprofit companies, the state’s failure to insist on more financial transparency by for-profits — teacher salaries, executive compensation, vendor payments and more — is particularly troubling to charter critics because the for-profit companies receive the bulk of the money that goes to charter schools. In some cases, even charter school board members don’t get detailed information.\n\nWithout that, experts say there is no way to determine if a school is getting the most for its money.\n\n“There needs to be a lot of transparency ... so that the board knows the company isn’t double-dipping, triple-dipping,” said Greg Richmond, president and CEO of the Chicago-based National Association of Charter School Authorizers.\n\nCharter defenders dismiss criticism that charters are not transparent enough and say the schools provide an excellent education. Indeed, the Free Press found innovative and high-performing charter schools. Out of 214 charter schools ranked in 2012-13 by the state, 27 were in the top 25% of all schools in Michigan.\n\n“They have contributed very positively to the education system in Michigan, and they’ll continue to,” said Dan Quisenberry, president of the Michigan Association of Public School Academies, a charter advocacy organization. Charter board members “swear an oath of office, just like every other public official, and they’re highly accountable to parents for academic outcomes and fiscal outcomes.”\n\nBut critics have another view. Miron said Michigan charter schools have become “a private system of education without public oversight.”\n\nOften no consequences for poor performance\n\nMichigan’s laws are either nonexistent or so lenient that there are often no consequences for abuses or poor academics. Taxpayers and parents are left clueless about how charter schools spend the public’s money, and lawmakers have resisted measures to close schools down for poor academic performance year after year.\n\nThe Free Press found that questionable decisions, excessive spending and misuse of taxpayer dollars run the gamut:\n\n■ A Sault Ste. Marie charter school board gave its administrator a severance package worth $520,000 in taxpayer money.\n\n■ A Bedford Township charter school spent more than $1 million on swampland.\n\n■ A mostly online charter school in Charlotte spent $263,000 on a Dale Carnegie confidence-building class, $100,000 more than it spent on laptops and iPads.\n\n■ Two board members who challenged their Romulus school’s management company over finances and transparency were ousted when the length of their terms was summarily reduced by Grand Valley State University.\n\n■ National Heritage Academies, the state’s largest for-profit school management company, charges 14 of its Michigan schools $1 million or more in rent — which many real estate experts say is excessive.\n\n■ A charter school in Pittsfield Township gave jobs and millions of dollars in business to multiple members of the founder’s family.\n\n■ Charter authorizers have allowed management companies to open multiple schools without a proven track record of success.\n\nMichigan’s first charter schools opened in 1994, based on a simple formula that exists to this day:\n\nThe boards of school districts, community colleges and state public universities can charter, or authorize, a school. Michigan gives charter schools an amount equal to or slightly less than the school district in which they are located. Authorizers can keep as much as 3% for oversight. The rest goes to the school. And individual school boards are responsible for running the school.\n\nBut many school boards let management companies handle the money and make the decisions. That’s reality, regardless of what charter enthusiasts anticipated when the first schools opened. And thestate exercises little control over whether a charter school is well run and high-performing, or not. Oversight is a patchwork with 40 authorizers.\n\n“Michigan has one of the least restrictive environments for charter schools in the entire nation,” said Casandra Ulbrich, vice president of the state Board of Education, which sets education policy and advises lawmakers.\n\n“We basically opened the door to all types of different charter schools, most of which are run by for-profit management companies, and it’s led to a lot of issues, primarily ... financial oversight and transparency.”\n\nCharter schools have been controversial from the start. The Michigan Legislature passed the state’s charter law in 1993, a key piece of then-Republican Gov. John Engler’s education reforms. Legal challenges quickly followed.\n\nWilliam Collette, an Ingham County circuit court judge, ruled the law unconstitutional in 1994. In a recent interview, he said he was concerned that the state had lost its power to make sure charter schools “were not violating the principal of separation of church and state, and not teaching ideology.”\n\n“There was very little oversight, or any way of tracking the way charter schools were going to use the funding” from the state, Collette said.\n\nA Court of Appeals panel upheld Collette’s ruling, but the Michigan Supreme Court overturned it in 1997.\n\nState law sets no qualifications for charter applicants\n\nIn Michigan, anyone and everyone can apply to open a charter school. There are no state guidelines for screening applicants.\n\nAnd in many cases, authorizers have given additional charters to schools managed by companies that haven’t demonstrated academic success with their existing schools.\n\nCentral Michigan University, for example, gave two additional charters to schools managed by the for-profit Hanley-Harper Group Inc. in Harper Woods, before its first school had any state ranking and despite test scores that showed it below statewide proficiency rates in reading and math. The school’s first ranking, released last year, put it in the 14th percentile, meaning that 86% of schools in Michigan did better academically.\n\n“We have a product, yes, we are trying to sell and constantly working to make ... better and better and better,” company founder Beata Chochla, who has run several small businesses, including janitorial and home health care, told the Free Press in an interview.\n\nFerris State University has authorized a fourth Hanley-Harper school, expected to open this fall in Oak Park.\n\n“We were convinced they had a good plan,” Ferris State’s interim charter schools director Ronald Rizzo said, adding that critics who believe an operator should have a successful academic track record before adding schools are “welcome” to their views.\n\nAuthorizers also have been slow to close poor performers. Among the oldest and poorest performing schools in metro Detroit:\n\n■ Hope Academy, founded in Detroit in 1998, ranked almost rock-bottom — in the first percentile — in 2012-13.\n\n■ Commonwealth Community Development Academy, founded in Detroit in 1996, ranked in the third percentile.\n\nBoth schools are authorized by Eastern Michigan University, which said in a statement that it is not satisfied with either. Yet just last year, EMU renewed Hope Academy’s charter.\n\n“That’s a shocker,” Western Michigan’s Miron said. “It just shows that our system is broken.”\n\nNo guidelines for when a charter should be revoked\n\nMichigan law provides no statewide standards for how the boards of school districts, community colleges and public universities that authorize charter schools should monitor a charter’s performance, or when a charter should be revoked. Michigan has 40 authorizers — from rural districts with one charter to Central Michigan University with 64 — and, as a result, standards and oversight are inconsistent.\n\nMinnesota, by comparison, has clear performance standards for its authorizers and requires them to apply to the state Department of Education for approval to grant school charters. Minnesota law also requires a review of an authorizer’s performance at least every five years, including an analysis of the academic, operational and financial performance of its schools.\n\nThe Minnesota reviews begin in 2015 and will determine whether authorizers are meeting state requirements. Under the state’s current system, authorizers deemed less than satisfactory would be prohibited from adding charters or expanding existing ones.\n\nMichigan law does allow the state superintendent of education to stop an authorizer from opening new schools. But there’s a loophole: The authorizer can keep existing schools, and those schools can open new campuses. The Michigan Department of Education has never prohibited an authorizer from opening new charters and says it needs the Legislature to write specific guidelines for when it can act, or let MDE write those rules.\n\nTaxpayer money can be hidden from public view\n\nManagement companies insist — without much challenge from the state — that taxpayer money they receive to run a school, hire staff and pay suppliers is private, not subject to public disclosure.\n\nQuisenberry, the president of the Michigan charter schools association, said school expenditures are “appropriately public” while “things that would be related to the company itself and its internal operations are appropriately private.”\n\nGreg Lambert, an NHA representative, spelled out the company’s position to the board of the Detroit Enterprise Academy in 2010 when several members were demanding more transparency.\n\n“Mr. Lambert stated that the public dollars became private when they were received by NHA. He further indicated that because NHA is a private company, the information need not be disclosed,” according to minutes of the meeting. Lambert has since retired.\n\nIn practice, it is difficult to know how charter management companies are spending money except in broad categories. They typically don’t disclose total employee compensation or salaries of those making more than $100,000, despite a state law saying all school districts — which include charters — must post that on their websites. Detailed budgets are difficult to find. And unlike traditional school districts, the management companies usually don’t disclose their vendors, contracts and competitive bid documents. The schools don’t have to disclose management fees.\n\n“We’re having a big debate over whether we’re putting enough money into public education,” said John Austin, president of the state Board of Education. “But with many schools, we don’t know where the money we’re spending now is going, who’s getting rich, and at what price to the taxpayer.\n\n“And worst, we’re not seeing good educational outcomes.”\n\nMixed results academically, less spending in the classroom\n\nCharter schools in general spend more on administration and less in the classroom than traditional districts.\n\nA Free Press analysis based on 2012-13 data found traditional schools spend an average of $6,985 per student in the classroom, and charter schools spend $4,893. At traditional schools, administration costs an average of $1,090 per student, compared with $1,894 in charter schools.\n\nUnlike traditional districts, charter schools cannot seek millages to pay for buildings; they must pay for their campuses out of state per-pupil funding. But some school boards have not shopped around for the best deal and pay above fair-market value for their facilities, particularly if they rent from their management company.\n\nCharters also haven’t met the expectation that they would raise achievement in schools with high poverty, a barometer of student performance and a factor in school rankings. The isolated success of some charter schools — like some traditional schools — serves to heighten frustration among educators that more far-reaching progress hasn’t been made.\n\nThe Detroit Edison Public School Academy, a charter school on the city’s east side, is outpacing most Detroit schools — and state proficiency rates — on standardized tests. It ranks in the 77th percentile. Yet it remains an exception.\n\n“The theory of charters was if you remove elected school boards, a centralized bureaucracy and powerful unions, that you would get better student achievement. The evidence so far, in Michigan and around the country, is ... some charters work and some don’t,” said Lou Glazer, president of Michigan Future Inc., a think tank that financially supports nine schools in Detroit, including eight charter schools\n\n“On average, if there are gains, they’re marginal at best.”\n\nLoopholes in Michigan law allow insider deals and nepotism\n\nNeither the state nor school authorizers have been aggressive in policing charter schools for sweetheart dealings and nepotism.\n\nState law prohibits board members from serving if relatives work for the school, or if they have an ownership interest in, or significant role with, its management company.\n\nBut those management companies are free to hire friends of board members or school founders. And charter boards are free to give contracts to friends and relatives of school officials. That can create multiple conflicts of interest — and raise questions about whether decisions are made in the best interests of the school.\n\nDownriver, two charters doled out millions of dollars’ worth of business to relatives of the schools’ administrator. At a charter school in Pittsfield Township, multiple members of the founder’s family were school vendors or employees. And schools in Ecorse and Southfield bought property at inflated prices from companies whose owners included the president of their management company.\n\nThe examples of self-dealing through the system are “outrageous and unfortunately far too common,” said Miron of Western Michigan, which does not authorize charter schools.\n\nAuthorizers, management companies work closely — too closely?\n\nThe proliferation of schools run by management companies in Michigan also has brought with it cozy relationships between the companies and their schools’ authorizers.\n\nMany companies approach authorizers directly to open new schools — and at least one authorizing official, Grand Valley State University’s Tim Wood, said he actively recruits national management companies, both for-profit and nonprofit.\n\nBoth authorizers and management companies often have a hand in recruiting board members, who critics say can’t be truly independent.\n\nRichmond, of the National Association of Charter School Authorizers, said authorizers should not approve schools with boards chosen by the management company because these board members tend to “act like employees of the management company doing what the boss tells them.”\n\n“If you have an independent board, and authorizers should make sure they do, that board should be appropriately requiring a fair amount of transparency about how this money is spent — enough transparency to make sure they, the board, are not being double-charged for expenses.”\n\nMichigan authorizers say they don’t get involved in that level of detail because boards by law have primary responsibility for negotiating leases, management agreements, budgets and other financial information pertaining to day-to-day operations.\n\nBut with boards that leave decision-making up to management companies, the question becomes: Who’s monitoring how taxpayer money is spent?\n\nSaid Cindy Schumacher, who oversees Central Michigan University’s charter schools office: “We don’t really have a relationship with the management companies. It’s up to the boards to determine what the structure is.”\n\nRichmond, whose organization is pro charter, said even if a charter school does deliver academic excellence, that’s no excuse if taxpayers are gouged.\n\n“I can’t think of any other area of public or private enterprise that would agree to be ripped off by someone as long as they were providing a nice product.”\n\nAustin, the state board president, said too many authorizers are facilitating “management company-created schools ... companies running schools making lots of money and delivering very poor and mediocre education, which is the business that they are in. And that’s not the business we should be in terms of education policy in Michigan.”\n\nHe said the state board has tried to “insist on transparency,” but the Legislature has resisted. Lawmakers also have opposed prohibiting management companies with poor academic track records from opening new schools.\n\n“We should not let more bad schools to be created,” Austin said, “when we have enough challenges improving education in all our schools.”\n\nWhat’s there to hide, anyway? Critics call for open records\n\nState Superintendent Mike Flanagan, who runs the Michigan Department of Education and chairs the state Board of Education, said Michigan’s Legislature must insist on more transparency.\n\nBut Miron said the trend in Michigan and nationwide seems to be toward less transparency — such as the types of management agreements negotiated by National Heritage Academies.\n\nThe company takes 95% or more of the per-pupil taxpayer funding that its schools receive from the state, with 3% going to the authorizer and 2% or $35,000, whichever is less, given to the school board to spend at its discretion. NHA pays the bills and keeps whatever is left as profit.\n\nNHA and its supporters say their agreements are no different than contracts given by a traditional school district to a private company to provide maintenance or transportation. They say that vendor is not required to reveal how much it pays its janitors or bus drivers, or other details of its spending.\n\n“I think it’s a fair analogy, because the school is hiring NHA to do an educational service,” said Grand Valley’s Wood.\n\nBut there’s a big difference, say many other experts: The traditional school district that hires a janitorial company isn’t handing over almost all of its state funding to a private company.\n\nRichmond said authorizers should ensure that a management contract spells out precisely what services the company will provide and its compensation, including fees and bonuses. Such disclosures are among the national charter association’s best practices.\n\nSaid Flanagan: “If everyone is doing the right thing, they shouldn’t have a problem with being open.”", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2014/06/22"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2019/04/17/nashville-mayor-david-briley-teases-1-b-budget-mnps-school-funding/3484888002/", "title": "Nashville Mayor David Briley teases $1B budget for Metro schools", "text": "Mayor David Briley teased a budget for Metro Nashville Public Schools that could potentially exceed $1 billion while also alluding to the strings that would come attached to additional funding from the city.\n\nBriley dropped a flashy commitment Tuesday during his annual budget talks with the district that for the first time, school funding would cross the billion dollar threshold for the next fiscal year.\n\n\"This year’s budget that I will present to the Metro Council will for the first time exceed a billion dollars that our city is spending on public education,\" he said. \"It will also be the first time that 70 percent of those funds are local.\"\n\nThe mayor provided few details in his initial address of his budget for Metro schools but it is the largest ever local expenditure on public education.\n\nBut to be clear, that figure would cover capital expenditures and estimated debt payments on top of operating costs. Last year's budget for Metro schools was $987 million, including debt service.\n\n\"The final budget recommendation is yet to be determined, so it limits the amount of detail we can get into,\" Briley spokesperson Thomas Mulgrew said.\n\nIn her third day at the district's helm, MNPS Interim Superintendent Adrienne Battle presented a proposed a $963 million operating budget for the upcoming fiscal year, a $76.7 million increase over last year.\n\nThe budget proposal put forth by the district represents a list of needs that Nashville schools \"crave,\" according to Battle.\n\n“I believe the mayor has a commitment to support us in our ask and doing what’s best of our teachers,” Battle said after the meeting. “He communicated his priority around support our Metro public schools. Given that commitment, I believe he will put his best effort forward.”\n\nThe budget prioritizes a salary step increase and a 10 percent cost-of-living raise for employees. The total cost of employee compensation increases will total $54 million.\n\nIn last year's budget crunch, Briley proposed only $5 million in new funding for Metro schools, which asked for a $44.7 million increase. He also withheld the cost-of-living pay bump.\n\nThe district was forced to find $15 million in cuts to meet its annual fiscal obligations, including a required increase in funding for charter schools.\n\nBriley's announcement Tuesday was a surprise as many took previous years as an indication that it would be unlikely that the city would fund a dramatic increase.\n\nHe also took further steps in throwing his support behind Battle, who he endorsed to replace former Director Shawn Joseph.\n\n“I frankly hope that Dr. Battle is the director for a long time,\" he said, possibly suggesting a push for her permanent place as the schools' chief.\n\n\"I think she should be given a chance to do that. I think we need to find a way to build support around her and I think this city is ready to refocus on public education, to get past some of the discord we have had in recent past, because it is my belief that regardless where been in last few months on this issue, folks want to see the schools in our city succeed,\" he said.\n\nSalary increase for MNPS employees\n\nThe mayor pressed Vice Chair Christiane Buggs on Tuesday about how the district came to the 10 percent increase figure for raises for teachers and staff.\n\n\"That's easy,\" she said. \"They asked for it.\"\n\nBut Briley pushed back and said his administration and the school board will have to talk about increases by looking at objective data and \"concrete research.\"\n\n\"I don't know if 10 percent is enough. I don't know if it's too much,\" he said. \"To be frank, I would say I would commit over a longer term to more than 10 percent. I think that's probably what we ought to include in the context of some sort of memorandum of understanding between myself and you.\"\n\nTuesday was the first time Briley has hinted at aspects of a deal he said several weeks ago would have to be in place between him and the district, in order for the schools to get new funding.\n\nHe vowed he would take a leading role in the future direction of the city’s schools after a tumultuous year between Joseph and a split school board.\n\nMulgrew told The Tennessean details of the agreement are still being worked out and will be presented in the coming weeks.\n\nA call for Briley to fund the budget proposal\n\nThe school board has continually said its $963 million budget proposal presents the needs of the district, including funding priorities such as employee pay and social-emotional work. Teachers have rallied outside of schools for increased pay and more money for schools.\n\nAnd parents, teachers and community leaders rallied in support of the proposal, filling the room on Wednesday in support of the budget.\n\nAfter the budget hearing, the groups held a news conference after the hearing. And the consensus was unanimous: For Briley and the Metro Council to fully fund the budget.\n\nMichael Epps Utley, a parent with Fund MNPS, said the district has struggled for years to meet the needs of students due to underfunding.\n\n“Our students are feeling the results of underfunding right now, today. Those are people we lose. And when we lose them, it’s our fault, not theirs - they are children,” he said.“They are our city’s customers. We have to serve them better.”\n\nTeachers are having difficulty living in the city, said Erick Huth, Metro Nashville Education Association president. And supplies and textbooks have deteriorated, he said.\n\nThe district is asking for $2.7 million for new textbooks.\n\n“The funding for our city services and for our schools has been dismal,” Huth said. “Nashville schools suffers from one of the worst textbook collections we have ever had.”\n\nBrad Rayson, Service Employees International Union Local 205, said other employees are suffering, as well, and that is a disgrace. The district has at least 1,000 employees that work for less than $15 dollars an hour, requiring them to work two or three jobs, he said.\n\n“Our schools have been underfunded for too long and it is time that changed,” Rayson said.\n\nAnd Nashville Organized for Action and Hope member Dawana Wade, with Salama Urban Ministries, said the district needs to meet the social and emotional needs of students.\n\nFor years the district has had to put together meager resources for social-emotional learning, she said. The district wants $1.4 million more to meet the social-emotional needs of students.\n\n“The time has come to effectively fund these efforts to meet the need of our students,” Wade said. “Our firm expectation is this mayor and this Metro Council fully fund the budget as proposed.”\n\nWant to read more stories like this? A subscription to one of our Tennessee publications gets you unlimited access to all the latest news and the ability to tap into stories, photos and videos from throughout the USA TODAY Network's 109 local sites.\n\nReach Yihyun Jeong at yjeong@tennessean.com. Follow her on Twitter @yihyun_jeong.\n\nReach Jason Gonzales at jagonzales@tennessean.com and on Twitter @ByJasonGonzales.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2019/04/17"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/25/investing/bank-of-america-stock-bonus/index.html", "title": "Bank of America is giving workers $1 billion of stock | CNN Business", "text": "New York CNN Business —\n\nBank of America is handing out $1 billion worth of restricted stock to virtually its entire workforce as the bank seeks to gain an upper hand in the war for talent.\n\nIn a memo shared exclusively with CNN, Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said Tuesday the company is for the first time opening up its stock awards program to lower-level employees who make up to $100,000 a year. In the past, those employees received a one-time cash bonus.\n\nBank of America (BAC) said each eligible employee will receive between 65 and 600 restricted stock units, corresponding with their compensation. Those units will vest over four years beginning in 2023.\n\nAt a minimum, that means frontline workers like bank tellers will receive restricted shares that are valued, on paper, at about $2,900 based on Bank of America’s current share price of $45.\n\nAt the upper end, higher-salary employees would get restricted shares valued at around $27,000.\n\nBank of America said the estimated value of the stock awards is “multiple times higher” than the cash bonuses the bank handed out in the past. Last year, Bank of America gave $750 cash bonuses to lower-paid employees.\n\nBank of America said the stock awards – which are on top of compensation received as part of the bank’s annual review process – are going out to roughly 97% of its global employee base, but not to those who make above $500,000 a year.\n\n“That level of distribution is incredibly high,” said Brian Kropp, chief of HR research at Gartner. “The fact they are pushing out that kind of award across the workforce is rare.”\n\nBank of America said that only a small portion of its workforce, mostly part-time employees and workers in certain overseas locations, will receive a cash award, totaling $750 apiece.\n\nIn the past, Bank of America relied more on cash bonuses for lower-compensated employees. The decision to expand the pool of workers getting restricted stock that vests over time, is no coincidence. Bank of America is betting some employees won’t want to quit if that means leaving thousands of dollars of stock on the table.\n\nCompanies, including banks, are grappling with high levels of worker turnover. A record 4.5 million Americans quit their jobs in November, according to government statistics.\n\n“We are in the middle of this Great Resignation,” said Kropp. “Restricted stock creates a long-term retention hook rather than just a cash bonus.”\n\nBank of America acknowledged the stock awards, along with raising pay for minimum wage workers, are designed to attract and retain talent. The bank also cited its financial performance, highlighted by a record annual profit of $32 billion.", "authors": ["Matt Egan"], "publish_date": "2022/01/25"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2017/12/20/handful-companies-promise-bonuses-pay-raises/971199001/", "title": "AT&T, Boeing, others promise bonuses, pay raises once tax bill signed", "text": "Some of the cash windfall from corporate tax cuts is already trickling down to Main Street workers.\n\nA handful of U.S. companies are already promising to pay one-time bonuses to their employees and bump up hourly pay if President Trump signs into law the tax reform bill that has been voted on by the Republican-led Congress.\n\nMore:Trump declares victory as tax bill passes: 'It's always a lot of fun when you win'\n\nMore:The new tax plan will make Trump’s family richer, experts say. Here’s how.\n\nMore:Tax refund schedule for 2018: When can you expect your money?\n\nAT&T was the first company to go public with its plans to pass along coming tax savings to workers, saying once the tax bill is passed it would pay a special $1,000 bonus to more than 200,000 of its non-management workers. Front-line managers, the company said, will also be included in the bonus pool. The bonus could hit employees paychecks over the holidays if Trump signs the bill before Christmas, the company said in a statement. The telecom giant also confirmed it would invest $1 billion more in the U.S. in 2018.\n\n“Congress, working closely with the President, took a monumental step to bring taxes paid by U.S. businesses in line with the rest of the industrialized world,” Randall Stephenson, AT&T chairman and CEO, said in a statement. “This tax reform will drive economic growth and create good-paying jobs. In fact, we will increase our U.S. investment and pay a special bonus to our U.S. employees.”\n\nComcast announced Wednesday that it would award one-time $1,000 bonuses to more than 100,000 employees, which would include frontline and non-executive employees.\n\nThe Communication Workers of America, the union that represents many of those frontline workers, had demanded that employers guarantee the yearly $4,000 household wage increase that Republican lawmakers asserted would be the outcome of the tax cut.\n\nOther companies, including Fifth Third Bancorp, Wells Fargo and Boeing, also announced that they would pass along tax savings to their workers.\n\nThe news is the first sign that many in the middle-class will benefit financially from their employers paying less in taxes.\n\nThe tax reform bill, which includes a big and permanent tax cut for corporations and temporary tax relief for individual taxpayers, has fostered a heated debate on Capitol Hill and on Wall Street as to whether middle-class Americans would benefit as much as big business will.\n\nCorporate announcements in addition to AT&T's that were rolled out Thursday that show workers will share in the benefits include:\n\nFifth Third Bancorp, a regional bank based in Cincinnati, said it will raise the minimum wage for all of its nearly 3,000 hourly employees to $15, and would distribute a one-time bonus of $1,000 for more than 13,500 employees by the end of the year if the bill is signed by Dec. 25.\n\n“We want to invest in our most important asset – our people,” said Fifth Third president and CEO Greg Carmichael. The tax cut, the CEO said, provided an opportunity for the bank to \"reevaluate its compensation structure and share some of those benefits with its talented and dedicated workforce.\"\n\nWells Fargo, the San Francisco bank that has been hurt by a scandal involving the opening of 3.5 million unauthorized client accounts, also said it would boost its minimum wage to $15 per hour, an 11% increase from its current hourly rate of $13.50, once the law was passed. The pay raise will go into effect in March 2018, the company said.\n\nAerospace giant Boeing said it would move forward with $300 million in investments as a result of the new tax law, including $100 million in employee training and education and $100 million to enhance Boeing facilities as part of its \"workforce of the future\" initiative.\n\n\"Each of these investments benefits Boeing's most important strength – our employees – and reflects the real-time impact and economic benefit of the reforms,\" Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg, said in a statement.\n\nMedia and cable company Comcast said it would award special $1,000 bonuses to more than 100,000 eligible employees. The company, which also owns NBCUniversal, said it also expects to spend more than $50 billion over the next five years investing in infrastructure to improve and extend broadband plant and capacity, and its television, film and theme park offerings.\n\n\"With these investments, we expect to add thousands of new direct and indirect jobs,\" the company said in a media release.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2017/12/20"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/2019/09/15/united-auto-workers-union-calls-national-strike-against-gm/2334060001/", "title": "United Auto Workers union calls national strike against GM", "text": "DETROIT – The United Automobile Workers on Sunday morning called a nationwide strike against General Motors, set to start at midnight.\n\nIt's the first national UAW strike since 2007, coming against the backdrop of a federal corruption investigation that has implicated union President Gary Jones and his predecessor, Dennis Williams.\n\nThe action does not include Ford and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, whose UAW contracts were extended while the union tries to negotiate a deal with GM that would be template for talks with the other two companies. The union let the GM contract expire at midnight Saturday, but told autoworkers with Sunday shifts to report.\n\nThe union represents about 46,000 GM autoworkers at 55 facilities in the United States. No talks were known to be scheduled.\n\nA prolonged strike against GM could be painful for both sides, said Kristin Dziczek, vice president of industry, labor and economics at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor.\n\nUAW contract with GM expires:Union says 'significant differences' remain\n\nShutting down North American production costs GM about $400 million a day, said Dziczek. It’s also a big sacrifice for UAW workers, who get only $250 a week in strike wages, she noted. The union had $721 million in its strike fund in 2018 and temporarily increased dues in March this year to boost it to $850 million.\n\nGM has 90-100 days of inventory for most of the vehicles that are in high demand, Dziczek said. Consumers might find it harder to get certain colors or trims after a couple of weeks, but dealers trade with each other and that will help.\n\n“GM has enough inventory for a short strike of one or two weeks. After that it starts to get painful,” Dziczek said.\n\nThe strike announcement follows a meeting Sunday morning of GM union local presidents from around the country, gathering in a Marriott hotel in the same building as GM's Detroit headquarters.The UAW said the nearly 175 union local leaders on the National Council voted unanimously to strike.\n\n“We are standing up for our members and for the fundamental rights of working-class people of this nation,” said Terry Dittes, the union's GM department vice president. “Going into the bargaining season, our members have been very clear of what they will and will not accept in this contract.”\n\nWhen GM face bankruptcy 10 years ago, Dittes said, ”Our membership and the American taxpayer stood up and made the hard choices and sacrifices for this company.”\n\nHe said the union members have continued to build quality products that have led to big GM profits, so it is time for GM to step up.\n\nGM contract offer\n\nGM said its offer to the UAW included more than $7 billion in U.S. investments over the four-year life of a new deal, more than 5,400 jobs, higher pay and what the company said would be improved benefits.\n\n“We presented a strong offer that improves wages, benefits and grows U.S. jobs in substantive ways and it is disappointing that the UAW leadership has chosen to strike at midnight tonight,\" the company said. \"We have negotiated in good faith and with a sense of urgency. Our goal remains to build a strong future for our employees and our business.”\n\nThe company said it offered improved profit sharing; what it called \"solutions for unallocated assembly plants in Michigan and Ohio\"; a ratification payment of $8,000 and enabling the union to \"retain nationally leading health care benefits.\"\n\n\"Unallocated assembly plants\" refers to GM's decision announced last fall that it would indefinitely idle four of its U.S. plants. The UAW vowed to leave no stone unturned in fighting to get new vehicles to build in those plants, which include Lordstown Assembly in Ohio, Detroit-Hamtramck and transmission plants in Warren and Baltimore.\n\nHealth care is a key point in the talks. GM and Ford each spend more than $1 billion a year on health coverage. The average UAW worker pays about 3% of his or her health care costs compared with 28% paid by the average U.S. worker, research by the Ann Arbor-based Center for Automotive Research shows.\n\nCorruption probe hits UAW:Federal corruption investigation involves UAW president, former president\n\nAutoworkers argue that their jobs are physically taxing and lead to chronic injury early in life, so the health coverage is essential.\n\nDziczek said what GM disclosed about its offer leaves questions.\n\nGM’s description of its offer did not reference a path to making temporary workers permanent or closing the in-progression gap for workers hired at a lower wage after 2007. “Those are some pretty significant issues,” Dziczek said.\n\nHarley Shaiken, a labor scholar at the University of California, Berkley, said a national strike makes the point that the UAW is serious about unresolved issues and it puts “the ball in GM’s court” to resolve it. But GM’s move to outline what it’s offered the UAW is unprecedented, Shaiken said.\n\n“GM is making a highly risky moving by putting out a statement that detailed,” Shaiken said. “It means they are going to the UAW members rather than discussing it with the leadership.”\n\nIn its statement, GM said it has proposed an introduction of new electric trucks and the creation of the first “union represented battery cell manufacturing site” in the United States.\n\n“If GM is able to put electric trucks in Detroit-Hamtramck and a new battery facility in Lordstown, why not discuss that with the UAW last November when the unallocation statement came out?” Shaiken asked.\n\nDziczek said GM has a broader audience than just the UAW. It now stretches to the public, GM's investors and even the president, who has been critical of the company over the factory cuts and its footprint in China, and who promised to boost auto jobs.\n\nGM profit\n\nUAW National Bargaining Committee Chairman Ted Krumm said, “Today I represent tens of thousands of UAW members who are sacrificing their comfort and future to stand up and do what’s right.\n\n\"I want to be clear about something. This strike is about us, about standing up for fair wages, for affordable quality health care and for job security. We’re standing up for our temporary employee brothers and sisters who do the same work but for less pay. These are profitable times, we worked hard to make this company profitable and we deserve a fair contract b/c we helped make this company what it is.”\n\nTemporary workers account for about 7% of the GM workforce through the year and are paid $15 an hour, roughly half the $28-$33 per hour for a legacy worker. \"In-progression\" workers, who have a path to higher pay, start at about $17 an hour.\n\nGM reported that it made $11.8 billion in pretax profits in 2018, down 8.3% from 2017. CEO Mary Barra's total compensation was $21.87 million, about 281 times as much as the median GM worker's compensation, company disclosures showed.\n\nJanitor strike\n\nUAW-represented janitors who work for contractor Aramark at five GM plants in Michigan and Ohio went on strike. Autoworkers crossed the janitors' picket lines at Flint Assembly on Sunday morning as they awaited word from the Detroit meeting.\n\nAs the local leaders met, a few rank-and-file workers rallied outside in front of GM's headquarters.\n\n“I’m here to show support for all GM UAW membership,” said Frank Hammer, a retired president of Local 909 for GM’s Warren plant. “This will be a momentous decision if we want to strike, but it’s important for the industry and for contract bargaining.”\n\nHammer said it was “deplorable” that the UAW told GM union members to cross the picket line of Aramark-employed maintenance workers, who struck five GM sites in Michigan and Ohio at midnight Saturday. Autoworkers reported for their 7 a.m. shift Sunday at Flint Assembly, which makes Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickups.\n\n“The cardinal principle of our union is we don’t cross the picket line,” said Hammer. “I hope the UAW breaks the error in their policy.”\n\nJanitor strike:UAW-represented janitors at some GM plants go on strike; impact on auto production unclear\n\nHammer said GM must end two-tier wage system and find a way to help temporary workers become permanent, among other things.\n\nDaniel Rider, who works at Romulus Engine plant and was at the protest, said he was surprised to hear the UAW was calling for a strike starting Monday.\n\n“But I’m relieved that they called it and I’m ready to walk the picket line,” said Rider.\n\nHis assigned strike time is Friday 2:30 to 6:30 p.m. he said, but he plans to be there Sunday night and Monday to support his union “brothers and sisters.”\n\nHe said UAW leaders have not given membership any indication of what is on the table or where the impasse lies. He said if GM is offering union workers added jobs and wages along with additional health care benefits as GM said it is in a media statement, Rider said, “then why are we all going on strike? That sounds like all the things we wanted. But they must be far apart on how to achieve those things.”\n\nThe UAW, which represents nearly 150,000 hourly workers at GM, Ford and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, chose to negotiate a new contract first with GM. That deal will serve as a template for the UAW's later talks with the other two.\n\nUAW contract talks:UAW members are preparing to live on $250 a week. Here's why\n\nThe talks are playing out against the backdrop of a federal corruption investigation now touching the highest levels of the union. Charges against regional director Vance Pearson implicated UAW President Gary Jones and immediate past President Dennis Williams in the misuse of union money.\n\nThe union negotiates a new contract with the automakers every four years. In 2015 the UAW chose to lead with FCA. If the UAW leadership believes it must strike, members at all three companies have voted to authorize one.\n\nFord declined comment on the strike announcement. FCA said, bargaining with UAW was expected to continue under the extension agreement signed Friday.\n\n\"Over the past 10 years, we have demonstrated our commitment to growing our U.S. manufacturing base by investing more than $14 billion, and creating nearly 30,000 production and salaried jobs to support those operations. We continue to work toward our plan of adding another 6,400 production jobs,\" FCA said.\n\nThe UAW's rank and file want a base wage increase. They also seek to protect benefits and to narrow the wage gap between workers hired after 2007 compared with those who've worked at GM before 2007. They also want to establish a plan for temporary employees to go permanent, among other things.\n\nBut job security is critical too, given GM's November 2018 announcement that it would idle four U.S. plants. Detroit-Hamtramck is the only one continuing to operate, but GM plans to shut it down in January. GM is restructuring, having trimmed 4,000 white-collar jobs in addition to the factories it targeted to idle, which also included Oshawa Assembly in Ontario. It anticipates a slowdown in auto sales, which set a record in 2017, and like other automakers, is investing in autonomous and electric technology, the former to capture a share of what is expected to be a hugely lucrative business and the latter largely because of Chinese and European requirements.\n\nFor its part, GM and other automakers seek to control costs amid trade and tariff uncertainties, unclear fuel economy standards and a predicted economic downturn on the horizon that could hurt sales. Health care costs are some of the highest for automakers and that also remains an issue.\n\nFollow Jamie L. LaReau on Twitter @jlareauan", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2019/09/15"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2014/03/27/ncaa-approaching-billion-per-year-amid-challenges-players/6973767/", "title": "NCAA approaching $1 billion per year amid challenges by players", "text": "Mark Alesia\n\nIndiana\n\nEvery year since 2001 — through the aftermath of the dot-com bust, the Great Recession and the economic stimulus plan — the NCAA has made more money.\n\nEvery year, it has given more to the colleges it serves. Every year, it has set aside more money for investments, amassing $627 million. Now, it's poised to top the eye-popping mark of $1 billion in annual revenue.\n\nAnd it's no secret that one big event, the Division I men's basketball tournament, accounts for 80 percent to 90 percent of that success. What is less clear is how much longer the winning streak will last.\n\nAmid the maze of numbers and legalistic jargon in a recent NCAA bond prospectus, there's an ominous-sounding section on risk.\n\nThe Indianapolis-based National Collegiate Athletic Association describes a one-year \"financial recovery plan\" if anything happens to the money from the basketball tournament. The recovery plan includes drawing heavily from reserve funds, budget reductions, lowering the amount of money distributed to schools and event cancellation insurance.\n\nIt sounds extreme, a worst-case precaution bond holders expect, not to be taken as a prediction of doom so much as an insurance plan against loss. But as Indianapolis prepares to begin hosting the Midwest regional semifinals Friday, it's clear the NCAA is in uncharted territory.\n\nThe association — once seen as a fearsome monolith — is now the target of increasingly aggressive attacks by high-profile lawyers with deep pockets. On Wednesday, Northwestern University football players won the first round of their effort to become a union, and the NCAA faces a bevy of lawsuits by players who want more of the economic pie.\n\nOne high-profile case is scheduled for trial June 9 and, last week, heavyweight sports antitrust lawyer Jeffrey Kessler filed a lawsuit seeking to remove all restrictions on player compensation.\n\n\"It's undeniable that the pressure cooker is building,\" said University of New Haven Professor Allen Sack, a member of Notre Dame's 1966 national champion football team and a longtime critic of the NCAA. \"It's a different ballgame. This is not like any other time.\"\n\nSaid Michael McCann, a law professor and legal analyst for SI.com: \"This is a transformative era for the NCAA, and at the end, the student-athlete will have a different role. There will be changes to amateurism.\"\n\nAnd changes to amateurism could mean changing uses for all that money.\n\nAlthough he disagrees that pressure is building, even NCAA President Mark Emmert recognizes he's in a battle to preserve the current model of college sports.\n\nIn an interview with The Indianapolis Star, Emmert was asked if he's apprehensive.\n\n\"I'm apprehensive in that the system right now serves 450,000 student-athletes and provides remarkable opportunities for them,\" Emmert said. \"Should that model be blown up, yeah, it would be a significant loss for America. So, of course we want to continue to support the collegiate model of athletics and think it's worth saving. Others disagree.\"\n\nAnd, when it comes to the NCAA's future, no city has more at stake than Indianapolis.\n\nSweetening the deal\n\nAs part of a decades-long strategy to use sports to spur growth, Indianapolis invested heavily in the NCAA.\n\nIt took a reported $50 million in incentives for Indianapolis to lure the NCAA from its Overland Park, Kan., headquarters in 1999. Indy and Kansas City, Mo., were the finalists.\n\nThe Lilly Foundation kicked in $10 million and private individuals, businesses and organizations raised $15 million. State and city taxpayers picked up the remaining $25 million.\n\nAt the time, a member of the Kansas City contingent was quoted as saying Indy \"may be a little beyond sane in what they have done.\"\n\nIndy built the NCAA a 142,000-square-foot headquarters and a 35,000-square-foot \"exhibition hall/museum\" called the Hall of Champions. The deal included 500 free parking spaces and \"first-class landscaping.\"\n\nThe rent: $1 per year.\n\nIn 2010, the NCAA and the White River State Park Commission extended the headquarters lease to 2060 with three 10-year options. It included free land for the NCAA to build, with its own money, an expansion of the headquarters.\n\nRent remains $1 per year for the life of the agreement.\n\nIn financial documents, the NCAA listed the true 50-year market value of the rent and land, as determined by outside experts, at $44.5 million.\n\nTaxpayers pick up the tab.\n\nIn return, the NCAA's growth has benefited the city.\n\nSince moving to Indianapolis in 1999, the NCAA has gone from about 350 employees to about 500, virtually all of whom live and pay taxes in the area.\n\nNCAA salaries and benefits have jumped from $20 million to $49 million.\n\nIn every five-year period until 2060, the NCAA has agreed to stage in Indianapolis the men's Final Four, the women's Final Four, pre-Final Four men's and women's basketball tournament games and the NCAA Convention.\n\nAccording to an NCAA-commissioned report by professors from Indiana University's Kelley School of Business, the association's headquarters, events and meetings accounted for $161.8 million to Indiana's economy in 2012.\n\nUniversity of West Virginia economics Professor Brad Humphreys had no issues with the report's impact attributed to the headquarters, but he said it \"vastly overstates the actual impact of the NCAA sports events.\"\n\nBut there are other intangible benefits.\n\nAllison Melangton, president of the Indiana Sports Corp, calls the NCAA \"a perfect fit for Indianapolis.\"\n\n\"They bring a lot of sports leadership to town,\" she said. \"They're a great community partner. … The national attention we get in Indy — we have more events here because they're here — elevates our presence nationally, that we're a sports town.\"\n\nSaid Emmert: \"Everyone who's involved in NCAA athletics knows the headquarters are here and sees Indianapolis as the epicenter of college athletics.\"\n\nAs the NCAA has grown, so have the benefits to its executives, including Emmert, who makes about $1.6 million a year, according to the latest public records. Those records also note that 86 NCAA employees made more than $100,000.\n\nThe NCAA uses consultants to supply salary ranges from comparable organizations, said chief financial officer Kathleen McNeely. She wouldn't name the organizations used by the NCAA but said they are for-profit and nonprofit. A compensation committee of school presidents makes the decisions.\n\n\"First of all, we have to compete in the market we're in, which is sports management,\" McNeely said. \"We have a lot of lawyers at the NCAA. A lot of our areas are legislative areas made up of bylaw interpretations and writing bylaws. We have a lot of lawyers in our enforcement division. Our legal counsel —we have lawyers in that area.\"\n\nThe NCAA also relies heavily on outside lawyers who specialize in areas such as antitrust. The NCAA spent $9 million on legal expenses in 2011-12.\n\nIt needs lawyers now, perhaps more than ever.\n\nPlaying defense\n\nIn 2005, the NCAA looked in the mirror, trying to identify its weaknesses.\n\nA risk management consultant identified four main areas of concern. All seem to apply today: federal or state legislative intervention, court decisions, reputation and lack of revenue diversification.\n\nLack of revenue diversification shows in the NCAA's television money. This year, CBS/Turner will pay about $700 million for the Division I men's basketball tournament.\n\nESPN will pay $31 million for everything else.\n\nLast year's basketball tournament brought in $81 million of non-television money. Baseball was next at $13.5 million, followed by women's basketball at $4.4 million.\n\nIndianapolis plays a role in helping protect the big money-maker.\n\nIn 2004, the NCAA wanted a backup site for basketball tournament games and to extend its lease in Indy. The Indianapolis Colts wanted a taxpayer-financed new stadium. The NCAA also knew that staging events in a big, new hometown stadium would save money.\n\nIn exchange for the guarantee of prime NCAA events being staged in Indy, the city extended the dollar-a-year lease and agreed to serve as a contingency site for all men's and women's NCAA tournament games.\n\nThe deal was contingent on \"substantial improvements to the (old RCA) Dome and/or a new facility.\"\n\nLucas Oil Stadium opened in 2008, financed mostly by taxpayers.\n\nThe NCAA has never needed to use the contingency agreement. The original \"memorandum of understanding\" in 2004 is still in effect. It says the Indiana Sports Corp will \"use its best efforts\" with the city, the Capital Improvement Board, the Pacers and area universities \"in the event of an emergency which requires the use of Indianapolis as a backup Event site.\"\n\nAs for the other risk areas, congressional interest in the NCAA creeps up occasionally but isn't a factor now.\n\nReputation is a constant battle for the NCAA, trying to show it's more than a group that prints money for three weeks every March. It runs 89 national championships, in sports such as rifle and rowing, for more than 1,100 member schools.\n\nThe bond prospectus says the NCAA returned 58 percent of its money to members in cash over five years. In 2012-13, the NCAA says it returned more than 90 percent of revenue to members in cash and services.\n\nLegal decisions are by far the biggest current concern, with the capability of radically changing the NCAA model of college sports.\n\nWith the basketball tournament bringing in billions over several years and coaches making millions, players have become increasingly bold about fighting for a bigger cut.\n\nScholarships are worth tens of thousands per year. But critics note that a real education is hard to obtain while working virtually full time as an athlete for coaches whose livelihoods depend on winning.\n\nStar players in the NCAA tournament are worth far more than their scholarships. The latest study of their true value was in The Atlantic, which estimated that the true value of freshman star Andrew Wiggins to Kansas was $575,565.\n\nIf the NCAA doesn't increase athlete benefits — Emmert says change is coming — the courts might do it instead.\n\nThe lawsuit scheduled for trial June 9 was brought by former UCLA star basketball player Ed O'Bannon, who wants athletes, not the NCAA, to control use of their name, image and likeness. That would have implications for production and sales of advertising, DVDs and video games, as well as rebroadcasts of games.\n\nThe Kessler lawsuit seeks to remove all restrictions on player compensation.\n\nAnother lawsuit also filed this month, by former West Virginia football player Shawne Alston, alleges the NCAA and major conferences illegally cap the value of scholarships at less than the actual cost of attending school.\n\nThe players seeking a union have mentioned better insurance and guaranteed multiyear scholarships instead of annual renewals. Lifetime scholarships for players to finish degrees, and get advanced degrees, also has been mentioned.\n\n\"Pay for play\" is anathema to many fans — two-thirds of the public is against it, according to a recent ABC poll. But Sack, the New Haven professor, contends they've been paid for decades through scholarships.\n\nThere used to be additional \"laundry money.\" Athletes can now tap into funds for situations such as buying a suit, traveling home for a funeral, or buying a computer. Bowl games in football, conference tournaments in basketball and the NCAA basketball tournament give players hundreds of dollars in gifts.\n\n\"Amateurism is whatever the NCAA arbitrarily decides to call it,\" Sack said.\n\nMcCann sees the possibility of conferences gaining more power and autonomy to define \"amateurism.\" That would mean more benefits to players that smaller schools can't afford. McCann does not foresee the demise of the NCAA.\n\n\"I just don't think the country wants that,\" McCann said.\n\nStrange marriage\n\nIt's a strange, enduring marriage, higher education and high-stakes sports. An interview with Emmert ended with a question about whether the NCAA would be around at the end of its lease in 2060.\n\nAs he often does, Emmert turned the question around on the interviewer.\n\n\"Will the Indy Star be here in 2060?\" he asks.\n\nThe reporter said the company is moving to a modern new office and evolving on different news platforms, adding, \"We've been here 100 years and the brand name's pretty strong.\"\n\nEmmert didn't hesitate.\n\n\"I'd say the same thing for the NCAA.\"\n\nCall Star reporter Mark Alesia at (317) 444-6311. Follow him on Twitter: @markalesia.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2014/03/27"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/15/politics/biden-build-back-better-manchin/index.html", "title": "What's in the Democrats' package on climate, health care and taxes ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe Democrats’ budget reconciliation package, which contains several landmark climate and health care provisions, was signed into law by President Joe Biden Tuesday.\n\nThe House passed the legislation, titled the Inflation Reduction Act, Friday after being approved by the Senate on August 7 on a party-line vote.\n\nStill, the effort remains a mere shadow of the sweeping $3.5 trillion reconciliation package that the majority party initially floated last year.\n\nAfter torpedoing the inclusion of any climate or tax provisions in mid-July, West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, a moderate Democrat, reversed course. The measures join a handful of important but narrow provisions to lower prescription drug prices and to extend enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies for three years.\n\nGone are the creation of a universal pre-K program, an extension of the enhanced child tax credit, an expansion of Medicare benefits, the establishment of a federally funded paid family and sick leave program and many other provisions aimed at broadening the nation’s social safety net.\n\nThe deal is far smaller than the slimmed-down $1.75 trillion version the House passed in October. But Manchin, whose vote is crucial to pushing any legislation through the Senate via the reconciliation process, shot down the House bill in December. Only a simple majority of senators was needed to pass the bill via reconciliation.\n\nSince then, Democratic leaders had been negotiating with Manchin to see what he’d be willing to support. The senator had repeatedly voiced concerns about the legislation’s potential impact on inflation, which has skyrocketed over the past year. Economists, however, disagree about the actual extent of the legislation’s effect on inflation.\n\nThe latest version of the package, which Biden signed into law Tuesday, is projected to reduce the deficit by more than $300 billion over a decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office.\n\nHere’s what’s in the legislation:\n\nMedicare drug price negotiation: The legislation will empower Medicare to negotiate prices of certain costly medications administered in doctors’ offices or purchased at the pharmacy. The Health and Human Services secretary will negotiate the prices of 10 drugs in 2026, and another 15 drugs in 2027 and again in 2028. The number is set to rise to 20 drugs a year for 2029 and beyond.\n\nThis controversial provision is far more limited than the one House Democratic leaders have backed in the past. But it will open the door to fulfilling a longstanding party goal of allowing Medicare to use its heft to lower drug costs.\n\nInflation cap: The legislation will also impose penalties on drug companies if they increase their prices faster than inflation, starting in 2023. However, the Senate parliamentarian ruled that the provision could only apply to Medicare, not the private insurance market as well, as the Democrats had wanted.\n\nLimit on Medicare out-of-pocket drug costs: The law will redesign Medicare’s Part D drug plans so that seniors and people with disabilities won’t pay more than $2,000 a year for medications bought at the pharmacy, starting in 2025. Insurers and drugmakers will have to pick up more of the tab.\n\nFree vaccines for seniors: Medicare enrollees will be able to get all vaccines at no cost. Right now, only certain vaccines, such as those for Covid-19, the flu and pneumonia, are free.\n\nAltogether, the drug price provisions are expected to reduce the federal deficit by $288 billion over a decade, according to the CBO.\n\nCheaper insulin: Medicare beneficiaries will pay no more than $35 a month for insulin, starting next year.\n\nDemocrats had hoped to extend that provision to those covered by private insurance, but the parliamentarian decided that including the commercial market was not compliant with reconciliation rules. Democrats kept the broader provision in the package, but Republicans raised a point of order to force a vote that stripped the private insurance market from the measure.\n\nAffordable Care Act subsidies: The legislation will also extend the enhanced federal premium subsidies for Obamacare coverage through 2025, a year later than lawmakers recently discussed. That way they won’t expire just after the 2024 presidential election.\n\nThe subsidies were expanded through this year as part of Democrats’ $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, known as the American Rescue Plan, which was enacted in March 2021. They have made health care coverage on the Obamacare exchanges more affordable, leading to a record enrollment of 14.5 million people this year.\n\nEnrollees pay no more than 8.5% of their income toward coverage, down from nearly 10%. And lower-income policyholders receive subsidies that eliminate their premiums completely.\n\nAlso, those earning more than 400% of the federal poverty level have become eligible for help for the first time. Those with incomes between 400% and 600% of the poverty level would face a doubling of premiums without the federal subsidies, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, which administers the federal Obamacare marketplace.\n\nOverall, the expanded assistance reduced premiums by 50%, or $67 per consumer per month, the agency said.\n\nIf the enhanced federal assistance were allowed to expire at the end of the year, nearly all of the 13 million subsidized enrollees would see their premiums rise for 2023, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. More than 3 million people could become uninsured, an Urban Institute analysis found.\n\nDemocrats were hoping to avoid the negative publicity of such premium increases. If Congress didn’t act, consumers would learn in the fall just how much more they could have to pay. Open enrollment begins on November 1, a week ahead of Election Day.\n\nInstead, CMS is projecting that even more people will flock to the Affordable Care Act exchanges now that the President has signed the bill.\n\n“We’re really going to be able to build on our record enrollment and see an increase this year, this upcoming enrollment,” CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure told CNN. “The only reason why we’re having that conversation is because the subsidies have been extended.”\n\nExtending the enhanced subsidies will cost $64 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nClimate provisions: The deal is the biggest climate investment in US history. It will slash US greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2030, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s office said.\n\nThe new agreement spans everything from electric vehicle tax credits to clean energy manufacturing to investments in environmental justice communities.\n\nExtending tax credits for electric vehicles made it in, after previous opposition from Manchin. The tax credits will continue at their current levels, up to $4,000 for a used electric vehicle and $7,500 for a new one. However, the income threshold for eligibility is lowered – a key demand of Manchin’s.\n\nThe law also contains 10-year consumer tax credits to bring down the cost of heat pumps, rooftop solar, electric HVAC and water heaters. It includes $60 billion of funding for environmental justice communities and for the reduction of legacy pollution.\n\nAnd it puts $60 billion towards domestic clean energy manufacturing and $30 billion for a production credit tax credit for wind, solar and battery storage.\n\nThe legislation provides $4 billion in additional drought funding – a key negotiation point for Sinema amid the multi-year drought in the Southwest.\n\nThe tax credits will be technology neutral – meaning they won’t favor renewables over fossil fuels outfitted with carbon-reducing measures. However, they are designed to reward those who reduce their emissions the most, according to Senate Finance Chairman Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon.\n\nThe deal also includes major provisions like a methane program that will levy a fee on oil and gas producers that emit methane above a certain threshold. It also includes $27 billion for a so-called clean energy accelerator – essentially a green bank that will leverage public and private funding to expand more green projects.\n\nTax provisions: To boost revenue, the law imposes a 15% minimum tax on the income large corporations report to shareholders, known as book income, as opposed to the Internal Revenue Service. The measure, which will raise $258 billion over a decade, according to updated figures provided by Schumer, will apply to companies with profits over $1 billion.\n\nConcerned about how this provision would affect businesses, particularly manufacturers, Arizona Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, a moderate Democrat, won changes to the package that will allow companies to write off investments faster, which will reduce their tax burden.\n\nSinema also nixed her party’s effort to tighten the carried interest loophole, which allows investment managers to treat much of their compensation as capital gains and pay a 20% long-term capital gains tax rate instead of income tax rates of up to 37%. The provision would have lengthened the amount of time investment managers’ profit interest must be held from three years to five years to take advantage of the lower tax rate. Addressing this loophole, which would have raised $14 billion over a decade, had been a longtime goal of congressional Democrats.\n\nIn its place, a 1% excise tax on companies’ stock buybacks was added, raising another $74 billion, according to Schumer’s office.\n\nThe package also calls for providing more funding to the IRS for tax enforcement, which is expected to raise $124 billion.\n\nDemocrats say families making less than $400,000 per year will not be affected, in line with a pledge by Biden. However, Republican lawmakers are seizing on a Joint Committee on Taxation report that shows that the measures will indirectly hit lower-income and middle-class Americans. Economists expect that employers will pass along a portion of the corporate tax to workers in the form of lower wages.\n\nAlso, there will be no new taxes on small businesses.\n\nManchin also threw cold water on one of Schumer’s priorities – addressing the $10,000 cap on state and local tax deductions, known as SALT, that was part of the GOP tax cut package in 2017 and affects many states in the Northeast and on the West Coast.\n\nThe deal also leaves out tax surcharges on wealthy individuals, which was part of the House bill last year.\n\nHere’s what was left out\n\nUniversal pre-K and lower child care costs: The earlier version of the House bill would have provided free pre-K for 3- and 4-year-olds, expanding access to 6 million children a year. It would have also limited child care costs for families with children younger than age 6 to no more than 7% of income for those earning up to 250% of the state median income, expanding access to about 20 million children. Funding for these programs would have lasted for six years, costing an estimated $381.5 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nPaid family and sick leave: Biden also called for a federally funded paid family and sick leave program for the millions of Americans who don’t already receive the benefit from their employer. The previous House bill included four weeks of paid family and sick leave, which would have cost $205.5 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nEnhanced child tax credit: The beefed-up child tax credit – which provided $300 a month for each child under age 6 and $250 a month for each one ages 6 through 17 – would have been extended through 2022 for more than 35 million families under the House bill.\n\nThe previous enhancement, which was part of the coronavirus relief package, was only in place for 2021.\n\nHeads of households earning up to $112,500 a year and joint filers making up to $150,000 annually would have qualified for the full enhanced credit. But, unlike in 2021, only these families would have received the funds in monthly installments this year. Eligible parents with higher incomes would have had to claim the credit on their tax return next year.\n\nThe credit would have been made permanently refundable so the lowest income families would continue to qualify.\n\nThis credit, along with the earned income tax credit, would have cost about $203 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nEarned income tax credit: The expanded earned income tax credit, which was also part of the coronavirus relief package, would have been extended through 2022 as well, helping 17 million low-wage childless workers.\n\nThe previous House bill would have nearly tripled the maximum credit childless workers can receive, extended eligibility to more people, reduced the minimum age and eliminated the upper age limit. This credit, along with the enhanced child tax credit, would have cost about $203 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nHome health care: Biden’s original plan called for permanently improving Medicaid coverage for home care services for seniors and people with disabilities, with the goal of reducing the more than 800,000 people on state Medicaid waiting lists.\n\nThe plan also aimed to improve the quality of caregiving jobs. The measure would have cost nearly $158 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nAffordable housing: The legislation would have funneled $25 billion into the construction, rehabilitation or purchase of affordable homes for low-income people and for the creation and preservation of affordable rental housing. It would have provided $65 billion to address the capital needs backlog of public housing and would have bolstered rental assistance for hundreds of thousands of families.\n\nThe measure would have also invested in down payment assistance and in community-led redevelopment projects in under-resourced neighborhoods. And it would have provided $24 billion to fund housing vouchers and supportive services.\n\nThe effort would have cost about $148.1 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nLowering the cost of college: The earlier House bill would have increased the maximum Pell grant by $550 for more than 5 million students enrolled in public and private nonprofit colleges and expanded access to undocumented students brought to the US as children, a group also known as Dreamers.\n\nIt would have invested in historically Black colleges and universities and other institutions that serve underrepresented communities. And it would have increased funding for workforce development.\n\nThese provisions would have cost a total of $39.8 billion, according to the CBO’s estimate.\n\nBiden initially also called for making tuition free for two years at community colleges, but that provision was dropped from the House bill.\n\nChildren’s nutrition: The previous House bill would have expanded free school meals to nearly 9 million children during the school year and provided the parents of 29 million kids a monthly $65 per child benefit to purchase food during the summer.\n\nCongress recently passed a measure extending pandemic school meal waivers.\n\nMedicaid coverage gap: Democrats had called for providing Affordable Care Act premium subsidies for low-income Americans in the 12 states that have not expanded Medicaid, which would have enabled them to buy Obamacare policies with no monthly premiums, through 2025.\n\nDoing so would have cost about $57 billion, the CBO estimated.\n\nAnd the bill would have required state Medicaid programs to provide 12 months of eligibility to women after they give birth. States currently must provide at least 60 days of coverage.\n\nMedicare hearing benefits: Hearing services would have been covered under Medicare, starting in 2023, under the earlier bill that passed the House.\n\nOnly 30% of seniors over age 70 who could benefit from hearing aids have ever used them, the White House said.\n\nThis measure would have cost $36.7 billion, according to the CBO.\n\nBiden had initially also called for expanding Medicare to include vision and dental coverage.\n\nExtending Medicare solvency: Senate Democrats said in early July that they had finalized a deal to extend the solvency of Medicare by a few years by closing a tax loophole. The proposal would have ensured that owners of certain “pass-through” businesses, who include business income on their personal tax returns, would pay the 3.8% net investment income tax. It would have applied to individuals who earn more than $400,000 annually and to joint filers who earn more than $500,000.\n\nBut that agreement was then also scuttled by Manchin.\n\nMedicare’s hospital insurance trust fund will only be able to pay scheduled benefits until 2028, according to the most recent analysis by the program’s trustees.\n\nThis story and headline have been updated with additional developments.", "authors": ["Tami Luhby Katie Lobosco", "Tami Luhby", "Katie Lobosco"], "publish_date": "2022/07/15"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/general-motors/2022/04/29/gm-ceo-mary-barra-salary-compensation/9574068002/", "title": "GM CEO Mary Barra earned $29M in 2021: How salary ...", "text": "General Motors Chair and CEO Mary Barra got a raise and remains the highest paid CEO of the Detroit Three automakers.\n\nIn fact, all of GM's top officers saw big increases in compensation last year.\n\nBut the median pay for all GM employees declined in 2021 compared with 2020, largely due to parts shortages disrupting production and resulting in some workers losing hours or being temporarily laid off.\n\nIn its annual executive compensation report that GM filed to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday, GM reported that Barra made a total compensation of $29,136,780 in 2021 for running the company and chairing the board of directors. For 2020, Barra took home $23.7 million in total compensation and $21.6 million in 2019\n\nGM listed its global workforce as 157,000, of which, 98,000 employees are in the U.S.\n\nChips shortage impact\n\nPublic companies are required to disclose compensation figures as part of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act.\n\nIn the filing, GM lists Barra's 2021 base salary as $2.1 million, up from $1,995,000 in 2020.\n\nThis is the third consecutive year Barra topped her crosstown rivals at Ford Motor Co. and Stellantis.\n\nLast month, Ford Motor Co. filed documents that showed its CEO Jim Farley received total compensation of $22.8 million in 2021 for running the company. Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares made $21 million in 2021.\n\nMeanwhile, the ratio of Barra's total compensation to the median of all GM employees' total compensation is 420 to 1.\n\nThe median pay for GM's global employees in 2021 was $69,433, according to GM. In 2020, GM reported the figure as $71,682. Neither includes the compensation of a fully vested pension, said GM spokesman David Caldwell.\n\nCaldwell said the reason that the median employee salary was lower in 2021 compared with 2020 is because more plant employees had downtime due to a variety of reasons, including the global shortage of semiconductor chip parts, which continues to disrupt new car production.\n\nMedian employee pay can include salary or hourly wage, bonus, company contributions to 401(k), overtime and profit sharing. The amount does not include health care and other benefits.\n\nTop leaders pay\n\nBarra's 2021 compensation broke down as follows:\n\n$2.1 million in salary\n\n$14.6 million in stock awards\n\n$4 million in option awards\n\nNearly $7.6 million in incentive plan compensation\n\n$873,075 in other payments\n\nBeyond the lucrative salary, GM also spent $413,368 last year for personal travel, security, company vehicle programs, executive physical and financial counseling for Barra.\n\nGM has said 90% of Barra's and other executives' compensation is \"at risk,\" meaning it depends on GM's financial performance and meeting other goals and objectives.\n\nIn GM's filing, it also listed the 2021 total compensation of other key GM officers:\n\nPresident Mark Reuss : $12,535,747, up from $9,963,402 in 2020.\n\n: $12,535,747, up from $9,963,402 in 2020. CFO Paul Jacobson : $9,578,648, up from $5,179,672 for 2020.\n\n: $9,578,648, up from $5,179,672 for 2020. President of North America Steve Carlisle : $8,980,204, up from $6,289,463 in 2020.\n\n: $8,980,204, up from $6,289,463 in 2020. Executive Vice President of Global Product Development, Purchasing and Supply Chain Doug Parks: $8,835,477, up from $6,733,708.\n\nEVs tied to pay\n\nGM lists total executive compensation as including salary and \"short-term incentive plan\" targets. Those include: discretionary bonus, stock and option awards, non-equity incentive plan compensation (which is performance-based bonus), pension value, and other compensation, such as air travel, company vehicle programs, security, financial counseling, executive physicals, and employer contributions to savings plans such as a 401(k) match and life insurance.\n\nEarlier in the week when GM announced its first-quarter earnings results, Barra told investors that GM would now tie executive compensation to its EV targets.\n\n\"By announcing this change to the compensation package, the GM Board is essentially signaling to the market that GM is seriously committed to the shift to EVs,\" said Steve Melnyk, a business professor at Michigan State University in East Lansing.\n\nIt also appeases socially conscious investors, said Morningstar Auto Analyst David Whiston.\n\n\"The compensation change is another way to signal how serious GM is to its commitment of an all-zero emissions vehicle future in light vehicles by 2035,\" Whiston wrote in an email to the Detroit Free Press. \"It’s the type of thing that (socially conscious) investors will like to see and it helps GM avoid a criticism of someone pointing out what some would otherwise see as an inconsistency between words and compensation.\"\n\nThe EV targets will be part of GM's Long Term Incentive Plan which provides bonus compensation to executives. Business performance targets comprise 75% of plan and stock options make up the other 25%, said GM spokesman Caldwell.\n\n\"The new EV targets are within the business performance category,\" Caldwell said.\n\nWithin that 75%, the EV targets will account for about 15%, he said.\n\nContact Jamie L. LaReau: 313-222-2149 or jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. Read more on General Motors and sign up for our autos newsletter. Become a subscriber.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/04/29"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/cars/general-motors/2020/02/14/gm-pay-salaried-workers-bigger-bonuses-despite-turbulent-2019/4750378002/", "title": "GM to pay salaried workers bigger bonuses despite turbulent 2019", "text": "Most of the 69,000 salaried workers at General Motors can expect to receive annual bonuses in two weeks that match or exceed the amount they got last year, the Free Press has learned.\n\nThe bonuses come despite a turbulent year for GM. A year ago this month, the automaker began cutting some 4,000 salaried jobs, mostly in North America, as part of a restructuring plan to save it $2.5 billion in 2019.\n\nThen, in the fall, the UAW had a 40-day nationwide strike against GM after the automaker said it would idle three U.S. factories: Lordstown Assembly in Ohio and transmission plants in Warren and Baltimore. A fourth, Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly, won a reprieve in the UAW contract. But the strike cost GM $3.6 billion in 2019 pretax profits.\n\nDespite all of that, GM hit its global financial and other performance goals, allowing it to boost the bonus payments to salaried employees who meet their individual performance targets, a GM spokesman confirmed.\n\n\"We had a very strong performance in 2019,\" said Pat Morrissey, GM spokesman. \"When GM wins, all of our team members win.”\n\nThe payout\n\nGM employs 164,000 workers globally. Of those, 69,000 are salaried and about 48,000 of those salaried employees work in the United States, Morrissey said.\n\nGM's supervisors are meeting with salaried employees to tell them their bonus amounts, he said. Employees will receive their bonus payment in their Feb. 28 paychecks.\n\nGM does not disclose those amounts publicly because they can vary from zero, for people who are poor performers, to tens of thousands of dollars for high achievers with large salaries. There is no one-size-fits-all formula similar to that for GM's hourly workforce.\n\nThe GM-negotiated formula with the UAW for hourly workers' profit-sharing checks is $1,000 per every $1 billion in GM's North America earnings before interest and taxes. On Feb. 5, GM reported that its 2019 North American pretax profit was $8.2 billion, down from $10.8 billion in 2018. About 47,000 U.S. hourly workers will receive a profit-sharing check of about $8,000, down from $10,750 in 2018, GM said.\n\nTwo people familiar with GM's salaried workforce bonus program said GM raised the bonus payout marginally for 2019 from a year earlier. They declined to be named because they are not authorized to speak to the media, but they said a white-collar worker making $100,000 a year and who meets their performance targets could get a bonus of about $11,400 for 2019, up from $10,000 for 2018.\n\nMore:GM's laid off workers tell Ford employees: Start looking for new job\n\nAnxiety alleviated\n\nThis news alleviates the fear many salaried workers expressed as the UAW strike dragged into a fifth week last October.\n\nSeveral of GM's white-collar workers grew increasingly on edge about the impact the strike would have on their jobs and compensation.\n\nOne GM engineer, who asked to not be identified for fear of losing his job, told the Free Press then that he and some of his colleagues worried salaried workers might lose some of their job security or wages so that GM could satisfy the hourly workers' demands.\n\nThese upcoming bonuses along with the hourly employees' $8,000 profit-sharing checks are the best ways to attract and retain talent, said Adam Robinson, CEO of Hireology, a Chicago-based recruitment platform used by many car dealerships.\n\n“If I’m talking to a potential hire and I’m competing with other employers — I can say that you come here, you participate in the outcome because we have a generous profit sharing,” said Robinson. “It will make a difference in competing for talent.”\n\nMore:GM salaried workers feel anxiety about union negotiations\n\nMore:GM to pay UAW workers $8,000 in profit sharing\n\nContact Jamie L. LaReau at 313-222-2149 or jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. Read more on General Motors and sign up for our autos newsletter.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/02/14"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_10", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2023/02/21/vladimir-putin-speech-ukraine-war-nuclear-arms-treaty/11310584002/", "title": "Putin blames West for Ukraine war, suspends nuclear arms treaty", "text": "Tensions between the U.S. and the Kremlin ratcheted up Tuesday ahead of the one-year anniversary of Russia's war in Ukraine as Vladimir Putin vowed to pull Russia back from a key nuclear treaty and President Joe Biden reaffirmed the U.S. and its allies won't back down.\n\nPutin's move came on the heels of a surprise and historic visit by Biden to Kyiv on Monday. In a nearly two-hour speech to both houses of the Russian Parliament, Putin said he was suspending Moscow's participation in New START, a strategic nuclear arms reduction treaty between the U.S. and Russia.\n\nPutin said he was taking action because of the U.S. and NATO, without specifying more. \"In this regard, I am forced to announce today that Russia is suspending its participation in the strategic offensive arms treaty,\" he said.\n\nLess than 800 miles away, Biden followed with his own speech in Warsaw.\n\nHe said Putin thought Ukraine would \"roll over\" when he invaded with tanks a year ago, but \"he was wrong\" because of the bravery of Ukrainians and \"iron will\" of nations everywhere that have come to Ukraine's aid.\n\n\"One year ago, the world was bracing for the fall of Kyiv,\" Biden said. \"Well, I just came from visiting Kyiv, and I can report, Kyiv stands strong. Kyiv stands proud. It stands tall. And most importantly, it stands free.\"\n\n'Americans stand with you':Joe Biden walks streets of Kyiv in surprise visit\n\nNew START is the last remaining nuclear arms reduction deal between the U.S. and Russia. It was signed in 2010 and extended for five years in 2021. It limits each side to 1,550 long-range nuclear warheads.\n\n\"Over the last (few) years Russia has violated and walked away from key arms control agreements. With today's decision on New START the whole arms control architecture has been dismantled,\" NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.\n\nU.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described Putin's move as \"deeply unfortunate and irresponsible. We’ll be watching carefully to see what Russia actually does.\"\n\nUS has spent billions on Ukraine war aid:Is that money landing in corrupt pockets?\n\nAlthough Biden did not directly address Putin's pledge on the nuclear treaty, he said \"autocrats\" like Putin have gotten weaker over the past year as democracies have strengthened in solidarity with Ukraine.\n\n\"A dictator bent on building an empire will never be able to e the people's love of liberty,\" Biden said.\n\nBiden also addressed the Russian people, telling them the U.S. and allies \"do not seek to control or destroy Russia\" and pushing back at Putin’s claim that the West is plotting to attack Russia. He said the Russian people \"are not the enemies.\"\n\nDirecting his comments to Poland and other NATO allies, Biden said Putin \"no longer doubts the strength of our coalition,\" but said he \"still doubts our conviction” and “staying power.”\n\nHe declared: “Ukraine will not waver. NATO will not be divided. And we will not tire.\"\n\nAs he has done many times before, Putin blamed the West for provoking the war, accusing the U.S. and its European allies of wanting to acquire \"limitless power.\"\n\nHe said Ukraine's allies were \"playing a dirty game,\" that NATO members were openly talking about supplying Ukraine with nuclear weapons – they aren't – and that the entire planet was \"dotted\" with U.S. military bases.\n\nPutin claimed that Western economic sanctions on Russia were not working, that Russian farmers just had a \"record\" grain harvest – Russia has stolen Ukraine's grain over the past year – and that he plans to bolster Russia's diplomatic and economic ties to India, Iran and other countries in the Middle East.\n\nLarge parts of his speech were focused on domestic policies connected to infrastructure spending and financial reforms. He praised Russian soldiers and said he would \"systematically\" continue with the Ukraine invasion he ordered a year ago. He did not unveil any new military objectives connected to Ukraine.\n\nForced to flee:They counted the days until they could return to Ukraine. Now, they're not sure they'll go back\n\nPutin ruled out Russia making a first nuclear strike in Ukraine and said Russia would conduct nuclear tests only if the U.S. did so first.\n\nBiden said Russian forces have committed \"crimes against humanity without shame or compunction,\" pointing to the targeting of civilians, the kidnapping of children, \"rape as a weapon of war\" and bombings of maternal hospitals, schools and orphanages. \"It's abhorrent,\" Biden said, promising Russia will be held accountable.\n\nDuring Biden's unannounced visit to Warsaw on Monday, Biden met with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and reiterated American commitment to supplying the country with aid and weapons for the long term.\n\n\"Ukraine will never be a victory for Russia, never,\" Biden said in Warsaw.\n\nDig deeper:They counted the days until they could return to Ukraine. Now, they're not sure they'll go back", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/21"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_11", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/02/22/florida-bill-bans-dogs-car-window/11323391002/", "title": "Florida bill would ban dogs from sticking their heads out car windows", "text": "A new proposal in Florida is set to impact the goodest of good boys in Florida and their beloved car rides.\n\nA bill filed on Friday by Broward County Democratic state Sen. Lauren Book would prohibit dogs from putting their heads out of car windows.\n\nThe measure includes various animal-welfare regulations: penalizing cat declawing, banning certain animal testing, prohibiting rabbit sales before Easter and requiring the Florida Department of Law Enforcement to post an online registry of convicted animal abuses.\n\nAccording to the bill, drivers wouldn't be allowed to hold a dog in their lap, and dogs wouldn't be allowed to put their head or any other body part outside a car window.\n\nThe bill calls for pets to be restrained with a harness, seat belt, or if possible, to be held by a passenger.\n\nIf a dog is being transported in the bed of a truck, they must be restrained by using a crate that is safely secured and large enough to allow the dog to turn around normally.\n\nThose who violate the new provisions would receive a noncriminal traffic infraction, punishable as a moving violation.\n\nAnimalkind:The latest videos, news, and tips on the furry, the scaly, and every type of animal.\n\nAlligator attack:85-year-old Florida woman dead after alligator attacks while she walked her dog\n\n'The gator has me':Witness recalls the fatal alligator attack that left her 85-year-old neighbor dead", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/22"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/24/politics/florida-bill-lgbtq-school-discussions/index.html", "title": "Florida state GOP lawmakers advance bill prohibiting schools from ...", "text": "Washington CNN —\n\nFlorida state lawmakers advanced a bill last week that would prohibit some schools from “encouraging” conversations about sexual orientation and gender identity in classrooms with young students.\n\nHB 1557, titled the Parental Rights in Education bill, was passed by the state House’s GOP-controlled Education and Employment Committee on Thursday by a vote of 15-5.\n\nThough the bill’s sponsor says the legislation aims to provide parents with greater oversight over what their students learn and discuss at school, opponents have said it will have a harmful impact on LGBTQ youth, whom they say are at an increased risk for suicide when they are not able to learn about LGBTQ-related topics while in school.\n\nThe proposed legislation comes as policymakers around the country are engaged in spirited debates over parental rights and which social issues are taught in the classroom, with LGBTQ-related topics a major target for conservatives who say conversations around those subjects should be left for families to discuss at home.\n\nThe legislation would make it illegal for districts to “adopt procedures or student support forms that prohibit school district personnel from notifying a parent about his or her student’s mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being,” something LGBTQ advocates argue could lead to some students being unintentionally outed to their parents.\n\nIn addition, “A school district may not encourage classroom discussion about sexual orientation or gender identity in primary grade levels or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students,” according to the proposal, which would also allow parents to bring civil suits against a school district for any potential violation of its rules.\n\nWhile the bill doesn’t define “primary grade levels,” its sponsor, Republican state Rep. Joe Harding, told CNN on Monday that it would apply to students in kindergarten through third grade.\n\n“At that age they need to be worried about reading and worrying about their math,” he said. “For me, it’s why are we sensationalizing this age to have all these questions and to force so many questions on gender on these children at that age?”\n\n“We’re talking specifically about young, elementary-age children that just don’t need that stress in general,” Harding added. “Allow things to come up organically, but don’t force conversations on them.”\n\nThe bill now heads to another House committee, which could also approve it and then send it to the floor for a full House vote. A Senate companion bill is also making its way through that chamber, which is controlled by Republicans.\n\nHB 1557 is being strongly opposed by Democrats in the state and a number of LGBTQ advocacy groups, including the Trevor Project, a nonprofit organization that works on suicide prevention among LGBTQ youth. The group said last week that if passed, the bill would “ban classroom discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity in schools, erasing LGBTQ identity, history, and culture – as well as LGBTQ students themselves.”\n\n“The Trevor Project’s research has found that LGBTQ youth who learned about LGBTQ issues or people in classes at school had 23% lower odds of reporting a suicide attempt in the past year,” said Sam Ames, the group’s director of advocacy and government affairs, in a statement. “This bill will erase young LGBTQ students across Florida, forcing many back into the closet by policing their identity and silencing important discussions about the issues they face.”\n\nFlorida state Rep. Anna Eskamani, a Democrat who is among the bill’s opponents, told CNN’s Alisyn Camerota Monday that it’s “offensive for the state of Florida to consider such legislation.”\n\n“You know, I represent Pulse Nightclub in my district. Every day we have young people who ask questions about what happened at Pulse, who was impacted by Pulse. It’s so important that we can have these conversations and talk about every type of family within our schools,” she said on “Newsroom.”\n\nHB 1557 is also taking heat from Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg’s husband, Chasten, who said last week in a tweet directed at Florida Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis that the bill “will kill kids.”\n\nChasten Buttigieg wrote that the governor is “purposefully making your state a harder place for LGBTQ kids to survive in,” and cited data from the Trevor Project about queer youth who have seriously considered attempting suicide in the past year.\n\nCNN has reached out to DeSantis’ office for comment on Buttigieg’s tweet.", "authors": ["Devan Cole"], "publish_date": "2022/01/24"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/03/us/state-abortion-trigger-laws-roe-v-wade-overturned/index.html", "title": "13 states have passed so-called 'trigger laws,' bans designed to go ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nMany Americans anxiously anticipating the Supreme Court’s decision on Roe v. Wade may have been offered a glimpse of what’s to come when Politico revealed a draft Supreme Court opinion Monday night that would upend the landmark abortion rights case.\n\nThough the unearthing of the draft has no immediate effect on abortion access, the preliminary opinion, which was confirmed to be authentic by the court, would overturn Roe v. Wade if a majority of justices decided to join, leaving state legislators to weigh their own abortion policies.\n\nThe 1973 Roe v. Wade court decision affirmed the right to receive an abortion under the 14th Amendment, ruling that abortions were constitutionally protected up until about 23 weeks when a fetus could be able to live outside the womb.\n\nLast year, the Supreme Court agreed to hear a challenge to Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban, setting the court up to examine decades of precedent set by Roe. Some state legislatures have enacted policies to increase abortion access, including in California, which passed a law in March to eliminate out-of-pocket costs for abortion services covered by health plans, and in Colorado, where Democratic lawmakers codified the right to receive an abortion in the state.\n\nBut many Republican-led state legislatures have already moved to limit abortion access and others are poised to enforce restrictive laws that have remained unenforced since Roe was passed. In total, an analysis by the Guttmacher Institute finds that 23 states have laws aiming to limit abortion access, including some states that have multiple provisions in place.\n\nStates including Michigan, Wisconsin and West Virginia had abortion restrictions before the Roe ruling that have never been removed. Others have approved near-total bans or laws prohibiting abortion after a certain number of weeks – but many of them have been blocked by courts, including those in Alabama, Georgia, Iowa, Ohio and South Carolina.\n\nLegislators in 13 states have passed so-called “trigger laws,” which are bans designed to go into effect if Roe is overturned. In some cases, the law requires an official such as an attorney general to certify that Roe has been struck down before the law can take effect.\n\nThese are the states with “trigger laws” poised to go into effect almost immediately if Roe v. Wade is overturned.\n\nArkansas\n\nArkansas has a law on the books that would ban nearly all abortions in the event that Roe is overturned, except for in the case of a life-threatening medical emergency. A medical provider who violates the law could face up to 10 years in prison, a fine of up to $100,000 or both.\n\nLast year, a federal judge blocked another bill passed by state legislators which aimed to block nearly all abortions and made no exceptions for rape or incest.\n\nIdaho\n\nIdaho’s trigger ban would make providing abortions a felony punishable by up to five years in prison if Roe is struck down. Exceptions are provided to prevent the death of the pregnant person or in the case of rape or incest.\n\nIn March, Idaho legislators passed a separate bill modeled after Texas’ restrictive law, which prohibits abortion once fetal cardiac activity can be detected, which can happen as early as six weeks. The law also allows family members of the fetus to sue the medical provider who performed the procedure.\n\nThe ban was temporarily blocked by the state Supreme Court last month after abortion providers challenged it in a lawsuit.\n\nKentucky\n\nKentucky’s legislature passed a bill in 2019 which would ban abortions and make performing them a felony offense if the Supreme Court overturns Roe. Very limited exceptions would be provided to prevent the death or serious injury of the person giving birth.\n\nLouisiana\n\nLouisiana has a law in place that would ban a medical provider from performing an abortion procedure or providing drugs intended to induce an abortion in the case that Roe is overturned. The ban would not apply to life-threatening or serious medical emergencies, but requires the physician makes “reasonable medical efforts” to preserve the life of the adult and the fetus.\n\nMississippi\n\nMississippi law states that within 10 days of the state attorney general confirming Roe has been overturned, abortions are prohibited in the state. Limited exceptions are provided in cases of rape or when the procedure would preserve the mother’s life.\n\nMississippi passed a separate 15-week abortion ban in 2018, which is the source of the case currently in front of the Supreme Court. The court is expected to announce its decision in June, but a draft opinion revealed by Politico suggests a majority of the justices may be poised to strike down Roe.\n\nMissouri\n\nMissouri approved a law in 2019 that would make it a felony for medical providers to perform or induce an abortion except in cases of medical emergencies if Roe is struck down.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nA law approved by the North Dakota legislature in 2007 would ban abortion and make it a felony to perform the procedure except in cases when it would save the life of the mother. The law would go into effect “as a result of new decisions by the Supreme Court of the United States” that would make the provision constitutional.\n\nOklahoma\n\nOklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt signed a bill last month that would make performing abortions illegal in the state, only allowing exceptions to save the life of the pregnant person. The measure makes performing an abortion or attempting to perform one a felony punishable by a maximum fine of $100,000 or a maximum of 10 years in state prison, or both.\n\nA second bill signed into law last week sets a timeline for provisions to go into effect, depending on how the Supreme Court rules.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nSouth Dakota has had a trigger ban on the books since 2005, when a law was passed to set up an almost outright ban on abortions in the event that Roe is overturned. The law would make it illegal to perform an abortion except in life-threatening medical emergencies and would become effective “on the date states are recognized by the United States Supreme Court to have the authority to prohibit abortion at all stages of pregnancy.”\n\nTennessee\n\nTennessee law contains a provision that would prohibit all abortions except those that would prevent the death of the mother and would go into effect 30 days after Roe is struck down. Medical providers could be charged with a felony for violating the law.\n\nTexas\n\nTexas’ so-called trigger ban was signed into law in June 2021 and would make abortions illegal unless the pregnant person’s life is threatened or they are at risk of serious injury. The law would go into effect 30 days after the Supreme Court issues a judgment overruling Roe.\n\nUtah\n\nUtah passed a law in May 2020 banning almost all abortions if Roe is overturned. Exceptions include cases of rape or incest, detection of severe birth defects, or prevention of the death or serious injury of the person giving birth. Performing an abortion in violation of the law is a second-degree felony.\n\nWyoming\n\nSigned into law last month, Wyoming’s bill added a provision that would make it illegal to perform an abortion if Roe is overturned, with extremely limited exceptions for cases of sexual assault, incest, or the risk of death or severe injury to the person giving birth.", "authors": ["Elizabeth Wolfe"], "publish_date": "2022/05/03"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/02/09/lawmakers-ban-chinese-citizens-buy-american-land/11163052002/", "title": "Texas, lawmakers seek to ban Chinese citizens from buying US land", "text": "Lawmakers in Texas, Florida, Arkansas and in Congress have proposed laws banning citizens of China from buying land, homes and other buildings in the United States.\n\nIt's a move they say will help protect the United States from interference by adversaries like China's government, which they accuse of spying, theft and risking the American food supply. Former president and 2024 presidential candidate Donald Trump has backed the efforts.\n\nA federal proposal filed by a bipartisan group of members of Congress has been dubbed the \"Promoting Agriculture Safeguards and Security Act.\" Eleven states are considering versions of the same measure, and Iowa already has a ban in place.\n\nThe downing of what U.S. officials say was a Chinese surveillance balloon on Saturday has brought fresh attention to the growing tensions between the U.S. and China in several areas, from trade and tariff disputes to military maneuvers.\n\nBut critics say the laws – which sometimes also include bans on land purchases by North Koreans, Russians and Iranians – hark back to racist laws from the early 1900s preventing Asian Americans from becoming property owners.\n\n\"It is scapegoating, it's stigmatizing, and it plays into the view of Chinese Americans and Asian Americans as the perpetual foreigner: They can never be American enough,\" said Manjusha Kulkarni, executive director of AAPI Equity Alliance and founder of Stop AAPI Hate. \"And when you put these policies into place, you perpetuate that stigma and the attacks on Asian Americans.\"\n\nLATEST:Chinese spy balloon flew over other US missile and nuclear weapons sites, lawmaker says\n\nTexas proposal seeks to ban Chinese and other foreign nationals from owning land\n\nAlthough similar bills have been filed in several states, a Texas proposal got new attention earlier this year after Republican Gov. Greg Abbott said he would sign it.\n\nIn 2021, Abbott signed a different Texas law forbidding citizens or the governments of North Korea, Russia, Iran and China from having ownership or contracts connected to critical infrastructure. The federal government has already hit Russia with sanctions over its invasion of Ukraine, as well as on North Korea and Iran over their nuclear programs.\n\nThe proposed Texas property ownership law bars purchases by people from those four countries, including Green Card and visa holders, and asylum seekers. The laws would not apply to people who are already U.S. citizens.\n\n\"The growing ownership of Texas land by some foreign entities is highly disturbing and raises red flags for many Texans,\" Republican state Sen. Lois Kolkhorst said in a statement announcing her proposed law. \"By comparison, as an American, go try to buy land near a Chinese military base and see how it works out for you. It would never happen there, and it shouldn't happen here.\"\n\nKolkhorst said she's open to amending the bill to allow permanent U.S. residents born in those countries to buy land.\n\nWhere else is this an issue?\n\nKolkhorst cited several examples of what she called alarming land purchases in North Dakota, Florida and Texas, including the 2021 purchase of more than 130,000 acres by a Chinese-controlled company that planned to build a small wind farm near Laughlin Air Force Base in Texas.\n\nTexas lawmakers, including both of its U.S. senators, opposed the project on the grounds that China could use the property to interfere with the base or the already unreliable Texas electrical grid.\n\nNationally, the U.S. Air Force said last month that a proposed Chinese-owned corn mill near Grand Forks Air Force Base in North Dakota \"presents a significant threat to national security,\" but it did not elaborate. Federal law requires a Defense Department risk analysis whenever a foreign person or country buys property close to sensitive military sites.\n\n“As a third-generation Montana farmer, I’m not going to sit back and let our foreign adversaries weaken our national security by buying up American farmland,\" said Sen. Jon Tester, a Montana Democrat, in a statement when he helped introduce the PASS Act in Congress.\n\nMeasure 'targets immigrant communities'\n\nOpponents of the proposals say supporters are using familiar rhetoric to advance a racist agenda exploiting fear to attack outsiders.\n\n\"It's a resurrection of the 'Yellow Peril': We are outsiders who are threats,\" said Russell Jeung, a professor of Asian American studies at San Francisco State University. \"They are creating policies that aren't grounded in evidence or sound economic analysis, but are really based on stereotypes and outsized fears. And it works.\"\n\nKulkarni, of Stop AAPI Hate, said there's little evidence the Chinese government is backing a widespread campaign of land purchases for nefarious purposes.\n\nShe supports efforts to protect the United States from foreign adversaries, but she believes the PASS Act and other proposals are written too broadly.\n\n\"For a nation that sees itself as a country made up of immigrants, this is a measure that targets immigrant communities seeking to develop roots in the United States and to become part of the fabric of America,\" she said.\n\nMore: Japanese American detainees at Camp Amache recall 1942 incarceration\n\nAnti-Asian American violence: How teachers are trying to stop it.\n\nWhat are the concerns with foreign ownership?\n\nSome U.S. security experts worry Chinese ownership of companies like Smithfield Foods threatens the U.S. food supply. Smithfield owns brands from Nathan's Famous Hot Dogs to Cook's Ham and Kretschmar deli meats and cheese.\n\nAs of 2019, 76% of U.S. agricultural land owned by Chinese entities belonged to Smithfield, which exports pork products to China, according to federal statistics.\n\nA report in May 2022 by the congressionally chartered U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission warned that China's need for food is driving its efforts to buy farmland abroad, along with buying or stealing the technology behind genetically modified crops, sophisticated livestock management systems and advanced farming equipment.\n\n\"The United States is a global leader in all of these fields, making it a prime trading partner and often a target of China’s efforts to strengthen its agriculture sector and food security, sometimes through illicit means,\" the report said. \"These efforts present several risks to U.S. economic and national security.\"\n\nMore:Video shows moment US shot down suspected Chinese spy balloon\n\nHow much of American land is owned by foreigners?\n\nThe federal government already requires foreign buyers to report when they buy agricultural land.\n\nAs of 2020, about 3% of the nation's total farm, ranch and forest land was owned by foreign investors, according to the federal government. Of that, Chinese-backed owners represented less than 1% of the total of foreign-owned land, according to the USDA's Farm Service Agency, or about 550 square miles. For comparison, Rhode Island is about 1,000 square miles.\n\nWhy would foreign investors buy US land?\n\nExperts say foreigners would want to buy U.S. land and property for the same reason the rest of us do: Land and property are typically solid, safe investments that can appreciate well above a savings account.\n\nAdditionally, the transition to clean energy gives investors opportunities in a new arena, in the same way international companies own coal and other mines in the United States.\n\nBut some lawmakers fear the Chinese government is exploiting the openness of U.S. society to spy, steal trade secrets and otherwise undercut the United States but controlling critical supply chains.\n\nOne analysis noted that Smithfield, the pork producer, uses hog farming techniques in the United States that are banned in China for being too polluting.\n\n\"Chinese companies’ acquisition of hog herds in the United States may save China money and enhance its domestic capacity; however, this could also reduce China’s need for U.S.-sourced production and redistributes the environmental effects of hog waste to U.S. communities,\" the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said last year.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/09"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/04/23/politics/abortion-out-of-state-legislation/index.html", "title": "Can red states regulate abortions performed outside their borders ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nIf the Supreme Court reverses its long-standing abortion precedent later this year and lets states ban abortions within their borders, it will unleash a new legal and legislative fight over how far anti-abortion lawmakers can reach to target conduct that happens outside their state lines.\n\nA draft majority opinion published by Politico on Monday suggested the court’s majority was on the cusp of overturning 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. The opinion is not final, and it is possible the vote count will change before a formal opinion is later rolled out, likely by the end of June. In it, Justice Samuel Alito wrote that the “authority to regulate abortion must be returned to the people and their elected representatives.”\n\nAt the case’s December hearing, the conservative justices who appeared inclined to join Alito framed a post-Roe landscape as one where states can choose the contours of their abortion policies for themselves.\n\nBut legal experts say the reality, if Roe is reversed, will not be that simple.\n\nAlready, lawmakers in both red and blue states are beginning to draw new battles lines in expectation of a patchwork system where abortion rights are no longer protected nationwide.\n\nLegislation introduced this year in Missouri is an extreme example of how anti-abortion lawmakers are looking to crack down on abortions that happen beyond their states’ borders.\n\nOne measure sought to allow private citizens to sue anyone who helps a Missouri resident obtain an abortion out of state, while also targeting efforts to provide medication abortion to residents. Another bill would apply Missouri’s abortion laws to abortions obtained out of state by Missouri residents and in other circumstances, including in cases where “sexual intercourse occurred within this state and the child may have been conceived by that act of intercourse.”\n\nThat bill has seen no movement in the legislature, while lawmakers did an end run around the other legislation when it was brought up on the state House floor last month.\n\nMary Ziegler, a Florida State University College of Law professor who’s the author of “Abortion and the Law in America: A Legal History, Roe v. Wade to the Present,” said the Missouri bill is a sign of things to come.\n\n“This won’t be the last state that tries to regulate conduct outside of its borders,” Ziegler told CNN.\n\n‘The portability of medication abortion changes the access landscape’\n\nWhat has complicated the picture since the last time the Supreme Court seemed to be poised to overturn Roe is the development of medication abortion, in which pregnancies are ended with a two-pill regime. It is now the method used in more than half of all abortions in the country. A recent loosening of the regulations around abortion pills, which the Food and Drug Administration has now cleared to be dispersed by mail, has prompted anti-abortion states to think of new ways to regulate its availability. How the pandemic expanded the use of telemedicine has also changed the abortion landscape, as – coupled with the loosened FDA regulations – some abortion patients can undergo the medication abortion procedures without being inside a clinic.\n\n“In the last three years education about abortion pills has been a huge part of my job,” said Katie Glenn, the government affairs counsel for the anti-abortion group Americans United for Life.\n\nSeveral states have outlawed telemedicine abortions and sending the pills by mail.\n\nBut some, like Texas, have gone further by contemplating how they’ll prosecute providers who seek to send in abortion pills from out of state. Texas last year expanded upon its existing prohibitions on mailing medication abortion pills by classifying the offense as the type of crime that would warrant extradition.\n\n“As you start to think about all the ways that the portability of medication abortion changes the access landscape, I think you see a lot of laws targeting that,” said Rachel Rebouché, who is a co-author of a coming law review article exploring the interstate legal questions raised by a Roe reversal.\n\nOn the flip side – and in anticipation that their states will become so-called “safe havens” for abortion seekers and clinics – Democratic lawmakers are pushing proposals that would limit the ability of out-of-state authorities to investigate providers within blue states.\n\nNew York lawmakers have introduced several bills that would protect abortion providers from extradition to other states. California is considering legislation aimed at the civil enforcement mechanism – i.e. lawsuits filed by private citizens against those who facilitate outlawed abortions – that was championed by Texas’ six-week ban and is being considered by other states.\n\nA bill in Connecticut would bar state agencies from assisting investigations or prosecutions launched by out-of-state authorities and restrict the disclosure of reproductive health records sought by out-of-state subpoenas, among other provisions.\n\nGlenn argued that these bills may have unintended effects on patients. She posited, for instance, that the Connecticut bill would prevent an out-of-state resident from pursuing a lawsuit for a botched delivery performed in the state.\n\nConnecticut state Rep. Jillian Gilchrest, a Democrat who sponsored the bill, dismissed the criticism, telling CNN that “those on the anti-choice side would say anything to try and prevent individuals from being able to access legal safe abortion care.”\n\nShe said Connecticut lawmakers were prompted to push the bill, which passed the legislature last week, by the novel Texas law. The Texas law provided a model for one of the Missouri proposals targeting out-of-state abortions.\n\n“By being able to go after individuals that assist someone with an abortion, we recognized that a Texas-like law, in other states – they could reach to Connecticut,” Gilchrest said.\n\n‘Swift and decisive action’ against companies that aid employees in obtaining abortions out of state\n\nTexas legislators have previewed how they may seek to hinder access to the procedure even beyond their state.\n\nOne statehouse Republican sent Citigroup a letter earlier this year demanding that the company end its policy – adopted in reaction to the six-week ban – of covering travel costs for employees seeking abortions out of state.\n\nTexas state Rep. Briscoe Cain promised “swift and decisive action” if the company did not rescind the policy.\n\n“I intend to introduce legislation next session that bars local governments in Texas from doing business with any company that pays the abortion-related expenses of its employees or that provides abortion coverage as an employee benefit — regardless of where the employee is located or where the abortion is performed,” Cain wrote, adding that his proposal would apply “even if the employee is located out of state and even if the abortion is performed out of state.”\n\nCitigroup declined to comment on the Cain letter.\n\nThe tactic threatened by Cain echos a bill Texas enacted last year aimed at banks that decided to no longer finance certain gun manufacturing companies. But, more broadly, key legal questions remain untested about how lawmakers can regulate abortion-related conduct that happens outside their states.\n\nThe topic was debated among legal academics ahead the 1992 Supreme Court ruling in Planned Parenthood v Casey, a case that many believed would lead to the end of Roe. (The court instead upheld its protections.) It was also the subject of a law review article in 2007, when the departure from the court of Justice Sandra Day O’ Connor, the swing vote in the Casey case, revived the belief that Roe’s days are numbered.\n\n“Basically every time there’s this inflection point, with the court changing, you see kind of these issues come up again,” said Greer Donley, who is one of the co-authors of the new article, which will be published in the Columbia Law Review, about the topic.\n\nBut, she said, this is the first time “we’re really starting to see legislators playing with the text and language of these bills coming out.”\n\n“And certainly you have an anti-abortion movement that is extremely emboldened right now with its own belief that the court is going to support a lot of its more creative measures,” Donley told CNN.\n\nThis story has been updated following the publication of a draft opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade.", "authors": ["Tierney Sneed"], "publish_date": "2022/04/23"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2017/11/01/senator-lee-proposes-constitutional-amendment-ban-greyhound-racing-florida/821338001/", "title": "Dogs would join pigs in Florida's ark of a constitution", "text": "Dog advocates could have a chance to ban greyhound racing in Florida when they go to the polls next November.\n\nSen. Tom Lee, R-Brandon, a member of the Constitution Revision Commission, Wednesday filed a proposal to ban dog racing.\n\nForty states prohibit the sport. Florida law mandates it if tracks want to offer cardrooms and slots. The industry has been racked with allegations of animal abuse – at least 22 greyhounds have tested positive for cocaine this year.\n\nProposed regulations to rein in the industry have stalled in the Legislature for at least the past six years. Lee said committee testimony provided ample anecdotal evidence of abuse. State figures indicate that nearly 400 dogs have died at Florida tracks since 2013.\n\n“Special interests derail the issue every year,” said Lee. “I just happen to be in a position to give it the profile it needs.”\n\nLee has to guide the proposal through the Constitution Revision Commission hearings to get it before the voters. If 60 percent of voters approved, then the sport would cease to exist in the Sunshine State.\n\nThe industry has been in decline for years. A record $3.5 billion was bet on dog racing nationwide in 1991. That total fell to $500 million in 2014, according to the Association of Racing Commissioners International. The number of tracks has fallen from 50 operating in 15 states to 19 in 10 with most of them in Florida.\n\nThere are 12 tracks scattered from the panhandle to Miami-Dade County. They have been plagued with allegations of inhumane treatment. Their opponents described the dogs’ lives as being plagued by exploitation and abuse – cramped kennels, frequent injuries and doses of cocaine and steroids.\n\nState records indicated there are 8,000 dogs racing in Florida. The industry generates as much as $80 million annually, $11 million in tax revenue and 3,000 jobs, according to Jack Cory, the industry’s long-time lobbyist at the state Capitol. Also active among Tallahassee’s animal rescue groups, Cory vehemently defends greyhound racing.\n\n“Those allegations (of abuse) come from radical out-of-state animal rights groups that take care of no animals in the state of Florida,” said Cory, who dismissed Lee’s proposal as dumb.\n\nLee has until May to convince a majority of the 36 CRC commissioners to place the proposal on the 2018 ballot. Cory vows to fight him each step of the way – for 12 months if necessary.\n\n“If a ban on greyhound racing were to come, it would be over my cold dead bloody body,” Cory said. “I’m not going to let 3,000 Floridians lose their jobs without representing them as strongly as possible.\"\n\nLee said it is time to put the issue before the voters. He brushed aside his opponent’s line of attack that the proposal was more about Lee’s future after the Senate then it is about the welfare of the dogs.\n\n“This has been around for a long time,” said Lee. He noted he routinely scheduled bills increasing regulations on greyhound racing when he was Senate President 13 years ago.\n\n“They are acknowledging how popular this will be with the voters,” he said about the criticism.\n\nReporter James Call can be reached at jcall@tallahassee.com.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2017/11/01"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/local/indian-river-lagoon/health/2020/01/08/florida-legislature-reviewing-water-quality-bills-they-help-environment/2749202001/", "title": "Florida Legislature reviewing water quality bills; will they help ...", "text": "How you evaluate the environmental agenda of the Florida Legislature this year depends on whether you see the glass as half empty or half full.\n\nThere are several pieces of proposed legislation that, combined with a significant chunk of money in Gov. Ron DeSantis' proposed budget, should go a long way to pleasing the half-full types.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/01/08"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/local/indian-river-lagoon/2021/03/22/brian-mast-announces-3-water-bills-lake-okeechobee-lake-o-discharges-army-corps-harmful-algal-blooms/4796775001/", "title": "Bills would regulate Lake Okeechobee discharges, keep toxic algae ...", "text": "STUART — As hundreds of millions of gallons of water per day continued to pour through the St. Lucie Lock and Dam and into the St. Lucie River Monday, the Treasure Coast's congressman took to a podium at Flagler Park downtown.\n\nOn World Water Day, an international event to advocate for the sustainable use of freshwater, U.S. Rep. Brian Mast, R-Palm City, announced three water bills he said he will file to mitigate public health risks from toxic Lake Okeechobee discharges.\n\nThe bills aim to keep toxic algae out of the St. Lucie River, prioritize public health and alert people to the hazards of Lake Okeechobee discharges.\n\n\"Water supply doesn't matter if it's crap water that you can't touch, drink, or if it poisons the things that it gets on top of,\" Mast said, standing by the St. Lucie River in Stuart.\n\nMore: What are Lake O discharges?\n\nToxic Health Threat Warning Act\n\nIf passed, one of the three bills would require the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to notify at-risk coastal communities of potential incoming health hazards before releasing Lake O water containing toxic cyanobacteria, commonly called blue-green algae.\n\nThe bill, called the Toxic Health Threat Warning Act would require tests to determine whether the lake water is contaminated. If it is, the Corps would have to notify the public about the human health risks, Mast said.\n\n\"What happens to your health if you come in contact with the toxic discharges we get sent out here into our waterways? (The Corps) has to tell you what's going to happen to you if you touch that. That's the simple point,\" Mast said.\n\nMore:Is Lost Summer 2021 on the horizon?\n\nStop Poisoning Florida Act\n\nA second bill, called the Stop Poisoning Florida Act, would prohibit discharging lake water into the St. Lucie River if it contains a toxicity level the Environmental Protection Agency deems unsafe for human contact.\n\nThe EPA says 8 parts per billion of microcystin makes the water hazardous to touch, ingest or inhale for people, pets and wildlife. Water measured at this toxicity level would prevent the Corps from discharging water into the St. Lucie River.\n\n\"There were people who denied that the toxic algae was coming from Lake Okeechobee,\" South Florida Water Management District board member Jacqui-Thurlow-Lippisch said Monday, referring to a 10-month discharge event in 2016 that dumped nearly 219 billion gallons of water. \"It was not our local estuary that was causing those toxic discharges. They were coming straight out of Lake Okeechobee.\"\n\nMore:Ssssssuch a good dog! Canines hunt Everglades pythons\n\nProtect Florida Act\n\nA third bill, called the Protect Florida Act, would require the Corps to prioritize public health when making decisions about lake management. The Corps is currently rewriting its lake management rules for the first time since 2008.\n\nIn rewriting the Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual, the Corps must consider broad factors such as flood control, water supply, navigation and recreation across the entire Lake O system, Eva Vélez, the Corps' strategic program manager, said during a presentation in February.\n\nPublic health was missing from her list, but Mast's bill would add it, he said.\n\n\"How important is recreation on the water if you can't get into it because your liver is going to fail after getting in the water?\" Mast asked Monday. \"I mean, this is pretty common sense stuff.\n\nMore:TCPalm's complete coverage of water issues\n\nLake Okeechobee discharges\n\nThe Corps has been releasing a seven-day average of 323 million gallons a day through the St. Lucie Lock and Dam into the St. Lucie River since March 6, with no end in sight.\n\nThe Corps said it hopes releasing lake water into the brackish estuary now reduces the risk of toxic algae flowing into the river this summer, since blooms are more common during the warmer, wetter months. But it all depends on the weather.\n\nTropical Storm Eta dumped rainfall throughout South Florida, raising the lake's elevation to a peak 16.45 feet Nov. 13. The Corps wants it no higher than 12.5 feet by June 1, to make room for summer rains.\n\n\"I look out here and I imagine how it used to be when I was growing up here as a kid,\" said Mark Perry, executive director of the nonprofit Florida Oceanographic Society in Stuart. \"We don't need the nutrient loading, toxic algae and other things that come from these discharges from Lake Okeechobee.\"\n\nHow's the Water?Real-time bacteria counts at Florida beaches, rivers\n\nFor more news, follow Max Chesnes on Twitter.\n\nMax Chesnes is a TCPalm environment reporter covering issues facing the Indian River Lagoon, St. Lucie River and Lake Okeechobee. You can keep up with Max on Twitter @MaxChesnes, email him at max.chesnes@tcpalm.com and give him a call at 772-978-2224.\n\nRead more of Max's stories.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/03/22"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2022/08/25/fact-check-fake-list-banned-florida-books-circulates-widely-online/7876468001/", "title": "Fact check: Fake list of banned Florida books circulates widely online", "text": "The claim: Image shows a list of books that are banned from schools and libraries in Florida\n\nIn July, a new Florida law went into effect that allows parents to register concerns about books taught in schools and petition local districts to ban them.\n\nNevertheless, many prominent people on social media have been claiming that a slew of books were immediately banned in schools and libraries statewide by the law. They have circulated an image of 25 book titles listed on a piece of paper.\n\nThe book list includes novels that have been taught in schools for generations, including \"To Kill a Mockingbird,\" \"Catcher in the Rye\" and \"I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.\" It also includes the Harry Potter series and the biblical Song of Solomon.\n\nThe image of the banned book list has been shared by American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten and Star Wars actor Mark Hamill on Aug. 21 and 22. Hamill's tweet has racked up more than 30,000 retweets and 150,000 likes.\n\nAn Aug. 21 Facebook post featuring the image of the book list has been shared 80 times. The post reads, “Florida's Current Banned Book List. Tragic How Many Totalitarian Third World States Exist in the USA in 2022.”\n\nBut the list is a fiction.\n\nWhile school districts can ban books through a process created by the new law, Florida has not banned any books at the state level, a spokesperson for Gov. Ron DeSantis told USA TODAY.\n\nIn fact, several works on the list have been recommended to school districts by the state Department of Education.\n\nWeingarten corrected and deleted her tweet within several hours of posting it. Numerous other posts featuring the list, such as Hamill's, have remained online.\n\nUSA TODAY also reached out to Hamill and another user who shared the post for comment.\n\nFollow us on Facebook! Like our page to get updates throughout the day on our latest debunks\n\nNo state-level book bans in Florida\n\nHB1467, an education bill, passed the state legislature earlier this year and was signed into law by DeSantis. It allows parents to review and contest all instructional materials, including books. The law also sets term limits for school board members, creates selection requirements for school materials and compels districts to hold meetings related to instructional materials in public.\n\nFlorida does not issue statewide bans on specific books, Bryan Griffin, DeSantis' press secretary, told USA TODAY in an email. Instead, under the new law, \"the state sets guidelines regarding content, and the local school districts are responsible for enforcing them,\" he said\n\nThese content guidelines require specialists to review reading materials and prohibit reading materials that are \"inappropriate for the grade level and age group for which the material is used\" or contain \"pornographic content.\"\n\nClaims that the books shown in the image are banned in Florida are false, Griffin said.\n\n\"The image is fake – as far as I see it, this is just a completely fictitious list,\" he said.\n\nUSA TODAY also found no credible source for the list.\n\nIn addition, at least five of books on the list are endorsed as exemplary of a \"rich literary tradition\" in a guide to the state's current educational standards for English Language Arts, including \"To Kill a Mockingbird,\" \"1984,\" \"Of Mice and Men,\" \"The Call of the Wild\" and \"Lord of the Flies,\" as Griffin noted.\n\nFact check:State civics teacher training seminar in Florida was voluntary\n\nOur rating: False\n\nBased on our research, we rate FALSE the claim that an image shows a list of books that are banned from schools and libraries in Florida. Florida has not issued any statewide book bans, a DeSantis spokesperson told USA TODAY. Further, several works on the list have been recommended by the Florida Department of Education in a guide for educators.\n\nOur fact-check sources:\n\nThank you for supporting our journalism. You can subscribe to our print edition, ad-free app or electronic newspaper replica here.\n\nOur fact-check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/08/25"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/24/politics/florida-lgbtq-school-bill-house-passage/index.html", "title": "Florida House approves bill prohibiting schools from discussing ...", "text": "Washington CNN —\n\nFlorida moved one step closer on Thursday to banning teachers from discussing sexual orientation and gender identity in classrooms for young students, with the state’s GOP-led House of Representatives approving a controversial bill that’s facing intense opposition from LGBTQ advocates and the White House.\n\nHB 1557, titled the Parental Rights in Education bill, was passed by Florida’s House by a vote of 69-47. The legislation now heads to the state’s Republican-controlled Senate, where a similar bill is already under consideration. Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican, has signaled his support for the legislation.\n\nThe bills have become a major flash point in conservatives’ nationwide push to give parents greater oversight over what students learn and discuss at school, but opponents have strongly denounced the legislation, saying they would have a harmful impact on LGBTQ youth. President Joe Biden has called the proposed ban “hateful.”\n\n“Classroom instruction by school personnel or third parties on sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards,” according to the proposal, which would also allow parents to bring civil suits against a school district for any potential violation of its rules.\n\nIn addition, the House bill would require districts to “adopt procedures for notifying a student’s parent if there is a change in the student’s services or monitoring related to the student’s mental, emotional, or physical health or well-being,” something LGBTQ advocates argue could lead to some students being outed to their parents without the student’s knowledge or consent. Advocates also fear the bill would restrict students’ ability to speak confidentially with school counselors – some of whom are a student’s sole resource for mental health services.\n\nThe bill’s co-sponsor, Republican state Rep. Joe Harding, stressed Thursday that the bill was about giving parents a greater say in the education of their children.\n\n“We have a choice to empower parents in Florida or we have a choice to empower school districts. I’m asking you to side with the side of parents in Florida,” he said on the House floor just before lawmakers approved the bill.\n\nHarding previously told CNN that the bill is meant to deter school staff from inquiring about a student’s gender identity or pronouns without including their parents in the conversation. He said the experience could be confusing for young children.\n\nHarding said that he’d heard a few instances of parents complaining that school staff were discussing gender identity with their children without their input, though he didn’t get into specifics of where in the state these instances occurred. As to whether the bill would stop a teacher from answering students’ questions about gender identity or sexuality, Harding said the legislation is “not discouraging that,” adding that instructors “know when it’s time to engage the parent.”\n\nLGBTQ advocates, however, warn the measure would lead to further stigmatization of gay, lesbian and transgender children, causing more bullying and suicides within an already marginalized community. They say the bill would eliminate LGBTQ history from the curriculum and prevent teachers from having discussions in their classrooms if questions about sexual orientation and gender identity came up.\n\n“I haven’t heard the bill sponsor or anybody else give me examples as to what classroom instruction is and as to why … this bill has been brought up,” Democratic state Rep. Michele Rayner said Thursday as the bill was debated in the House. “I have not heard the bill sponsor tell me what example has happened in recent history that we have to have this bill.”\n\nAnother one of the bill’s opponents, Democratic state Rep. Anna Eskamani, said Thursday that the bill is “homophobic and transphobic, bigoted and discriminatory,” adding that “it feeds into a lie that kids become gay or trans from inclusive schools and that being LBGTQ+ is dangerous and or perverted.”\n\n“This bill is dangerous. This bill tells kids and educators that if they are gay or come out or come from an LGBTQ+ family that they better not saying anything about it. They better not let anyone find out or we’ll out you and put you in harm’s way,” she said.\n\nOpponents have pointed to research from the Trevor Project, a nonprofit organization that works on suicide prevention among LGBTQ youth. Amit Paley, the group’s CEO & executive director, said last week that their “research has consistently found a strong link between access to LGBTQ-affirming schools and lower suicide risk.”\n\n“LGBTQ youth who learned about LGBTQ issues or people in classes at school had 23% lower odds of reporting a suicide attempt in the past year,” Paley said in a statement.\n\nIn a rare move earlier this month, Biden weighed in on the legislation via Twitter, writing: “I want every member of the LGBTQI+ community – especially the kids who will be impacted by this hateful bill – to know that you are loved and accepted just as you are. I have your back, and my Administration will continue to fight for the protections and safety you deserve.”\n\nDeSantis said earlier this month that it was “entirely inappropriate” for teachers and school administrators to have conversations with students about their gender identity, though he also acknowledged, “I don’t think it’s happening here in large numbers.”\n\nIf approved by the Florida Senate and signed by DeSantis, HB 1557 would go into effect in July.", "authors": ["Devan Cole"], "publish_date": "2022/02/24"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_12", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/30/us/five-things-october-30-trnd/index.html", "title": "5 things to know on October 30, 2022: Start your week smart: South ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nMany loyal readers of 5 Things Sunday look forward to the weekly news quiz, so we have prepared a special Halloween quiz for you while you await the roaming hordes of witches, zombies, princesses and superheroes that will arrive at your door tomorrow night. And no tricks here … you’ll find the weekly news quiz lurking in the shadows below. Here’s what else you need to know to Start Your Week Smart.\n\nHere’s what else you need to know to Start Your Week Smart.\n\nThe weekend that was\n\n• At least 151 people were killed and dozens more hurt in an apparent crowd surge at packed Halloween festivities in the South Korean capital of Seoul, local officials say.\n\n• At least 100 people were killed after two car bombs exploded near Somalia’s education ministry in the capital Mogadishu on Saturday.\n\n• The man who allegedly attacked Paul Pelosi, the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in the couple’s San Francisco home on Friday is expected to be charged with multiple felonies Monday, according to San Francisco law enforcement officials.\n\n• Russia will suspend its participation in the United Nations-brokered grain export deal with Ukraine after drone attacks on the Crimean city of Sevastopol, the country’s defense ministry announced Saturday.\n\n• One lucky lotto player could be in for a very big treat on Halloween night as the Powerball jackpot grows to an estimated $1 billion, with the next drawing on Monday.\n\nThe week ahead\n\nMonday\n\nThe Supreme Court is set to hear two major cases concerning race-based affirmative action at Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, setting the stage for a landmark opinion that could gut the precedent that allows colleges to consider a student’s race when deciding which students should be admitted.\n\nTuesday\n\nThe now 24-year-old who admitted to killing 17 people in Florida’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in February 2018 is scheduled to be formally sentenced. Earlier this month, the jury in the gunman’s death penalty trial recommended that he be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole – a decision that enraged many of the victims’ families. Under Florida law, the judge cannot depart from the jury’s recommendation.\n\nThursday\n\nCNN will hold the second annual Call to Earth Day – an initiative dedicated to conservation, environmentalism and sustainability. CNN is partnering with schools, organizations and individuals across the world to raise awareness of environmental issues and to engage with conservation education. Help celebrate a planet worth protecting and join us here.\n\nFriday\n\nNovember 4 is the deadline for former President Donald Trump and his lawyers to submit documents subpoenaed by the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol. The committee announced earlier this month that it had officially sent a subpoena to Trump ordering him to turn over the documents by Friday and either appear in person or virtually for “one or more days of deposition testimony beginning on or about November 14.”\n\nSaturday\n\nIf you still own an alarm clock or a not-so-smart watch, remember to turn it back one hour before you go to bed. Daylight Saving Time comes to an end at 2 a.m. next Sunday (November 6).\n\nIs a (tweet) storm brewing at Twitter?\n\nIn this week’s One Thing podcast, CNN Business Writer Clare Duffy unpacks what happens now that Elon Musk has finally closed on his deal to buy Twitter. Will former President Donald Trump be allowed back on the platform? Will hate speech run amok? Why should non-Twitter users care? Listen here for answers.\n\nPhotos of the week\n\nCheck out more moving, fascinating and thought-provoking images from the week that was, curated by CNN Photos.\n\nWhat’s happening in entertainment\n\nTV and streaming\n\nSeason 2 of HBO’s Emmy-winning show “The White Lotus” premieres tonight at 9 p.m. ET. CNN’s Brian Lowry says the second season delivers “another five-star TV experience” as it shifts its mix of rich-people problems and staff struggles to a new island: Sicily. (HBO, like CNN, is a unit of Warner Bros. Discovery.)\n\nAnd Netflix launches its new ad-supported subscription plan on Thursday. The new tier will cost $6.99 a month in the US.\n\nIn theaters\n\nAcademy Award-winners Anne Hathaway and Anthony Hopkins – along with Emmy-winner Jeremy Strong – star in “Armageddon Time,” a coming-of-age story about the strength of family and the generational pursuit of the American Dream from writer/director James Gray.\n\nWhat’s happening in sports\n\nBaseball\n\nFollowing a loss to the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 1 of the World Series Friday, the Houston Astros bounced back to win 5-2 to even up the series in Game 2 on Saturday. Game 3 of the best-of-seven series is scheduled for Monday in Philadelphia.\n\nA note to our readers seeking a deep dive into the world of sports: while we can’t possibly feature everyone’s favorite sport in this space, Bleacher Report has got you covered. Check it out!\n\nQuiz time!\n\nTake CNN’s weekly news quiz to see how much you remember from the week that was! So far, 29% of fellow quiz fans have gotten eight or more questions right. How will you fare?\n\nPlay me off\n\nRay Parker Jr. - Ghostbusters (Official Video)\n\nWho you gonna call?\n\nIf you see any ghosts or a giant marshmallow man tomorrow night, you know who to call! Bonus points for every ’80s-era celebrity cameo you can identify. (Click here to view)", "authors": ["Andrew Torgan"], "publish_date": "2022/10/30"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_13", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/books/2023/02/24/roald-dahl-books-classic-versions-censorship-backlash/11337687002/", "title": "Roald Dahl books to be sold in in 2 versions after censorship backlash", "text": "Jill Lawless\n\nAssociated Press\n\nLONDON — Publisher Penguin Random House announced Friday it will publish \"classic\" unexpurgated versions of Roald Dahl's children's novels after it received criticism for cuts and rewrites that were intended to make the books suitable for modern readers.\n\nAlong with the new editions, the company said 17 of Dahl's books would be published in their original form later this year as \"The Roald Dahl Classic Collection\" so \"readers will be free to choose which version of Dahl's stories they prefer.\"\n\nThe move comes after criticism of changes made to \"Charlie and the Chocolate Factory\" and other much-loved classics for recent editions published under the company's Puffin children's label, in which passages relating to weight, mental health, gender and race were altered.\n\nThe backlash:Salman Rushdie, more slam changes to Roald Dahl's books: 'This is absurd censorship'\n\nAugustus Gloop, Charlie's gluttonous antagonist in \"Charlie and the Chocolate Factory\" — originally published in 1964 — became \"enormous\" rather than \"enormously fat.\" In \"Witches,\" a supernatural female posing as an ordinary woman may be a \"top scientist or running a business\" instead of a \"cashier in a supermarket or typing letters for a businessman.\"\n\nThe Roald Dahl Story Company, which controls the rights to the books, said it had worked with Puffin to review and revise the texts because it wanted to ensure that \"Dahl's wonderful stories and characters continue to be enjoyed by all children today.\"\n\nWhile tweaking old books for modern sensibilities is not a new phenomenon in publishing, the scale of the edits drew strong criticism from free-speech groups such as writers' organization PEN America, and from authors including Salman Rushdie.\n\nCamilla, the queen consort, appeared to offer her view at a literary reception on Thursday. She urged writers to \"remain true to your calling, unimpeded by those who may wish to curb the freedom of your expression or impose limits on your imagination.\"\n\nDahl's books, with their mischievous children, strange beasts and often beastly adults, have sold more than 300 million copies and continue to be read by children around the world. Their multiple stage and screen adaptations include \"Matilda the Musical\" and two \"Willy Wonka\" films based on \"Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,\" with a third in the works.\n\n'Matilda the Musical':How Darth Vader inspired Emma Thompson's 'shocking' Trunchbull\n\nBut Dahl, who died in 1990, is also a controversial figure because of antisemitic comments made throughout his life. His family apologized in 2020.\n\nIn 2021, Dahl's estate sold the rights to the books to Netflix, which plans to produce a new generation of films based on the stories.\n\nFrancesca Dow, managing director of Penguin Random House Children's, said the publisher had \"listened to the debate over the past week which has reaffirmed the extraordinary power of Roald Dahl's books and the very real questions around how stories from another era can be kept relevant for each new generation.\"\n\n\"Roald Dahl's fantastic books are often the first stories young children will read independently, and taking care for the imaginations and fast-developing minds of young readers is both a privilege and a responsibility,\" she said.\n\n\"We also recognize the importance of keeping Dahl's classic texts in print,\" Dow said.\n\n\"By making both Puffin and Penguin versions available, we are offering readers the choice to decide how they experience Roald Dahl's magical, marvelous stories.\"\n\nClassic children's books:Dr. Seuss' 'How the Grinch Stole Christmas!' gets a book sequel, and Cindy-Lou is involved", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/24"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2018/11/29/30-things-you-didnt-know-dr-seuss/38448053/", "title": "Dr. Seuss: Bet you didn't know these 30 things about the famous ...", "text": "Colman Andrews\n\n24/7 Wall Street\n\nTheodor Seuss Geisel, who was called Ted as a boy but would one day be known to the world as Dr. Seuss, was born in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1904. His father, Theodor Robert Geisel, who co-owned a brewery, often took young Ted to the city zoo. Perhaps inspired by these visits, Ted – with the encouragement of his mother, Henrietta – drew animal caricatures on his bedroom walls.\n\nDr. Seuss produced some 66 books in all, counting those he wrote but didn’t illustrate, those he co-authored or wrote under a pseudonym, and those that were published posthumously. He is the world’s best-selling children’s author, and according to some sources either the ninth or 11th most popular fiction writer of any kind in history. His books, which have been translated into 30 languages, have sold somewhere between 500 million and 650 million copies.\n\nVariously hailed as the American Poet Laureate of Nonsense and the Modern Mother Goose, Dr. Seuss has brought pleasure to (and encouraged reading comprehension in) four generations of children around the world. But not everything about him was family-friendly. Here are some surprising facts about this prolific author and illustrator.\n\nControversy:The debate over Dr. Seuss: When racist themes collides with childhood nostalgia\n\nTravel:Oh the Places You'll Go! Dr. Seuss museum opens its doors\n\n1.\n\nHis grandfather was a partner in the Kalmbach & Geisel brewery, known familiarly as \"Come Back and Guzzle,\" which later morphed into the Springfield Brewing Co., one of the largest such operations in New England.\n\n2.\n\nFormer President Theodore Roosevelt once humiliated him on stage, exclaiming \"What's this boy doing here?\" instead of giving him the award for selling war bonds that he was expecting.\n\n3.\n\nHis first published work was a parody of Walt Whitman's poem \"O Captain! My Captain!,\" composed as a plaint about the difficulty of Latin class for his high school newspaper.\n\n4.\n\nHe wrote a minstrel show called \"Chicopee Surprised\" as a fundraiser for a school trip, and he performed in it in blackface.\n\n5.\n\nHe was fired from the college humor magazine at Dartmouth College for drinking gin with friends in his dorm room – during Prohibition!\n\nLife prescriptions from the Doctor:Dr. Seuss quotes for every college moment\n\n6.\n\n\"Seuss\" is pronounced \"zoice\" in German, but Geisel preferred to rhyme it with \"Goose,\" as in Mother Goose.\n\n7.\n\nHe wasn't really a doctor. He began using the honorific in an attempt to mollify his father, who had wanted him to study medicine.\n\n8.\n\n\"Oh, the places you'll go!\", which became the title of his last book (published in 1990), was a Dartmouth catchphrase in the 1920s.\n\n9.\n\nHe was voted \"Least Likely to Succeed\" by Casque & Gauntlet, the senior society to which he belonged at Dartmouth.\n\n10.\n\nHe attended Oxford University in 1926, pursuing a master's degree in English, but he left after less than a year.\n\n11.\n\nHelen Palmer, a fellow student at Oxford who was to become his first wife, encouraged him to give up the academic world to concentrate on his art.\n\n12.\n\nHe and Helen were unable to have children, but he sometimes pretended humorously to have offspring, with names like Chrysanthemum-Pearl, Wickersham, Miggles and Boo-boo.\n\n13.\n\nHis first published cartoon appeared in The Saturday Evening Post in 1927.\n\n14.\n\nIn 1929, he drew a four-panel cartoon for the satirical weekly Judge that included a blatantly racist image, complete with the N-word.\n\n15.\n\nWhen it ran into financial difficulties, Judge began paying him in merchandise, including 100 cartons of shaving cream on one occasion and 13 gross of nail clippers on another.\n\n16.\n\nHe was subsequently hired to create ads by the makers of Flit, a DDT-laced bug spray produced by a subsidiary of Standard Oil of New Jersey.\n\n17.\n\nHe created a slogan for the bug spray – \"Quick, Henry, the Flit!\" – that became an oft-quoted slogan of the day a la \"Where's the Beef?\"\n\n18.\n\nSome of his Flit ads featured more racist imagery, of both blacks and Middle Easterners.\n\nMore:Dr. Seuss's political cartoons re-emerge amid criticism of Donald Trump\n\n19.\n\nHe later rejected racism, drawing cartoons such as one featuring Uncle Sam wielding a Flit-like spray to blow the \"Racial Prejudice Bug\" out of the heads of white citizens.\n\n20.\n\nWorking for another Standard Oil subsidiary, which produced Essomarine boat fuel, he became \"Admiral-in-Chief\" of the so-called Seuss Navy, an outfit made up for promotional purposes.\n\n21.\n\nHe began writing and drawing children's books because it was one of the few genres not forbidden by his ad contracts.\n\n22.\n\nHis first published children's book, \"And to Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street,\" was rejected by publishers 27 times before it went to press in 1937.\n\n23.\n\nIn 1939, he published a book for adults called \"The Seven Lady Godivas,\" full of cartoon nudes. It didn't sell well, and he went back to children's books.\n\n24.\n\nDuring World War II, he enlisted in the Army and co-wrote some 27 humorous instructional cartoons featuring a hapless Army recruit called Private Snafu.\n\n25.\n\nHe might have invented the word \"nerd,\" which appears in his 1950 book \"If I Ran the Zoo\" – though the derivation is disputed.\n\n26.\n\nHe wrote a fantasy movie about an evil piano teacher, \"The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T.,\" released in 1953.\n\nDebate:Are Dr. Seuss' books racist? Experts weigh in on controversy\n\n27.\n\nHelen, who was in frail health, committed suicide after Geisel had an affair with a friend's wife, Audrey Dimond – who was to become the second Mrs. Geisel.\n\n28.\n\nHe has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in recognition of the fact that his stories have inspired feature films and TV specials.\n\nMore Seuss:'The Grinch' Benedict Cumberbatch gets cranky about Christmas sweaters, standards on repeat\n\n29.\n\nHis license plate read \"GRINCH,\" a reference to one of his most famous books, \"How the Grinch Stole Christmas!\"\n\n30.\n\nHe was a heavy smoker until the early 1980s and died of oral cancer – though not until 1991, when he was 87.\n\nMethodology\n\nTo unearth little-known facts about Theodor “Dr. Seuss” Geisel, 24/7 Wall St. consulted the Springfield Museums’ Seuss in Springfield website, Penguin Random House’s Seussville website, the website of the New England Historical Society, an article reproducing early Seuss cartoons on Buzzfeed, and the following books: “Dr. Seuss: The Cat Behind the Hat” by Caroline M. Smith; “Of Sneetches and Whos and the Good Dr. Seuss,” edited by Thomas Fensch; “Dr. Seuss & Mr. Geisel: A Biography” by Judith & Neil Morgan; “Theodor Geisel: A Portrait of the Man Who Became Dr. Seuss” by Donald E. Pease; “Who Was Dr. Seuss?” by Janet B. Pascal; and “The Beginnings of Dr. Seuss: An Informal Reminiscence,” edited by Edward Connery Lathem.\n\n24/7 Wall Street is a USA TODAY content partner offering financial news and commentary. Its content is produced independently of USA TODAY.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2018/11/29"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/2021/12/13/censorship-america-book-bans-free-speech-rules/8788156002/", "title": "Censorship in America: Book bans, free speech rules not new", "text": "This cat Benjamin Franklin was a bad mother —\n\nShut your mouth.\n\nJust talkin' about Franklin.\n\nAmericans have always been shushing each other. Long before 1971's \"Theme from Shaft\" (shut your mouth) hit No. 1 — and long before the recent uptick in raucous school board meetings nationwide, where parents have demanded the suppression of everything from \"Beloved\" and \"The Handmaid's Tale\" to \"Huckleberry Finn.\"", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/12/13"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_14", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_15", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/21/mcclellan-first-black-woman-congress-virginia-election/11307643002/", "title": "Democrat Jennifer McClellan wins special election; first Black ...", "text": "Correction & clarification: A previous version of this article misspelled the name of the late Donald McEachin, the former congressman from Virginia.\n\nDemocrat Jennifer McClellan coasted to victory in Virginia’s special election Tuesday, becoming the state’s first Black woman in Congress.\n\nMcClellan, a state senator and corporate lawyer, was declared the projected winner over Republican Leon Benjamin, a pastor, within 30 minutes of the polls closing, according to the Associated Press.\n\nShe will succeed Democrat Rep. Donald McEachin, who died last November, and represent a district anchored by Richmond that stretches south to the North Carolina border.\n\nPresident Joe Biden called McClellan Tuesday night while \"she was headed to her historic win\" and \"looks forward to working with the Congresswoman-elect,\" according to a White House pool report.\n\nHistoric first:Jennifer McClellan just won election to Congress. Black women say it's not enough\n\nOnce McClellan is sworn in, there will be a record 28 Black women in Congress. Her victory does not change the GOP margin in the House as Republicans still will be able to lose four GOP votes on bills and pass legislation.\n\nVirginia voters headed to the polls on Tuesday to fill the lone vacancy in the 118th Congress.\n\nBiden won Virginia's 4th Congressional District by roughly 35 percentage points in 2020.\n\nThat made McClellan, a corporate attorney for Verizon, the favorite against Benjamin, a pastor who lost to McEachin last year in a district anchored by Richmond that stretches south to the North Carolina border.\n\nStay in the conversation on politics: Sign up for the OnPolitics newsletter\n\nVirginia's first Black woman in Congress?\n\nOverall, 22 states have ever elected at least one Black woman to Congress, according to the Pew Research Center.\n\nIf McClellan prevails, the 50-year-old state legislator would be the first Black woman Virginia voters have ever sent to Congress.\n\n\"Just one day left until Virginia elects the first Black woman to Congress,\" McClellan boasted Monday on Twitter. \"Who’s ready?\"\n\nPolitics: Biden pulls off secret trip to war-torn Kyiv. Here's how it happened.\n\nMore: Nikki Haley on 2024 White House bid: 'Why not me?'\n\nA Republican who called the COVID-19 pandemic a 'cover-up'\n\nThe two contenders couldn't be more different in their beliefs.\n\nBenjamin is a staunch conservative who has emphasized his support for parents' rights and school choice. He's also the host of a conservative video program where he has often surfed into conspiracy theory waters.\n\nAmong his past statements were refusing to concede his own 2020 election loss; espousing that the COVID-19 pandemic was a \"cover-up\" to establish a “new world order\"; and arguing the vaccine for the disease contained a \"tracking system\" set up to control people using 5G cellphone networks.\n\nMcClellan challenged McAuliffe in 2021 governor primary in race ultimately won by Republican Glenn Younkin\n\nMcClellan surprised many when she challenged Terry McAuliffe in the Democratic primary for governor in 2021. McAuliffe ultimately lost to Republican Glenn Youngkin.\n\nThat race raised McClellan's profile to the forefront of Virginia politics and, during this congressional campaign, she has leaned into progressive legislative ideas such as expanding voting rights, protecting access to abortion and environmental justice.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/21"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/22/politics/jennifer-mcclellan-virginia-donald-mceachin/index.html", "title": "Jennifer McClellan is poised to make history in Virginia after winning ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nJennifer McClellan has won the Democratic nomination for Virginia’s 4th Congressional District in the special election to succeed the late Rep. Donald McEachin, the commonwealth’s Democratic Party announced early Thursday morning in a news release, putting her in prime position to become the first Black woman to represent the Old Dominion in Congress.\n\nMcEachin died in November just weeks after winning reelection.\n\nMcClellan defeated fellow state Sen. Joe Morrissey and two other candidates in Tuesday’s “firehouse primary,” which was conducted by party officials across a handful of pop-up voting locations in the Richmond-area district. She took 85% of the vote to Morrissey’s 14%, according to the Virginia Democratic Party news release. McClellan enters the February 21 special election against Republican Leon Benjamin as the favorite for a safely Democratic seat that President Joe Biden would have carried by 36 points in 2020.\n\n“Tuesday’s party-run process saw historic turnout with 27,900 votes cast, making it the largest party-run nomination process in the history of the Democratic Party of Virginia” the release stated. “Voter turnout even exceeded the last state-run primary in VA-04, when 15,728 votes were cast.”\n\nAt a news conference Thursday with Virginia Democratic Party officials, McClellan said she was ready “to bring a new perspective to the Virginia delegation that has never had a Black woman sitting at the table.”\n\nShe paid tribute to McEachin, whom she called a friend and mentor, and recalled voting barriers her family members previously faced – including the poll tax her father and grandfather had to pay to be able to vote, the literacy test her great-grandfather had to take, and “the fact that the women in my family did not vote until after 1965. I stand on their shoulders today.”\n\n“I stand on the shoulders of Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to Congress. I stand on the shoulders of John Mercer Langston, the first Black man sent to Congress from Virginia in the 4th Congressional District,” she added.\n\nMcClellan, who finished third in the 2021 Democratic primary for governor, had the support of party leaders and groups ranging from the political arm of the Congressional Progressive Caucus to the moderate-backing Democratic Majority for Israel PAC. Democratic members of the commonwealth’s congressional delegation had endorsed her, as did Richmond Mayor Levar Stoney and other local officials.\n\nMorrissey’s feuds with the Virginia Democratic Party establishment may have been part of his appeal among some disenchanted partisans, but he was dogged by his controversial history, including his resignation from the state House in 2014 after a misdemeanor conviction for contributing to the delinquency of a minor – a 17-year-old part-time staffer at his law office with whom he had sex and exchanged nude photos. He was in his mid-50s at the time, but has argued, according to a local report, that he believed the woman was 18. (Morrissey has since married the woman and they have several children.) Morrissey has also been stripped of his law license – twice – and remains disbarred following a 2019 state Supreme Court decision to uphold its revocation.\n\nBenjamin, a Navy veteran and pastor, won the GOP nomination at a party canvass on Saturday. This is his third bid for the seat, after losing to McEachin last month and in 2020.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional reaction.", "authors": ["Gregory Krieg Ethan Cohen Melissa Holzberg Depalo", "Gregory Krieg", "Ethan Cohen", "Melissa Holzberg Depalo"], "publish_date": "2022/12/22"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/21/washington-biden-news-live-updates/11306108002/", "title": "VA poised to elect first Black woman to Congress as campaigns heat ...", "text": "WASHINGTON — Nikki Haley is in Iowa touting her presidential credentials. Rep. Barbara Lee is running to fill the California Senate seat being vacated by retiring Dianne Feinstein. And Virginia is about to elect its first Black woman to Congress.\n\nThe calendar says 2023 but it feels like 2024.\n\nHere's what else is happening in politics:\n\nStay in the conversation:Sign up for the OnPolitics newsletter\n\nMcCllelan wins Va. special election, making history\n\nDemocrat Jennifer McClellan defeated Republican Leon Benjamin to become the first Black woman Virginia will send to Congress.\n\nThe Associated Press called the race after the polls closed at 7 p.m. EST\n\nThe seat was left vacant by the death of Rep. A. Donald McEachin in November.\n\n– Phillip M. Bailey\n\nBiden administration unveils new proposal that would limit asylum at border\n\nThe Biden administration announced a new policy proposal Tuesday that would limit access to asylum for migrants who cross the United States’ southern border illegally if they fail to apply for protections in another country.\n\nThe administration did not give a specific date for when the policy would go into effect. But officials said they intend to time the implementation of the new policy to coincide with the end of Title 42.\n\nIf the policy is approved, migrants will be ineligible for asylum if they had not used existing lawful processes, such as a humanitarian parole program available for Venezuelans, Nicaraguans, Haitians or Cubans; scheduled a time and place of arrival at a port of entry or been denied asylum in a third country they have traveled through.\n\nThe move comes two years after the administration dismantled a similar Trump-era policy that required migrants seeking asylum in the US to first apply for protections in three Central American countries.\n\n– Rebecca Morin\n\nMore:New Biden administration proposal seeks to limit access for asylum seekers at southern border\n\nSection 230: Supreme Court eager to steer clear of sweeping changes to internet\n\nThe Supreme Court seemed hesitant Tuesday to hand down a sweeping ruling that could change the way search engines and other websites recommend content to users, but the justices struggled with how to address whether Big Tech can ever be held liable when those recommendations cause harm.\n\nAt issue in the case, Gonzalez v. Google, is a controversial law known as Section 230, which has been widely interpreted as shielding websites from lawsuits for user-generated content. The question for the court is whether recommendations – such as a suggestion for the next video to watch on YouTube – are covered under that law.\n\nThe family of a 23-year-old American killed in a 2015 terrorist attack in Paris sued Google, which owns YouTube, for promoting videos dealing with the Islamic State group. But several of the justices from both ends of the ideological spectrum seemed concerned about potentially holding companies liable for all such recommendations.\n\n- John Fritze\n\nSupreme caution:Supreme Court eager to steer clear of sweeping changes to internet in Section 230 dispute\n\nDOD: Service members told to avoid poppy seed products\n\nThe Department of Defense wants service members to cut poppy seeds from their diets to make identifying illicit drug use among the rank and file easier, according to a memo released Tuesday.\n\nPoppy seeds are derived from the poppy plant, which produces opium, the key source for narcotics like codeine and heroin. The DOD warned in the memo that some poppy seed varieties could have higher codeine contamination than previously thought, which might show up on drug tests.\n\n- Ella Lee\n\n‘Kyiv stands strong,’ Biden says, marking one year of Russia’s war in Ukraine\n\nPresident Joe Biden said the world has responded to a \"test for the ages,” marking the one-year anniversary of Russia’s war in Ukraine amid heightened tensions between the U.S. and the Kremlin.\n\nBiden, in a speech outside the Kubicki Arcades palace in Warsaw, said Russian President Vladimir Putin thought Ukraine would \"roll over\" when he invaded, but \"he was wrong\" because of the \"iron will\" of Ukrainians and nations everywhere.\n\n\"One year ago, the world was bracing for the fall of Kyiv,\" Biden said. \"Well, I just came from a visit to Kyiv, and I can report, Kyiv stands strong. Kyiv stands proud. It stands tall. And most importantly, it stands free.\"\n\nThe message of solidarity – delivered in front of U.S., Poland and Ukraine flags – came shortly after Putin said Russia will pull back from the New START nuclear treaty in response to a surprise visit Biden made Monday to Kyiv, Ukraine’s capital.\n\n– Joey Garrison\n\n'Kyiv stands strong’:Biden declares Putin ‘was wrong,’ marking one year of Russia’s war in Ukraine\n\nNikki Haley tells voters considering Trump to ‘look forward’\n\nIn her first visit to Iowa since announcing she would run for president, former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley made a direct pitch for her candidacy over former President Donald Trump, saying “we’ve got to look forward.”\n\nThe answer came after Haley opened a campaign event in Urbandale to audience questions. West Des Moines Republican activist Gary Leffler asked Haley why Iowans who supported Trump in the past should caucus for her instead.\n\n“President Trump is my friend. I think he was the right president at the right time,” Haley responded, but adding that “we need to leave the status quo in the past. We’ve got work to do. We’ve got to look forward.”\n\n– Brianne Pfannenstiel\n\nNikki Haley in Iowa:Nikki Haley begins Iowa courtship for 2024, tells those considering Trump to 'look forward'\n\nFirst lady Jill Biden heading to Africa\n\nFirst lady Jill Biden will travel to Namibia and Kenya this week, part of the Biden administration’s effort to strengthen ties in sub-Saharan Africa and regain trust amid growing influence from China and Russia in the region.\n\nLater trips by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris are also in the works.\n\nThe first lady is expected to focus on the role of young people in strengthening democracies, empowering women and the food crises in Kenya.\n\nShe will be the first top official to visit sub-Saharan Africa since the start of the Biden administration.\n\n– Maureen Groppe\n\nFirst lady Jill Biden heading to Africa:Youth, empowering women, food crises are on the agenda\n\nRep. Cicilline, a co-author of Trump impeachment article, to leave Congress\n\nRep. David Cicilline, the Rhode Island congressman who served as a manager in former President Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial, will leave Congress before the end of his term to lead the Rhode Island Foundation, his office announced on Tuesday.\n\nCicilline was a lead author of the Trump impeachment article considered by the House and held a prominent role throughout the proceedings, at one point urging his GOP colleagues to think about what they will tell their children and grandchildren about that moment.\n\n“Do you stand for the republic or for this president?” Cicilline asked of his peers in January 2021.\n\nThe Rhode Island congressman challenged Rep. James Clyburn in November for assistant Democratic leader, calling on Democrats to “fully respect the diversity of our caucus” by putting a member of the LGBTQ community in a top leadership position. Cicilline is gay. He withdrew his challenge ahead of the party’s vote.\n\nCicilline’s last day will be June 1, the press release said.\n\n– Ella Lee\n\nRep. Barbara Lee announces Senate run\n\nRep. Barbara Lee, D-Calif., has officially entered the Senate race to replace Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who won't seek reelection in 2024.\n\nIn a video released Tuesday, Lee said she was “running for U.S. Senate because Californians deserve a strong, progressive leader who has accomplished real things and delivered real change.”\n\nLee, however, faces a growing field of contenders for the Senate seat: Rep. Katie Porter and Rep. Adam Schiff have both announced their campaigns.\n\n– Mabinty Quarshie\n\nSupreme Court declines case of man who mocked police online\n\nThe Supreme Court on Tuesday declined to hear the case of an Ohio man who was arrested for creating a parody Facebook page in 2016 to mock his local police department.\n\nAnthony Novak was arrested and indicted for violating a state law that makes it illegal to use a computer to disrupt police functions. He was acquitted by a jury.\n\nNovak then sued the police and the city, alleging violations of the First and Fourth Amendments. A Cincinnati-based appeals court sided with the police, holding they were entitled to what's known as qualified immunity – a legal doctrine that protects police from liability for civil rights violations in many circumstances.\n\nThe case received additional attention when The Onion, the Chicago-based satirical publication, filed a legal brief poking fun at the police and the legal community’s obsession with Latin.\n\n– John Fritze\n\nTransportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg calls for rail safety after Ohio derailment\n\nDepartment of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg is pushing for stronger rail regulation after the fiery train derailment in East Palestine, including safer train cars and bigger fines for companies that break the rules.\n\n\"I would say there's a window of opportunity with Congress now, after what happened to East Palestine, that I do not think existed before,\" Buttigieg told reporters Monday. \"We need to use that window of opportunity to raise the bar.\"\n\nButtigieg called on Norfolk Southern and other railways to expedite the implementation of DOT 117 train cars, which are designed to prevent the release of the car's contents if something happens. The Biden administration also wants federal officials to increase the maximum fine for railroads that violate safety rules.\n\nRepublicans and some Democrats have been skeptical of the response by Buttigieg, who was quiet in the days after the crash. He said he's been letting the NTSB conduct its investigation but plans to visit the area \"when the time is right.\"\n\n– Haley BeMiller, The Columbus Dispatch\n\nPutin announces suspension of New START arms treaty\n\nShortly before concluding his nearly /two-hour speech to lawmakers and various Russian elites, President Vladimir Putin announced he was suspending Moscow's participation in New START - a strategic arms reduction treaty between the U.S. and Russia.\n\nPutin said this action was being taken because of the U.S. and NATO, without specifying more.\n\n“In this regard, I am forced to announce today that Russia is suspending its participation in the strategic offensive arms treaty,” he said.\n\nNew START is the last remaining nuclear arms deal between the U.S. and Russia. It was signed in 2010 and extended for five years in 2021. It limits each side to 1,550 long-range nuclear warheads.\n\n– Kim Hjelmgaard\n\nDig deeper:In combative speech, Putin suspends nuclear arms treaty while lashing out at West over Ukraine war\n\nPutin delivers combative speech ahead of Biden address\n\nHours before U.S. President Joe Biden was expected to address, from Poland, his view of Russia's war in Ukraine as the conflict approaches the one-year mark, Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered a speech in Moscow ahead of Friday's anniversary.\n\nAs he has done many times before, Putin blamed the West for provoking the war, accusing the U.S. and its European allies of wanting to acquire \"limitless power.\" He said Ukraine's allies were \"playing a dirty game,\" that NATO members were openly talking about supplying Ukraine with nuclear weapons - they aren't - and that the entire planet was \"dotted\" with U.S. military bases.\n\nIn a wide-ranging speech before Parliament, Putin claimed that western economic sanctions on Russia were not working, that Russian farmers just had a \"record\" grain harvest (Russia has stolen Ukraine's grain over the last year), and that he plans to bolster Russia's diplomatic and economic ties to the Middle East.\n\nAbout an hour into the speech, Putin was mostly focused on domestic policies connected to infrastructure spending and financial reforms. He praised Russian soldiers and said he would \"systematically\" continue with the Ukraine invasion he ordered a year ago. He has not yet mentioned any new military objectives. He ruled out Russia making a first nuclear strike in Ukraine.\n\n– Kim Hjelmgaard\n\nClarence Thomas may be one to watch as Supreme Court takes up Section 230 case\n\nAs the Supreme Court turns to the thorny issue Tuesday of whether Big Tech firms such as Google and Twitter should be immune from lawsuits over online content, many observers will be closely watching Associate Justice Clarence Thomas.\n\nAmong the court's most stalwart conservatives, Thomas has made his views on the controversial Section 230 law clear: In a series of statements, he has criticized lower courts for reading too much into the law and has made a case for giving the government greater power to regulate social media. Thomas' point is that the 1996 law appears to give internet firms protection from lawsuits in some cases – but not the broad immunity embraced by lower courts.\n\nAt issue in the Google case is whether targeted recommendations YouTube's algorithm makes to users – suggesting the next video to watch, for instance – are shielded by Section 230. The family of a woman killed in an Islamic State group attack in 2015 sued Google, which owns YouTube, for promoting the group's videos via its algorithms.\n\nThe other eight justices are largely a blank slate.\n\n– John Fritze\n\nMore:As Supreme Court takes up Google case, only Thomas has made his thoughts clear\n\nVirginia set to elect first Black congresswoman\n\nState Sen. Jennifer McClellan will likely become Virginia's first Black congresswoman Tuesday, as the result of a special election to replace the late Rep. Donald McEachin.\n\nMcEachin represented Virginia's reliably blue 4th Congressional District before he died after battling cancer last year.\n\nMcClellan, who previously ran for governor of Virginia in 2021, faces Republican Leon Benjamin Tuesday. Benjamin ran for the House seat twice before, but lost each time to McEachin.\n\n– Mabinty Quarshie\n\nBattle over ideological tilt of Wisconsin Supreme Court takes shape\n\nThe Wisconsin Supreme Court's conservative tilt is on the ballot this year and it could determine abortion rights, the fate of legislative maps and other key policies in the battleground state.\n\nVoters will decide during Tuesday's primary, to replace a retiring conservative justice, which two candidates will advance to the general election on April 4.\n\nThe winner in April will determine whether conservatives continue their control of the court, or if liberals will gain the majority.\n\nIn 2020 Wisconsin's supreme court blocked former President Donald Trump's lawsuit to overturn the state's election results. And in 2024 it could once again play a critical role in determining election results.\n\n– Mabinty Quarshie\n\nMore:Post-Roe abortion battle draws attention to state judicial elections, new legal strategies\n\nHow President Biden pulled off a secret trip to Ukraine\n\nWhile most of Washington slept, President Joe Biden arrived in Kyiv around 8 a.m. local time Monday.\n\nThe dramatic display of solidarity with Ukraine was the culmination of months of planning by a small team of administration officials. A final decision came in an Oval Office meeting Friday to move forward with a secret trip to war-torn Ukraine ahead of the one-year anniversary of Russia's invasion.\n\n– Joey Garrison, Rebecca Morin\n\nMore:How President Biden pulled off a secret trip to Ukraine", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/21"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/22/black-women-candidates-democrats-2024/11228825002/", "title": "McClellan election win makes history. Black women say it's not ...", "text": "Outside spending was a big factor in major races .\n\nBlack women voters are the Dems' backbone, but many say they're not accepted as the party's face.\n\nAdvocates say Black candidates, especially women, have to create 'machines' outside the party.\n\nWhen Stephanie Thomas entered Connecticut's race for secretary of state, she was a first-term lawmaker whom many people didn't know – and were hesitant to support.\n\n\"I was certainly considered a bit of a long shot, because I hadn't been politically involved for very long,\" Thomas told USA TODAY.\n\n\"So it was actually very surprising to many outsiders that I won the (Democratic state) convention\" and gained the party's endorsement.\n\nThomas had to overcome a lack of name identification and hustle to raise campaign cash.\n\nIt paid off.\n\nIn last year's midterm election, she became Connecticut's first Black female secretary of state. And on Tuesday, in another first, Virginia elected a Black woman to Congress as Jennifer McClellan won a race in the fourth congressional district.\n\nStay in the conversation on politics: Sign up for the OnPolitics newsletter\n\nBut other Black women running for office often struggle to replicate that kind of success.\n\nIn 2022, Stacey Abrams fell in her second bid for Georgia governor; former Rep. Val Demings and Cheri Beasely were defeated in their senatorial races in Florida and North Carolina, respectively.\n\nThese high-profile losses point to a larger and reoccurring problem for Democrats, elected officials and advocates said.\n\nThough Black female voters are the Democratic Party's backbone, activists, strategists and experts tell USA TODAY they aren't accepted as the party’s face.\n\nFrom the hand-wringing about Vice President Kamala Harris' electability to the electoral losses last year, Black women are demanding Democrats step up their political support – with increased financial backing, endorsements, candidate pipeline building and mentoring – in the coming months or risk deflating the party's most loyal bloc.\n\nPolitics: More people of color are running for Congress in mostly white districts and winning, experts say\n\nBlack women are making progress\n\nMore Black women are running for Congress, governor and higher statewide offices than in the past, and overall, it has made political representation more diverse.\n\nOf the 149 women in the current Congress, a record 27 are Black women, according to Rutgers University's Center for American Women and Politics. All the women serve in the House. Democrat Jennifer McClellan was elected Virginia's first Black congresswoman Tuesday. Once she is sworn in, there will be 28 Black female lawmakers in Congress.\n\nDemocratic pollster Cornell Belcher said it's important to spotlight the wins before painting individual losses as a problem with the entire group.\n\n\"When I look at Congress and I look at a House that is as Black and brown as it's ever been, women of color are leading that charge,\" he said.\n\nPolitics: Republican Nikki Haley calls for 'a new generation' - preferably her - in her first 2024 campaign rally\n\nMore: Are GOP spending cuts likely as debt ceiling deadline approaches?\n\nBelcher said it is also noteworthy that Black congressional candidates are winning in predominately white areas where they hadn't before.\n\nIn Illinois, for example, Rep. Lauren Underwood, a Black woman \"with natural, kinky hair,\" he said, has held a House seat since 2018 once represented by former Republican House Speaker Dennis Hastert.\n\nOther historic victories last year include Democratic Rep. Summer Lee becoming the first Black women elected to Congress from Pennsylvania and former Rep. Karen Bass, D-Calif., elevated to mayor of Los Angeles.\n\nNina Smith, a former senior adviser in the Abrams campaign, said that even in the shadow of her former boss losing the Georgia gubernatorial race by 8 percentage points, there’s reason to be optimistic.\n\n“We just got to be a bit more strategic.”\n\nMore: Despite historic campaigns, no Black women won Senate or governor races in 2022 midterms\n\nWaking up Democratic donors\n\nBlack female candidates, advisers and consultants say systemic factors must be addressed: lack of access to donors, poor investment from political parties or outside groups, and the combined tropes of sexism and racism.\n\nSmith said the first involves pushing the Democratic Party and their donors to invest in contenders earlier. She said that includes creating a “media ecosystem” similar to conservative-leaning outlets that will shield Black female candidates against negative attacks.\n\nThat includes heavy investments in digital and Black-owned media outlets to build a stronger narrative about a candidate's strengths, qualifications and campaign goals. During last year's midterms, the Congressional Black Caucus PAC Independent Expenditure spent $2 million mobilizing Black voters in 28 midterm races, which included digital, radio and print ads in Black newspapers.\n\n“There has to be a real investment in making connections with voters and doing so outside of the traditional framework of the party or framework of an election season,” Smith said.\n\nPolitics: Governors offer insights into 2024 race for the White House\n\nMore: Schumer on raising debt ceiling: 'We're gonna win this fight'\n\nBlack women, unlike their male counterparts, are often forced to prove their credentials while running for office and even after they’ve won, said Ohio Democratic Rep. Emilia Sykes.\n\nSykes pointed to times while she was in Ohio's Legislature when state troopers would ask why she was at the statehouse even though she wore a lapel pin designating her a lawmaker. \"Or for them to tell me I didn't look like a legislator, keeping me from entering the hall,\" Sykes said.\n\nPolitical strategists and other allies are pushing for Democratic leadership to support Black female candidates publicly and as early as possible in the campaign cycle.\n\n\"We've created these long-term pipeline maps for white men – it's the same thing we need to do for candidates of color and Black woman in particular,\" said Glynda Carr, president and co-founder of Higher Heights for America, which helps Black female candidates run for office.\n\nOutside spending trounced Black women\n\nIn many major statewide 2022 contests where Black female contenders fell short, they outpaced their opponents in fundraising.\n\nFlorida's Senate race saw Demings raise about $81 million versus roughly $51 million pulled in by Republican incumbent Marco Rubio, a former presidential candidate.\n\nIn Georgia, Abrams used her Democratic star power to raise $113 million, which far exceeded Republican Gov. Brian Kemp’s $78 million bankroll.\n\nTracy King, spokesperson for Collective PAC, which aims to elect more Black people to public office, said that in the past decade she has seen Black women close those one-to-one fundraising gaps.\n\nBut that there’s a larger problem, she said.\n\n\"What I'm seeing is a lack of support from the larger Democratic community that includes those big donors and super PACs,” she said. “In North Carolina, especially, that's what really made the difference.”\n\nBeasley raked in roughly $39 million in that Senate contest, which was more than double compared with the $15 million haul by her GOP opponent, according to federal campaign finance records.\n\nA look at the wider fundraising landscape, however, shows conservative political groups spent $83.3 million combined either attacking Beasley or supporting then-Rep. Ted Budd, according to OpenSecrets.\n\nThat more than eclipsed the roughly $22.2 million spent in the Tar Heel State by Democratic-aligned political organizations, according to an analysis by USA TODAY.\n\nThe same thing happened in Florida, where conservative-leaning outside groups spent about $9.7 million supporting Rubio compared with the approximately $3.2 million from liberal-aligned organizations that tried to boost Demings.\n\nAre Dems working to help Black women?\n\nA’shanti F. Gholar, president of Emerge, an organization that helps prepare Democratic women to run for office, said the Democratic National Committee, especially chair Jamie Harrison, has been a champion of the work her group has done.\n\nGholar recently presented to the DNC's women's caucus during its 2023 winter meeting on the Seated Together program, which prepares Black women to run for office.\n\nThe six-month program focuses on the unique challenges Black women face through training and coaching as they run for office. It places special focus on media training, strategic planning and network building among Black women.\n\n\"It was extremely well received,\" she said. \"I had great conversations with Black women DNC members from various states, who really liked what we were doing and love the fact that we were highlighting the role of Black women and running for office.\"\n\nYet many Black female candidates and allies are pushing for more national investment.\n\n\"Current existing elected officials – especially leaders within a particular party – have a huge influence,\" said Aimee Allison, founder and president of She the People, a group that advocates for women of color in politics.\n\n\"People like (former House Speaker) Nancy Pelosi, who wield an incredible amount of influence, make calls to drive endorsements, money, attention to their particular set of candidates.\"\n\nTake, for example, Colorado state Rep. Leslie Herod.\n\nHerod, who is running for mayor of Denver, said that although the Democratic Party isn't officially supporting her yet, she has received individual support from Black Democrats. Former Denver Mayor Wellington Webb endorsed Herod for mayor, and his network of Black mayors across the country is supporting Herod, she said.\n\n\"As Black women and as Black people, we have to create our own machines, and we are doing that,\" Herod said. \"Some from within the party and some from outside the party.\"\n\nThough the DNC does not endorse in primaries nordirectly contribute to candidates, officials said they were working to invest in Black women's political leadership.\n\n“There is always more work to be done, and Chair Jaime Harrison and the DNC are redoubling that commitment as we prepare for elections in 2023 and 2024,\" said Brencia Berry, the DNC's director of coalitions and community engagement, in a statement to USA TODAY.\n\nSimilar to Herod, Rep. Summer Lee, D-Pa., built her own campaign infrastructure from scratch when she ran for office. She didn't receive traditional Democratic support until after the primary was over and the general-election season began. But she got support from the progressive PAC Justice Democrats and the Working Families Party, a minor political party.\n\nThat machine helped take on \"some of the ugliest attacks that we saw throughout the cycle,\" Lee said. \"But we also recognize that that was built off of the backs of grassroots donors, particularly grassroots progressive donors across the country, in this region and across the country.\"\n\nLee raised more than $1.8 million in her 2022 race, according to OpenSecrets. Her Republican opponent, Michael Doyle, raised $198,855.\n\nYet the United Democracy Project, a pro-Israel PAC, spent more than $2 million opposing Lee; in one ad it attacked Lee for her prison abolition stance. Lee is against the death penalty and campaigns for prison reform.\n\nWhat are outside groups doing?\n\nOutside the party structure, some Black candidates are taking matters into their own hands.\n\nFormer Democratic Senate candidate Mandela Barnes launched the Long Run PAC this month to support marginalized candidates – young people, people of color and LGBTQ people – running for office.\n\nMeanwhile, other groups are huddling about ways to step up to provide the resources that Black women may not receive from party leaders, including on-the-ground voter canvassing.\n\nSykes and Herod helped create the Seated Together program with Emerge.\n\nCongress: Schumer says there will be 'a clean debt ceiling' increase\n\nMore: 'Sleazy but not criminal.' Some George Santos fabrications likely protected by the First Amendment\n\nOf the Emerge alums, two Black women were elected to Congress and three Black women were elected to statewide office in 2022. More than 40 were elected at the state level.\n\nElsewhere, political action committees are pouring in financial resources to educate voters on Black female lawmakers running for office.\n\n\"We tend to try and come in as early as we can because it often takes more time to just make sure that people are aware of the candidates,\" said Adrianne Shropshire, executive director of BlackPAC.\n\nSuch help will be crucial for candidates in 2023, such as Kentucky attorney general candidate Pamela Stevenson, who will face a well-connected Republican this fall.\n\nStevenson, an Air Force veteran who was recruited to run by Gov. Andy Beshear, already has faced early jabs from the state GOP as a \"soft on crime\" candidate in the wake of the 2020 protests over the police shooting death of Breonna Taylor.\n\n“It's the same old tired playbook,” Stevenson, who has been endorsed by Collective PAC, told USA TODAY. \"If you're Black – you're a criminal. If you're a Black woman – you're soft on criminals because your son is a criminal.\n\n\"I'm counting on Kentuckians and on the people to look at me, look at my record.\"", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/22"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/08/politics/2022-midterm-election-historic-firsts/index.html", "title": "Meet the history-makers of the 2022 midterm elections", "text": "CNN —\n\nAs midterm results continue to roll in days after Election Day, Democratic and Republican candidates have already been celebrating historic victories.\n\nHeading into Election Day, both parties were looking to diversify their ranks of elected officials, both in Congress and beyond, and they appear on track to do so.\n\nHouse Republicans will add new members of color to their conference, including John James, who will be the first Black Republican congressman from Michigan, and Juan Ciscomani, who will be the first Latino Republican to represent Arizona in Congress.\n\nDemocrats will make a breakthrough for LGBTQ representation in governor’s offices. In Massachusetts and Oregon, Democrats Maura Healey and Tina Kotek will become the nation’s first out lesbian governors.\n\nRepublican Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the former Trump White House press secretary, will be the first female governor of Arkansas. And Maryland Democrat Wes Moore will be the state’s first Black governor.\n\nThere are still several races that have not yet been called. But for now, here’s a look at the candidates who CNN projects will make history in the 2022 midterms.\n\nThis list will be updated as more winners are projected.\n\nAlabama\n\nKatie Britt talks with the media during a watch party in Montgomery, Alabama, on May 24, 2022. Butch Dill/AP\n\nAL-SEN: Republican Katie Britt will be the first elected female senator from Alabama, CNN projects, winning an open-seat race to succeed her onetime boss, retiring GOP Sen. Richard Shelby. Britt is a former CEO of the Business Council of Alabama and was the heavy favorite in the general election in the deep-red state. Two women have previously represented Alabama in the Senate, but both were appointed to fill vacancies.\n\n\n\nArizona\n\nAZ-06: Juan Ciscomani will be the first Latino Republican elected to Congress from Arizona, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s 6th Congressional District. Ciscomani, who was born in Mexico and immigrated to the US with his family as a child, previously worked at the Tucson Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and was a senior adviser to Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey.\n\nArkansas\n\nFormer White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders speaks at the America First Policy Institute Agenda Summit in Washington, DC, on July 26, 2022. Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images\n\nAR-GOV: Republican Sarah Huckabee Sanders will be the first woman elected governor of Arkansas, CNN projects, winning the office her father previously held for over a decade. Sanders, who earned a national profile in her role as press secretary in the Trump White House, is also the first daughter in US history to serve as governor of the same state her father once led.\n\nAR-LG: Republican Leslie Rutledge will be the first woman elected lieutenant governor of Arkansas, CNN projects. Rutledge, the state attorney general, originally sought the open governor’s seat but switched to the lieutenant governor’s race after Sanders entered the GOP gubernatorial primary. Lieutenant governors are elected on separate tickets in Arkansas.\n\nWith the election of Sanders and Rutledge, Arkansas will join Massachusetts as the first states to have women serving concurrently as governor and lieutenant governor.\n\nCalifornia\n\nCA-SEN: Democrat Alex Padilla will be the first elected Latino senator from California, CNN projects, winning a special election for the remainder of Kamala Harris’ term as well as an election for a full six-year term. Padilla, the son of Mexican immigrant parents, was appointed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom to the seat Harris vacated when she became vice president.\n\nCA-SOS: Democrat Shirley Weber will be California’s first elected Black secretary of state of state, CNN projects. Weber, a former state assemblywoman, has been serving in the position since last year after Newsom picked her to succeed Padilla, who was appointed to the US Senate.\n\nCA-AG: Democrat Rob Bonta will be California’s first elected Filipino American attorney general, CNN projects. Bonta, who was born in the Philippines and immigrated with his family to the US as an infant, has been serving in the position since last year after Newsom appointed him to succeed Xavier Becerra, who left to become President Joe Biden’s Health and Human Services secretary.\n\nCA-42: Democrat Robert Garcia will be the first out LGBTQ immigrant elected to Congress, CNN projects, winning election to California’s 42nd Congressional District. Garcia, who immigrated from Lima, Peru, in the early 1980s at the age of 5, is the current mayor of Long Beach.\n\nLos Angeles Mayor: Democrat Karen Bass will be the first woman and the first Black woman elected mayor of Los Angeles, CNN projects. Bass, who currently represents a Los Angeles-area House seat, will defeat real estate developer Rick Caruso. Bass was on Joe Biden’s short list for a running mate in the 2020 campaign. She’s no stranger to making history: She previously served in the California State Assembly, where in 2008 she became the first Black woman to serve as speaker of a state legislature.\n\nBass said on November 17, the day after her race was called, that the accomplishment of becoming the first female mayor of Los Angeles and the magnitude of the job was “sinking in.”\n\n“To me, when you do make history, when you’re in a position like this – and I was in a similar position when I was sworn in as speaker – it means that you have extra responsibility. You always have to make sure that you maintain excellence in every step of the way,” she said. “The path that you go is laying the foundation for those that come behind you.”\n\nColorado\n\nCO-08: Democrat Yadira Caraveo will be the first Latina elected to Congress from Colorado, CNN projects, winning the race for the state’s new 8th Congressional District. Caraveo, a state representative and the daughter of Mexican immigrant parents, will defeat Republican state Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer to win the seat located north of Denver.\n\nConnecticut\n\nCT-SOS: Democrat Stephanie Thomas will be the first Black woman elected secretary of state of Connecticut, CNN projects. Thomas, a member of the Connecticut House, will succeed appointed Democratic incumbent Mark Kohler.\n\nFlorida\n\nDemocrat Maxwell Frost will succeed Rep. Val Demings in Florida's 10th District. Courtesy Nathan Bullock\n\nFL-10: Democrat Maxwell Frost will be the first member of Generation Z elected to Congress, CNN projects, winning the open seat for Florida’s 10th Congressional District. Generation Z refers to those born after 1996. Frost will succeed Democrat Val Demings, who vacated the seat to run for Senate.\n\nThe 25-year-old representative-elect told CNN’s Poppy Harlow on November 9 that when President Joe Biden called to congratulate him, the President recalled being too young to be sworn in as a senator when he was first elected at age 29.\n\n“He asked me if it was the same situation. I said, ‘No, Mr. President, you had me beat on that. I’m already old enough to be sworn in on January 3.’ So, it was great to talk with him. You know, he was elected at a very young age, too, so he understands that experience,” Frost said on “CNN This Morning.”\n\nFrost, who made reducing gun violence a central part of his campaign, also told CNN that he will work to pass universal background checks in Washington.\n\nIllinois\n\nIL-03: Democrat Delia Ramirez will be the first Latina elected to Congress from Illinois, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s redrawn 3rd Congressional District. Ramirez, a Chicago-area state representative and the daughter of Guatemalan immigrants, was also the first Guatemalan American to serve in the Illinois General Assembly.\n\nIL-17: Democrat Eric Sorensen will be the first out gay person elected to Congress from Illinois, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s 17th Congressional District. Sorensen, a former Rockford and Quad Cities meteorologist, will defeat Republican Esther Joy King in the race to succeed retiring Democratic Rep. Cheri Bustos.\n\nMaryland\n\nWes Moore speaks at a rally in Rockville, Maryland, on August 25, 2022. Drew Angerer/Getty Images\n\nMD-GOV: Democrat Wes Moore will be the first Black governor of Maryland, CNN projects, becoming only the third Black person elected governor in US history. Moore, an Army veteran and former nonprofit executive, will succeed term-limited Republican Gov. Larry Hogan.\n\nMD-LG: Democrat Aruna Miller will be the first Asian American lieutenant governor of Maryland, CNN projects. Miller, who immigrated to the US with her family from India as a child, is a former member of the state House of Delegates. She was elected on the same ticket as Moore.\n\nMD-AG: Anthony Brown will be the first Black person elected attorney general of Maryland, CNN projects. Brown, who currently represents Maryland’s 5th Congressional District, has a been a longtime fixture in state politics, having also served as state lieutenant governor and in the state House and run for governor in 2014.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nMaura Healey speaks during a get-out-the-vote event in Boston on November 2, 2022. Mark Stockwell/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty Images\n\nMA-GOV: Democrat Maura Healey will be one of the first out lesbian governors in US history, CNN projects, winning an open-seat race for the governorship of Massachusetts. Healey, the current attorney general of Massachusetts, will also be the commonwealth’s first elected female governor. Also making history with Healey as one of the nation’s first out lesbian governors is Oregon Democrat Tina Kotek.\n\nWith the election of Healey and her running mate, Kim Driscoll, Massachusetts will join Arkansas as the first states to have women serving concurrently as governor and lieutenant governor.\n\nMA-AG: Democrat Andrea Campbell will be the first Black woman elected attorney general of Massachusetts, CNN projects. Campbell, who ran for Boston mayor last year, was previously the first Black female president of the Boston City Council.\n\nMichigan\n\nMI-10: John James will be the first Black Republican elected to Congress from Michigan, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s 10th Congressional District. James, who lost bids for US Senate in 2018 and 2020, will defeat Democrat Carl Marlinga in the open-seat race for the redrawn suburban Detroit district.\n\nMI-13: Democrat Shri Thanedar will be the first Indian American elected to Congress from Michigan, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s 13th Congressional District. Thaneder, who immigrated to the US from India, was elected to the Michigan House in 2020 and unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for governor in 2018.\n\nNevada\n\nNV-SOS: Democrat Cisco Aguilar will be the first Latino elected secretary of state of Nevada, CNN projects. Aguilar, who is Mexican American, will defeat Republican nominee Jim Marchant, a former state assemblyman who has repeatedly promoted false conspiracy theories about elections in Nevada.\n\nNew York\n\nNY-GOV: Democrat Kathy Hochul will be the first elected female governor of New York, CNN projects, winning a full four-year term to the office she assumed last year after Gov. Andrew Cuomo resigned. Hochul, who previously served as the state’s lieutenant governor and a Buffalo-area congresswoman, will defeat Republican Lee Zeldin.\n\nNY-03: Republican George Santos will be the next congressman from New York’s 3rd Congressional District, CNN projects, winning the first House election between two out gay candidates. Santos, an investor and the son of Brazilian immigrants, will defeat Democrat Robert Zimmerman for the Long Island-based seat.\n\nOhio\n\nOH-09: Democrat Marcy Kaptur will win a 21st term to the House from Ohio, CNN projects, and will become the longest-serving woman in Congress when she’s sworn in next year to represent the state’s 9th Congressional District. Kaptur, who was first elected in 1982 and is currently the longest-serving woman in House history, will break the record set by Barbara Mikulski, who represented Maryland in the House and Senate for a combined 40 years.\n\nOklahoma\n\nOklahoma Rep. Markwayne Mullin speaks at a new conference outside the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on May 12, 2022. Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images\n\nOK-SEN: Republican Markwayne Mullin will be the first Native American senator from Oklahoma in almost 100 years, CNN projects, winning the special election to succeed GOP Sen. Jim Inhofe, who is resigning in January. Mullin, a member of the Cherokee Nation, currently represents the state’s 2nd Congressional District. Democrat Robert Owen, also a member of the Cherokee Nation, represented Oklahoma in the Senate from 1907 to 1925.\n\nOregon\n\nOR-GOV: Democrat Tina Kotek will be one of the first out lesbian governors in US history, CNN projects, after winning an open three-way race for the governorship of Oregon. Kotek, a former speaker of the state House, will succeed term-limited Democratic Gov. Kate Brown. She will share the distinction as the nation’s first out lesbian governor with Massachusetts Gov.-elect Maura Healey.\n\nOR-05: Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer will join Democrat Andrea Salinas as the first Latino members of Congress from Oregon, CNN projects. Chavez-DeRemer, who is Mexican American and the former mayor of Happy Valley, will defeat Democrat Jamie McLeod-Skinner in the race to succeed Democratic Rep. Kurt Schrader in Oregon’s 5th Congressional District.\n\nOR-06: Democrat Andrea Salinas will join Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer as the first Latino members of Congress from Oregon, CNN projects. Salinas, a state representative whose father immigrated to the US from Mexico, will defeat Republican Mike Erickson to win the state’s new 6th Congressional District.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nPA-LG: Democrat Austin Davis will be the first Black lieutenant governor of Pennsylvania, CNN projects, winning election on a ticket with gubernatorial nominee Josh Shapiro. Davis is currently a member of the Pennsylvania House representing a Pittsburgh-area seat. He will be elected on a ticket with Democratic gubernatorial nominee Josh Shapiro.\n\nPA-12: Democrat Summer Lee will be the first Black woman elected to Congress from Pennsylvania, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s 12th Congressional District. Lee, a Pittsburgh-area state representative, will succeed retiring Democratic Rep. Mike Doyle.\n\nVermont\n\nDemocrat Becca Balint, here in an undated handout photo provided on September 28, 2022, will succeed Rep. Peter Welch in Vermont's At-Large District. Becca Balint/Handout/Reuters\n\nVT-AL: Democrat Becca Balint will be the first woman elected to Congress from Vermont, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s at-large district. With Balint’s win, Vermont will lose its distinction as the only US state never to have sent a woman to Congress. Balint, the president pro tempore of the state Senate, will also be the first out LGBTQ person elected to Congress from Vermont.\n\nVT-AG: Charity Clark will be the first woman elected attorney general of Vermont, CNN projects. Clark previously served as chief of staff to Democratic Attorney General T.J. Donovan, who stepped down in June for a private sector job.\n\nWashington\n\nWA-03: Marie Gluesenkamp Perez will be the first Latino Democrat elected to Congress from Washington state, CNN projects, winning election to the state’s 3rd Congressional District. Gluesenkamp Perez, an auto repair shop owner whose father immigrated to the US from Mexico, will defeat Republican Joe Kent to succeed GOP Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, who finished third in the August top-two primary. Herrera Beutler was herself the first Hispanic member of Congress from Washington state.\n\nThis story has been updated with additional developments.\n\nCORRECTION AND UPDATE: An earlier version of this story was updated to reflect that CNN had not projected a result in Colorado’s 8th Congressional District at that point. On November 18, 2022, CNN projected Democrat Yadira Caraveo as the winner.", "authors": ["Andrew Menezes Gregory Krieg", "Andrew Menezes", "Gregory Krieg"], "publish_date": "2022/11/08"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/22/washington-biden-news-live-updates/11312074002/", "title": "Women in Congress set record with McClellan victory; Tim Scott ...", "text": "President Joe Biden is set to meet with allies from the eastern flank of NATO and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg Wednesday to shore up Western support for Ukraine, nearly a year since the Russian invasion.\n\nThe Supreme Court continues its turn to thorny issues Wednesday, as the court debates whether Twitter, Google and Facebook can be held liable under a 2016 law for “aiding and abetting” the Islamic State group. The justices will hear arguments in a case stemming from a 2017 terrorist attack at a nightclub in Istanbul, Turkey.\n\nHere's what else is happening in politics:\n\nStay in the conversation: Sign up for the OnPolitics newsletter\n\nAhead of Trump visit to East Palestine, White House fires back\n\nThe White House is firing back at Republicans following the toxic East Palestine, Ohio train derailment, blaming the Trump administration and Republicans in Congress for undoing Obama-era rail safety measures designed to avert such disasters.\n\nThe aggressive rebuttal comes as former President Donald Trump is set to visit East Palestine on Wednesday. Republicans have attacked the Biden administration, especially Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, for its response to the Feb. 3 Norfolk Southern freight train derailment that unleased toxic chemicals.\n\nButtigieg plans to visit East Palestine on Thursday, making his first trip there since the derailment, to meet with community members and receive an update on the ongoing investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board. The board's initial findings are expected Thursday. Federal agencies have maintained that the air and water following the train derailment are safe.\n\n- Joey Garrison\n\nRail rift:White House blames Trump administration and Republicans over East Palestine, Ohio spill\n\nDemocrats funnel millions to New York to flip House seats in 2024\n\nThe House Majority PAC, a political action committee that focuses on electing Democrats to the House, has launched a $45 million New York Fund program in an effort to regain control of the U.S. House in 2024.\n\nDemocrats held off the predicted \"red wave\" in the 2022 midterms, winning more seats in key districts than anticipated. But candidates in New York didn't fare as well. Eighteen Republicans – including six in New York – currently represent districts President Joe Biden won in the 2020 presidential election. The committee plans to direct funds to Democratic campaign efforts to flip House seats in New York.\n\n- Rachel Looker\n\nUnexpected outcome:'Not a repudiation': Joe Biden holds off red wave, gets unexpected boost from midterm election\n\nSupreme Court skeptical of claim Twitter aided terrorism\n\nThe Supreme Court appeared skeptical Wednesday of a lawsuit accusing Twitter, Facebook and Google of aiding terrorism by hosting and recommending content created by the Islamic State group – the second case in as many days dealing with whether Big Tech can be held liable for such content.\n\nThe lawsuit was filed by the relatives of Nawras Alassaf, a Jordanian citizen killed in an attack on a nightclub in Istanbul in 2017. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for that attack, in which 39 people were killed.\n\n“Go back to 1997, CNN did an interview of Osama bin Laden -- a very famous interview of him…and that interview became famous, (a) tool for recruiting, notoriety. Could, under your theory, CNN have been sued for aiding and abetting the September 11 attacks?” Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh asked the attorney for the family at one point.\n\nThe attorney, Eric Schnapper, responded that the “First Amendment would solve that problem.”\n\n- John Fritze\n\nInternet provider protections:Supreme Court eager to steer clear of sweeping changes to internet in Section 230 dispute\n\nSupreme Court sides with death row inmate in Arizona\n\nThe Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled that a death row inmate in Arizona should be granted a resentencing because he wasn’t allowed to tell the jury that a life sentence in the state meant he would never be eligible for parole.\n\nThe 5-4 opinion, written by Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, means that John Montenegro Cruz should receive a new penalty phase in which he can make clear that he would not walk free if sentenced to life in prison.\n\nThe court’s decision could affect other death row inmates in Arizona. Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett wrote a dissent asserting that the Supreme Court should have left the issue to state courts.\n\nCruz was convicted in 2005 of murdering a Tucson police officer, Patrick Hardesty.\n\n– John Fritze\n\nMore:U.S. Supreme Court hears oral argument of Arizona man on death row\n\nA new record of women will serve in Congress\n\nA historic number of women will serve in the 118th Congress once congresswoman-elect Jennifer McClellan, D-Va., is sworn in to office.\n\nA total of 150 women will serve in Congress, surpassing the previous record set at the swearing-in of the 118th Congress last month, according to Rutgers University’s Center for American Women and Politics. Additionally, 125 women, 92 Democratic women and 28 Black women will serve in the House – new records for each category.\n\nMcClellan’s special election victory Tuesday also made her Virginia’s first Black female member of Congress.\n\n– Mabinty Quarshie\n\nMcClellan wins:First Black woman from Virginia in Congress\n\nBiden checked in on Ohio train derailment from Poland\n\nFacing criticism for his administration’s handling of a trail derailment in Ohio, President Joe Biden called state and federal officials from Poland Tuesday and “reaffirmed my commitment to making sure they have everything they need.”\n\nBiden tweeted details of how the government has responded. But the mayor of East Palestine, Ohio, has criticized Biden for going to Ukraine and Poland this week instead of to Ohio.\n\nFormer President Donald Trump planned to visit East Palestine Wednesday and donate water and cleaning supplies.\n\n– Maureen Groppe\n\nPence: Social Security, Medicare should ‘be on the table’ long-term\n\nIf congressional Republicans don’t want to talk about entitlement reform amid the debt ceiling talks, former Vice President Mike Pence certainly does.\n\n\"While I respect the speaker's commitment to take Social Security and Medicare off the table for the debt ceiling negotiations, we've got to put them on the table in the long term,” Pence said Wednesday morning on CNBC.\n\nThe White House has been eager to goad GOP lawmakers – namely Sen. Rick Scott – for past comments on changes to entitlements.\n\nPence, a potential 2024 GOP presidential contender, showcased his CNBC appearance on his Twitter page and was blunt that “fiscal discipline” is a top priority in his travels across the country.\n\n— Phillip M. Bailey\n\nWisconsin Supreme Court headed for high-stakes general election\n\nWisconsin voters decided on two judges to advance to a high-stakes general election for the highest state court after a four-way primary on Tuesday.\n\nJanet Protasiewicz and Daniel Kelly won out in what was a nonpartisan-in-name-only primary between two liberal and two conservative judges.\n\nThe court currently has a 4-3 conservative majority, but conservative Justice Patience Roggensack announced her retirement. With a Democratic governor and Republican-controlled state legislature, control of the state's Supreme Court could decide the future of many policies in the battleground state. The general election is set for April 4.\n\n– Ken Tran\n\nMore:Wisconsin Supreme Court heads to April general election\n\nVivek Ramaswamy, Republican anti-‘woke’ activist, announces 2024 presidential bid\n\nVivek Ramaswamy, a Republican activist who made a name for himself criticizing “woke” culture in the corporate world, announced he will run for president in 2024 on Tuesday.\n\n“We’ve celebrated our ‘diversity’ so much that we forgot all the ways we’re really the same as Americans, bound by ideals that united a divided, headstrong group of people 250 years ago,” Ramaswamy wrote in a tweet, adding he’s running for the nation’s top office to “revive” those ideals.\n\nRamaswamy emerged on the national stage after publishing his book \"Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam,\" which criticizes political correctness and identity politics. He joins the GOP field that includes former President Donald Trump and former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley.\n\n– Ella Lee\n\nNikki Haley campaign:Nikki Haley begins Iowa courtship for 2024, tells those considering Trump to 'look forward'\n\nHouse Judiciary Committee will hold hearing on fentanyl crisis\n\nThe House Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing next month on a surge of illicitly manufactured fentanyl being trafficked into the United States.\n\nThe hearing, which says in its title that “inaction is no longer an option,” is set for March 1 at 9 a.m. ET. The committee’s website has not yet added the hearing to its calendar.\n\nIn February, National Drug Control Policy Director Rahul Gupta called the surge the “worst drug crisis\" the country's ever faced. More than 56,000 people died from overdoses involving synthetic opioids in 2020, including fentanyl — an increase of more than 56% in overdose death rates from 2019, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.\n\n– Ella Lee, Sarah Elbeshbishi\n\nHow is fentanyl smuggled in the US?:Lawmakers are asking tough questions to stem the flow\n\nBiden calls Putin’s suspension of nuclear arms treaty a 'big mistake’\n\nRussia’s suspension of a nuclear arms treaty is a “big mistake,” President Joe Biden said Wednesday.\n\nBiden made the brief comment to reporters as he entered the presidential palace in Warsaw where he is meeting with leaders from nations on the eastern edge of the NATO alliance.\n\nRussian President Vladimir Putin announced Tuesday he is suspending Moscow’s participation in New START, a strategic nuclear arms reduction treaty, the last remaining nuclear arms reduction deal between the U.S. and Russia. It limits each side to 1,550 long-range nuclear warheads.\n\n– Maureen Groppe\n\nMontana Democratic Sen. Jon Tester to run for reelection\n\nSen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., will run for reelection in 2024 – a win for Democrats, whose hopes of keeping control of the Senate in 2024 could come down to a few key races.\n\n“It’s official. I’m running for reelection,” Tester tweeted Wednesday. “Montanans need a fighter that will hold our government accountable and demand Washington stand up for veterans and lower costs for families.\"\n\nDescribed to the Daily Beast as the “only Democrat who can win” in Montana, Tester’s commitment to run again next year is a boon to the party’s efforts to stay in power in the upper chamber. Democrats need to defend 23 Senate seats in 2024, compared to 11 for the GOP.\n\n– Ella Lee\n\nVirginia elects first Black woman to Congress in special race\n\nDemocrat Jennifer McClellan will become state’s first Black woman in Congress after she coasted to victory in Virginia’s special election Tuesday.\n\nMcClellan, a state senator and corporate lawyer, defeated Republican Leon Benjamin, a pastor,. She will succeed Democrat Rep. Donald McEachin, who died last November, and represent a district anchored by Richmond that stretches south to the North Carolina border.\n\nOnce McClellan is sworn in, there will be a record 28 Black women in Congress. Her victory does not change the GOP margin in the House as Republicans still will be able to lose four GOP votes on bills and pass legislation.\n\n– Phillip M. Bailey\n\nHere's what Black women say they need from Democrats to win elections\n\nMore Black women are running for Congress, governor, and higher statewide offices than in the past; and overall, it has made political representation more diverse.\n\nYet Black women activists, strategists and experts tell USA TODAY they aren't accepted as the party’s face.\n\nFrom the continued handwringing about Vice President Kamala Harris' electability to the electoral losses last year, Black women are demanding Democrats step up their political support – with increased financial backing, endorsements, candidate pipeline building and mentoring – in the coming months or risk deflating its most loyal bloc.\n\n– Phillip M. Bailey, Mabinty Quarshie\n\nBiden emphasizing NATO alliance on final day of trip to Poland, Ukraine\n\nPresident Joe Biden ends his three-day trip to Ukraine and Poland Wednesday with a final emphasis on the strength of the NATO alliance, which has stood up to Russian President Vladimir Putin.\n\nBiden plans to meet with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and with allies on NATO’s eastern flank before returning to Washington.\n\nAddressing the world in a speech at Warsaw Royal Palace Tuesday, Biden said the U.S. commitment to the alliance and its mutual defense pact is \"rock solid.\"\n\n“And every member of NATO knows it. And Russia knows it as well,” Biden said. \"It's a sacred oath, a scared oath to defend every inch of NATO territory.”\n\n– Maureen Groppe\n\nSupreme Court turns next to Twitter, terrorism and student loans\n\nThe Supreme Court turns Wednesday to a lawsuit accusing Twitter, Facebook and Google of aiding terrorism by hosting and recommending content created by the Islamic State group – a follow-up to the court's arguments Tuesday dealing with Section 230.\n\nThe lawsuit was filed by the relatives of Nawras Alassaf, a Jordanian citizen killed in an attack on a nightclub in Istanbul in 2017. The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for that attack, in which 39 people were killed.\n\nNext week, the high court will hear arguments about President Joe Biden's $400 billion student loan relief program. Six conservative states and two individuals assert the Biden administration overstepped its authority with that effort.\n\n– John Fritze\n\nMore:Fate of Biden's student loan plan tops packed Supreme Court calendar\n\nSen. Tim Scott heads to Iowa, amid presidential run speculation\n\nSen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., heads to Iowa Wednesday as he continues his Faith in America listening tour.\n\nScott will deliver remarks at an event at Drake University and then at the Republican Party of Polk County Lincoln dinner.\n\nThe events come as Scott mulls launching a presidential bid in 2024 and as fellow South Carolinian Nikki Haley headed to Iowa this week. Haley launched her presidential campaign last week, becoming the first major Republican to challenge former President Donald Trump.\n\n– Mabinty Quarshie\n\nMore:In 2024 run, Nikki Haley touts role as first woman of color governor. She shares the title.\n\nJill Biden travels to Africa\n\nFirst lady Jill Biden will travel to Namibia and Kenya Wednesday through Sunday, part of the Biden administration's effort to strengthen ties in sub-Saharan Africa and regain trust amid growing influence from China in the region.\n\nThe trip will be Biden’s sixth to Africa throughout her time in public service. She will be the first top official to visit sub-Saharan Africa since the start of the Biden administration.\n\n– Maureen Groppe\n\nPutin suspends nuclear arms treaty\n\nPresident Vladimir Putin announced Tuesday that Russia will pull back from a key nuclear treaty, ratcheting up tensions with the United States, as President Joe Biden visited the region with a fresh pledge of support for Ukraine. Putin's speech came on the heels of a surprise and historic visit by Biden to Kyiv.\n\nIn his nearly two-hour speech to both houses of the Russian Parliament, Putin said he was suspending Moscow's participation in New START – a strategic nuclear arms reduction treaty between the U.S. and Russia.\n\n– Kim Hjelmgaard", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/22"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2022/10/27/tennessee-nov-8-election-john-rose-candidate-congress-dist-6/69596356007/", "title": "Tennessee Nov. 8 election: John Rose, candidate, Congress Dist. 6", "text": "The Tennessean Editorial Board asked candidates on the Nov. 8 state and federal general election ballot in Tennessee to answer our questionnaire. Find biographical information and their responses to 10 questions. Early voting starts on Oct. 19.\n\nMore:Learn about candidates running in the Nov. 8 Tennessee general election | Editorial\n\nBiographical Information\n\nName: John Rose\n\nJohn Rose Age (at time of Nov. 8 election): 57\n\n57 Neighborhood, town and/or city: Cookeville\n\nCookeville Education: Vanderbilt University Law School - JD (1990-1993) Purdue University - MS, agricultural economics (1988-1990) Tennessee Technological University - BS, agribusiness economics (1983-1988) Cookeville High School - Diploma, salutatorian (1980-1983)\n\nVanderbilt University Law School - JD (1990-1993) Purdue University - MS, agricultural economics (1988-1990) Tennessee Technological University - BS, agribusiness economics (1983-1988) Cookeville High School - Diploma, salutatorian (1980-1983) Job history : Boson Software LLC, President (2005-present) Rose Farm, Farmer Transcender Corp., President and Co-Founder (1992-2000)\n\n: Boson Software LLC, President (2005-present) Rose Farm, Farmer Transcender Corp., President and Co-Founder (1992-2000) Family: Wife: Chelsea of 11 years. Sons: Guy (5) and Sam (1)\n\nHear more Tennessee Voices:Get the weekly opinion newsletter for insightful and thought provoking columns.\n\nTen Questions about your Candidacy\n\nWhat office are you seeking? (Include district):\n\n6th Congressional District (Republican incumbent)\n\nWhy are you running for this office?\n\nAs the father of two young boys (ages 5 and 19 months), I am running for office because I want to leave a better future for our children. For the first time in our country’s history I believe this American tradition is at stake. A majority of Americans believe the country is headed down the wrong path, and I want to do everything I can to prevent that from happening so that our children have the same opportunities that we did.\n\nWhat makes you qualified to hold this office and better qualified than your opponent(s)? (Please specify if you are unopposed, but feel free to answer)\n\nAs a Nashville business owner and farmer in rural Tennessee, I understand the challenges of a diverse district such as ours that includes a major metropolitan area, thriving suburban cities and some of our state’s most beautiful small towns. I have successfully built two small businesses here in Nashville, one recognized five years in a row by the Nashville Chamber of Commerce’s Music City Future 50 list for being one of the fastest growing businesses in the region. For the past 25 years, I have operated an 8th generation family farm in DeKalb and Smith Counties. I also served as Tennessee’s 33rd Commissioner of agriculture managing a statewide staff serving our state's largest industry. As a Vanderbilt trained lawyer, licensed since 1993, I possess a critical understanding of our Constitution and laws. I believe I have the education, knowledge, experience and perspective to represent our district in Congress. As your Representative in Congress, I have never stopped listening to your concerns even when we may disagree. The amount of knowledge I have gained in the last four years serving in Congress combined with my life experiences and my desire to leave a better future for our children makes me best suited to continue representing Middle Tennessee in Washington.\n\nHow can you make the biggest impact on your community through this position?\n\nI can make the biggest impact on our community by providing world-class and effective constituent services, which help each Tennessean when they need me most. As a Member of the U.S. House of Representatives, my job is to not only serve as your federal representative on all matters within the House of Representatives but to also help my constituents navigate the large and complex federal government. I have helped countless Tennesseans with trouble getting a passport, receiving their tax return, and helping secure federal grants for community projects like water infrastructure and road repaving.\n\nIf you are elected (or re-elected), what are your top 2 to 3 priorities for your new (or next) term in office?\n\nLowering gas prices and the cost of living, defending our country from crime, illegal immigration, and foreign adversaries, and holding our federal government accountable.\n\nLowering gas prices and the cost of living: Tennesseans are paying the price for President Biden’s reckless spending and anti-energy policies. I have no doubt that the trillions of additional dollars President Biden and Congressional Democrats have spent since gaining complete control of Congress and the White House have fueled the flames of record-high inflation. This unnecessary and costly deficit spending must end, and Congress needs to put our fiscal house back in order. Additionally, America is blessed with an abundance of natural resources that we should take advantage of to lower the price of gas and diesel fuel we rely on to power our economy. Defending our country: There were a record 2.37 million illegal border crossings in Fiscal Year 2022 (Customs and Border Protection use the Fiscal Year to keep records). This doesn’t even include the more than 600,000 “got-aways”. Combined, that’s more than triple the population of Davidson, Sumner, and Wilson counties combined. Every corner of our communities felt the impact of this humanitarian crisis. Whether it's the fentanyl killing our children or the billions of dollars being diverted from other issues to process such an eye-popping number of illegal immigrants. We must secure our southern border by finishing the border wall, ending catch and release, and reinstating the “Remain in Mexico” policy to get illegal immigration under control. Holding the government accountable: It has been more than ninety days since a Biden Administration official has testified in front of the committee on which I serve, the House Committee on Financial Services. This is unacceptable as the American people deserve to have their voices heard in regard to how the Biden Administration implements laws. For example, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed climate change rule would pose tremendous costs to local, small farms across Tennessee. The SEC commissioners should be compelled to publicly testify on the rule’s impact and answer questions as to how they expect small farms with limited resources to comply with such a burdensome and costly rulemaking.\n\nSign up for Latino Tennessee Voices newsletter: Read compelling stories for and with the Latino community in Tennessee.\n\nSign up for Black Tennessee Voices newsletter: Read compelling columns by Black writers from across Tennessee.\n\nWhat are you hearing most from voters about what they want you to accomplish, if elected?\n\nTennesseans want their shot at the American Dream. They want a house in a safe neighborhood or community. They want a good paying job. They want to send their children to quality schools. They want good roads and high speed internet. And, the last thing they want is for Washington to get in the way. Yet, that is where we are. Student loan payoffs for the elite few, 87,000 new IRS agents hired, children being indoctrinated with the liberal agenda at school, corruption at all levels of government, our National Security at risk thanks to crises such as the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan and a wide-open border, and the list goes on. Voters tell me, unequivocally, they want less government and more freedom. I agree with them and that goal is central to every decision I make.\n\nWhat else do you want voters to know about you that will help them make an informed decision on Election Day?\n\nAs a Christian I am guided by biblical morals and believe that this nation is a nation under God. Faith fuels my drive to serve Tennesseans with honesty and integrity. I pray that my earnest and faithful devotion to this great state may enable you and your family to fully and freely pursue your version of the American Dream.\n\nTell us about a mentor or guide who made a difference in your life and what wisdom would you impart to the community?\n\nMillard Vaughn Oakley, a rags to riches, Tennessee success story, who I had the privilege of knowing during his life. He passed earlier this year but will live on as a Tennessee folk hero known for his extraordinary generosity much of which we may never hear about. We come from different political parties, but shared a deep love for Tennessee that transcended politics. That friendship serves as a constant reminder to me that with America’s best interests in mind, cooperation and bipartisanship is possible.\n\nWill you commit to being civil in how you present yourself and the way you interact with opponents and others? (Our definition of civility is being a good, active, honest and respectable citizen)\n\nYes\n\nA fun question: What are one or two attractions (restaurants, parks, venues, etc.) that visitors cannot miss if they come to your community?\n\nRalph’s Donuts in Cookeville. Tennessee State Fair, annually in the district in Wilson County.\n\nCall Opinion and Engagement Director David Plazas at (615) 259-8063, email him at dplazas@tennessean.com or tweet to him at @davidplazas.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/10/27"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2022/04/15/ketanji-brown-jackson-poll-finds-skepticism-over-confirmation-process/7310985001/", "title": "Ketanji Brown Jackson: Poll finds skepticism over confirmation process", "text": "About 68% of Americans see Supreme Court confirmations as about politics more than the law.\n\nNineteen percent of respondents said they watched some or all of the hearings live.\n\nA majority of Americans who watched the hearings said they support Judge Jackson's confirmation to the Supreme Court.\n\nWASHINGTON – The arduous process of confirming a Supreme Court nominee has turned into one of the most significant spectacles in American politics – at once a job interview, law lecture and television campaign ad that plays out over four days.\n\nWith Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's historic confirmation in the books, a new poll suggests a majority of Americans are uncertain whether it's worth all the fuss.\n\nNearly seven in 10 Americans see the constitutionally mandated task of confirming a Supreme Court nominee as more about politics than substance, according to an exclusive USA TODAY/Ipsos poll conducted after Jackson's confirmation. Only about 36% of people say the marathon of hearings leads to better justices on the high court.\n\nThe skepticism appears to be shared across party identification: Fewer than half of both Republicans and Democrats think the hearings lead to better outcomes.\n\n\"I think it's already decided who they're going to (vote for) before they even start talking to each other or interviewing each other,\" said Teresa Griesse, a 68-year-old business owner from Missouri who identifies as an independent. \"I believe it's politics. I don't believe it's a fair choice.\"\n\nJackie Johnson, a 74-year-old sales representative for the Georgia lottery who identifies as a Democrat, said the outcome depends on who's in office.\n\n\"It's a two-sided thing. It's like a game of baseball: one side's gotta win,\" Johnson said.\n\nHazing:Constitutional questions, cafeteria choices await Ketanji Brown Jackson\n\nDiversity:Judge Jackson's Supreme Court confirmation ends idea of 'Black seat'\n\nWait:Jackson confirmed in a hurry. Getting on the Supreme Court? That'll take time.\n\nIf Americans are turned off by confirmation hearings, they appear to share the sentiment with the justices themselves, outside experts and even senior Senate aides – some of whom described them as \"kabuki theater\" and \"insufferable\" to a commission created by President Joe Biden last year to study the politicization of the Supreme Court.\n\nPublic support for the Supreme Court has fallen in recent months as its 6-3 conservative majority takes up a series of culture war issues such as access to abortion, the availability of handguns and the constitutionality of affirmative action in college admissions. But some, including Chief Justice John Roberts, have warned that the exceedingly partisan confirmation process has played a role in harming the court's above-the-fray image.\n\n\"When you have a sharply political, divisive hearing process, it increases the danger that whoever comes out of it will be viewed in those terms,\" Roberts said in 2016.\n\nJackson, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, was confirmed 53-47 on April 7 and will be sworn in as the 116th Supreme Court justice later this year. The Harvard-educated lawyer and Miami native will become the first Black woman to serve on the court in its 233-year history, a milestone even some of her critics acknowledged.\n\nLess than half – about four in ten Americans – said Jackson was treated fairly at her hearings last month. The number rose to 55% for those who tuned in to watch.\n\nRepublicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee peppered Jackson with questions about critical race theory, how often she attends church and how she would define the word \"woman.\" She faced a barrage of questions about her judicial philosophy, her work as a federal public defender and her sentencing in criminal cases.\n\nSens. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, in particular, slammed Jackson on sentences she handed down for people convicted of possessing or distributing child pornography, which were frequently below guidelines set by the U.S. Sentencing Commission. Jackson's supporters pointed to Sentencing Commission data that shows most federal judges issue sentences below the guidelines in child porn cases.\n\nSentencing:A look at the child porn cases at issue in Jackson's Senate hearings\n\nPhilosophy:After hearings, experts debate how Jackson would interpret Constitution\n\nIt's not clear how much of that criticism cut through, particularly given the war raging in Ukraine, a recent jump in COVID-19 cases and the fact that Jackson's confirmation wouldn't upset the current 6-3 balance on the Supreme Court. Just under two-thirds of respondents said Jackson's \"judicial philosophy\" was a reason to oppose her – roughly the same as the share of people who cited her \"record on the vulnerable and children.\"\n\n\"Judge, you gave him three months,\" Hawley, widely considered to be a possible GOP presidential candidate in 2024, pressed Jackson about one of the child pornography cases during the hearings. \"My question is, do you regret it – or not?\"\n\n\"Senator, what I regret is that in a hearing about my qualifications to be a justice on the Supreme Court, we have spent a lot of time focusing on this small subset of my sentences,\" Jackson responded at one point.\n\nAbout two in 10 Americans said they watched some or all of the Senate confirmation hearings live, according to the poll. Roughly one-third said they learned about the hearings through news coverage. Nearly half said they didn't follow the hearings at all.\n\nGriesse said she watched \"very, very little\" of the hearings, while 29-year-old Jonathan White of New Jersey, who identifies as a Republican, said he watched all of it.\n\n\"She's overly qualified and they don't want to hear about it,\" White said of Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee.\n\nNo one – aside from perhaps Jackson herself – came out of the four-day series of hearings looking significantly better than before the gavel fell, the poll suggests. About 24% – including 41% of Republicans – said they had a more favorable impression of Hawley, Cruz and Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., after the hearings. Senate Democrats fared only slightly better, with 30% saying they had a more favorable impression.\n\nThose numbers were highly dependent on the party affiliation of the respondent.\n\nBy comparison, 40% of respondents said they had a more favorable view of Jackson after the hearings.\n\nOverall, 49% of Americans said they supported Jackson's confirmation – a number that rose to nearly two-thirds among those who said they followed the hearings. About 64% of Americans said it is significant there will soon be four women on the Supreme Court for the first time in its history: Jackson and Associate Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Amy Coney Barrett.\n\n\"The significance of Jackson's confirmation, and all it represents, did not go unnoticed by the American public,\" said Cliff Young, president of the poll firm Ipsos. \"However, in our deeply partisan landscape, a strong majority see the nomination process as nothing more than politics as usual, and the hearing did little to change deeply-rooted attitudes about politics in America.\"\n\nThe USA TODAY/Ipsos Poll of 1,005 Americans, taken April 12-13, has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.8 percentage points.\n\nThe Constitution requires that the Senate provide its \"advice and consent\" on presidential nominees to the Supreme Court, but it doesn't require hearings – and for most of the nation's history, senators didn't convene them. The first Supreme Court confirmation hearing was set in 1916 when President Woodrow Wilson nominated Louis Brandeis, who would go on to be one of the court's most influential associate justices.\n\nIn modern times, both sides have alleged political shenanigans. Republicans point to President Ronald Reagan's nomination of Robert Bork in 1987, which Democrats torpedoed over his judicial philosophy. And they blame Democrats for the frenzy that surrounded the confirmation of Associate Justices Clarence Thomas in 1991 and Brett Kavanaugh in 2018. Thomas faced allegations that he sexually harassed a former co-worker. Kavanaugh faced allegations of decades-old sexual misconduct.\n\nBoth men denied the allegations during tense Senate hearings and were narrowly confirmed.\n\nDemocrats note Senate Republicans blocked President Barack Obama's 2016 nominee to the court, Merrick Garland, by arguing confirmations shouldn't take place months out from a presidential election. Four years later, after the death of Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Republicans then rushed through President Donald Trump's nominee, Barrett, just weeks before the 2020 election.\n\nToday, with a few exceptions, the Senate confirmation process has tended to be more predictable, with nominees growing increasingly adept at not directly answering questions and final votes largely locked into place before the hearings begin. Jackson picked up three Republican votes – Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah. In announcing her support for Jackson, Murkowski pointed in part to the judge's qualifications, which, she said, \"no one questions.\"\n\nJohnson, the Georgia saleswoman, said Jackson's performance made her proud.\n\n\"I don't know if I could've been that strong and stayed as calm as she did,\" she said.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/04/15"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/21/politics/mayra-flores-first-mexican-born-woman-congress/index.html", "title": "Mayra Flores becomes the first Mexican-born woman sworn in to ...", "text": "Washington CNN —\n\nRepublican Rep. Mayra Flores of Texas on Tuesday became the first Mexican-born woman to be sworn in to Congress.\n\n“My very first day in office and it’s a memorable one for sure. This is what dreams are made of; faith, family, and hardwork,” Flores tweeted Tuesday.\n\nFlores won a special election in Texas’ 34th Congressional District earlier this month to fill the seat vacated by former Democratic Rep. Filemon Vela, the first time a congressional seat has changed parties since the 2020 election. She bested a field of four candidates – two Republicans and two Democrats – in the all-party contest.\n\nVela left his South Texas seat in March to join a law and lobbying firm in Washington. Flores will serve the remainder of his term, until January.\n\n“This win is for the people who were ignored for so long! This is a message that the establishment will no longer be tolerated! We have officially started the red wave!!” the Flores campaign wrote on Facebook on the night of the June 14 election. Her top Democratic opponent, Dan Sanchez, conceded the race the same night.\n\nBut Flores’ stay on Capitol Hill might be a short one – she will be up for election for a full term in November against Democratic Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, who is shifting from the 15th Congressional District. The redrawn 34th District is considerably friendlier to Democrats – while now-President Joe Biden won the seat under its current lines by 4 points in 2020, he would have won the new version by about 16 points.\n\nFlores benefited from a significant investment by national Republicans and relative indifference from Democrats, who were outspent by an estimated 20 to 1. Republicans had zeroed in on the race as part of an effort to project growing strength with moderate and conservative Hispanic voters in South Texas.\n\nThe National Republican Congressional Committee last week called Flores’ win a “blue print for success in South Texas,” according to a memo obtained by CNN.\n\nBefore last week’s election, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee had said it believed that Democrats would hold the seat in the fall.\n\n“A Democrat will represent TX-34 in January. If Republicans spend money on a seat that is out of their reach in November, great,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spokesperson Monica Robinson told CNN before the special election. The committee dipped into the race late, spending $100,000 on digital ads earlier this month.\n\nThe lack of support for Sanchez frustrated Gonzalez, who had told Politico weeks ago that it would “be a tragedy” if the seat turned red for any amount of time. In a statement prior to the results of the June 14 election, he welcomed the late interest in the contest but demanded more.\n\n“I’m pleased to see Democrats mobilizing around this race,” he told CNN, “but South Texas needs sustained investment from the party.”", "authors": ["Ethan Cohen Melissa Holzberg Depalo Gregory Krieg Rachel Janfaza", "Ethan Cohen", "Melissa Holzberg Depalo", "Gregory Krieg", "Rachel Janfaza"], "publish_date": "2022/06/21"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/08/31/politics/mary-peltola-alaska-house-special-election/index.html", "title": "Mary Peltola set to make history as the first Alaska Native in ..."}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_16", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2023/02/19/richard-belzer-detective-john-munch-law-order-svu-dead/11300263002/", "title": "Richard Belzer, comedian and TV detective John Munch on 'Law ...", "text": "Richard Belzer, a longtime stand-up comedian known for \"Saturday Night Live\" and one of TV's most memorable detectives as John Munch in \"Law & Order\" franchise shows, has died. He was 78.\n\nBelzer died peacefully Sunday at his home with his family in Beaulieu-sur-Mer, in southern France, his longtime friend Bill Scheft confirmed to USA TODAY. Scheft, a writer who had been working on a documentary about Belzer, told The Associated Press there was no known cause of death, but that Belzer had been dealing with circulatory and respiratory issues.\n\nComedian Laraine Newman first announced his death on Twitter. Newman, who worked alongside Belzer during his appearances on \"SNL\" from 1975 to 1980, paid tribute to her co-star on Sunday. \"I'm so sad to hear of Richard Belzer's passing,\" Newman wrote. \"I loved this guy so much.\"\n\n\"He was one of my first friends when I got to New York to do 'SNL.' We used to go out to dinner every week at Sheepshead Bay for lobster,\" she recalled. \"One of the funniest people ever. A master at crowd work. RIP dearest.\"\n\nBelzer's \"Law & Order\" co-star Chris Meloni shared a photo on Twitter kissing the late star on the cheek. \"Good bye mon ami. I love you,\" Meloni wrote alongside the tribute. He also posted a photo of Mariska Hargitay feeding Belzer an apple.\n\nRemembering those we lost: Celebrity Deaths 2023\n\n'I'm leaving SVU':How 'Law & Order' is preparing to say goodbye to Kelli Giddish's Detective Rollins\n\nIn addition to his work as a comedian, Belzer played the role of Detective John Munch for 23 years. The character first appeared in NBC's \"Homicide: Life on the Street\" in 1993 and made its way into several other unrelated shows including, \"Law & Order: Special Victims Unit,\" \"Law & Order: Trial by Jury,\" \"30 Rock,\" \"The X-Files,\" \"Arrested Development,\" \"The Wire\" and \"Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.\"\n\nBelzer never auditioned for the role of Detective John Munch. After hearing him on \"The Howard Stern Show,\" executive producer Barry Levinson brought Belzer in to read for the part.\n\n\"I would never be a detective. But if I were, that's how I'd be,\" Belzer once said. \"They write to all my paranoia and anti-establishment dissidence and conspiracy theories. So it's been a lot of fun for me. A dream, really.\"\n\n\"He made me laugh a billion times,\" his longtime friend and fellow stand-up Richard Lewis said Sunday on Twitter.\n\nFormer \"Law & Order: SVU\" showrunner Warren Light said Belzer was \"the first actor to welcome\" him when he began on \"SVU.\"\n\n\"Open, warm, acerbic, whip smart, surprisingly kind. I loved writing for Munch, and I loved being with Belz,\" Light tweeted. \"We sensed this would be his parting scene. Godspeed, Belz…\"\n\nBorn in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Belzer was drawn to comedy, he said, during an abusive childhood in which his mother would beat him and his older brother, Len. He would do impressions of his childhood idol, Jerry Lewis. \"My kitchen was the toughest room I ever worked,\" Belzer told People magazine in 1993.\n\nBelzer is survived by his third wife, the actress Harlee McBride, whom he married in 1985.\n\nFor the past 20 years, they lived mostly in France, in homes he purchased partially from the proceeds of a lawsuit with Hulk Hogan. In 1985, Belzer had Hogan as a guest on his cable TV talk show “Hot Properties” to perform a chin-lock on him. Belzer passed out, hit his head and sued Hogan for $5 million. They settled out of court.\n\nContributing: Jake Coyle, The Associated Press", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/19"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_17", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2023/02/21/first-generation-iphone-sells-63000/11310634002/", "title": "First-generation iPhone sells for more than $63,000", "text": "A factory sealed, first-generation iPhone sold at auction for a whopping $63,356.40 – more than 100 times its original price – after a woman was gifted the phone in 2007, but never opened it because she didn't want to get rid of her other phone.\n\nThe 2007 phone, still sealed in its box, was consigned by the owner and sold on LCG Auctions after bidding closed on Sunday.\n\nIn all, 27 people bid for the phone that had been expected to sell for $50,000.\n\nThe item went up for auction on Feb. 2.\n\nStudent loans:Payments are set to restart in 2023. Here's how borrowers should prepare.\n\nPaid verification to launch:Meta is launching a paid verification service for Facebook and Instagram\n\nKaren Green, the phone's original owner according to the listing, had it appraised in 2019. Because it was an 8GB – not 4GB – and was still in the original box, it was estimated to be worth $5,000.\n\nIn 2007, the phone came out and, that summer, Green was gifted the phone when she got a management job at PetSmart, according to Business Insider.\n\nAt the time, Green already had three phone lines with Verizon, and iPhones would only use AT&T, the outlet reported. To avoid a pricey termination fee, she \"left the phone on a shelf for years, unopened and unused, wrapped in a pair of felt pajamas for extra measure.\"\n\n\"I didn't want to get rid of my new phone,\" Green said in a 2019 appearance on \"Doctor & The Diva.\"\n\nWhen Green recently heard of another original, unopened iPhone listing on eBay for $10,000, something sparked.\n\n\"I thought to myself, 'Oh my God, I think I have the original,'\" she told the outlet. \"I called my son and I was like, 'Go get the phone and make sure it's not opened.\"\n\nNow, 15 years later, she's $63,000 richer.\n\nNatalie Neysa Alund covers trending news for USA TODAY. Reach her at nalund@usatoday.com and follow her on Twitter @nataliealund", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/21"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/06/tech/apple-event-new-iphone/index.html", "title": "iPhone 14: What to expect at Apple's 'far out' event | CNN Business", "text": "CNN Business —\n\nApple is expected to debut its iPhone 14 lineup at the company’s annual September keynote event on Wednesday.\n\nThe product event, which has been teased with a “far out” tagline, will take place at Apple’s Cupertino, California, headquarters and will be livestreamed on Apple’s website and social media channels.\n\nThis year’s invitation featured a night sky with a constellation of stars forming the Apple logo, leading some to speculate there will be major camera upgrades on iPhones to allow for better nighttime or long-distance photography. But in typical Apple fashion, the tech giant was sparse on details as it builds up excitement and urges customers to tune in on the big day.\n\nThe event will kick off at 10 a.m. PT/1 p.m. ET on Wednesday, and CNN Business will carry live coverage of it. Here is a look at what to expect from CEO Tim Cook and his team.\n\nThe star of the show\n\nAs it has done every year for about a decade, Apple is widely expected to unveil its latest iPhone at the September keynote.\n\nApple is expected to go big with the iPhone 14 — literally. It’s rumored that it will debut a 6.7-inch phone that’s not a Pro model, meaning it will have the bigger screen size but without the higher price tag. The rumor mill also suggests that Apple might ditch its cheaper, mini-sized iPhone in the 14 lineup so that they don’t compete with iPhone SE sales.\n\nA woman walks past an image of an iPhone 13 Pro at an Apple Store on the day the new Apple iPhone 13 series went on sale, in Beijing, China, on September 24, 2021. Garcia Rawlins/Reuters\n\nForecasts point to the latest Pro model being slightly slimmer, and the much-disliked notch around the front-facing camera system to be absent in the new iPhone models.\n\nApple watchers are also getting excited about a potential major camera quality upgrade with the iPhone 14 — possibly one that can shoot 8K video. If this happens, it could be among the biggest changes to the iPhone’s camera quality to date.\n\nHow Apple will price the iPhone 14 is already shaping up to be a test, as broader economic conditions for both the tech sector and consumers have entered choppy waters. A handful of analysts have already forecast slight price hikes for the latest-and-greatest iPhone model. “My expectation is that Apple will probably have to nudge prices up,” Ben Wood, chief analyst at market research firm CCS Insight, told CNN Business ahead of the event.\n\nCurrently, the regular, non-mini iPhone 13 starts at $799, the iPhone 13 Pro starts at $999 and the iPhone 13 Pro Max starts at $1,099. Some analysts are predicting a $100 price hike on at least the higher-end Pro and Pro Max models. But given the strain consumers are facing, he thinks Apple will also do “everything they can to make that as minimal as possible.” This could mean offering attractive trade-in bonuses, payment installment plans, and other offers.\n\nDespite rising inflation and other economic headwinds, Cook said in the company’s most recent earnings call that there has been “no obvious evidence” of macroeconomic impact on iPhone sales yet. This doesn’t mean the tech giant is immune to a worsening economic climate. It reported a nearly 11% decline in profits during the three months ending in June, compared to the same period a year ago. This event also comes amid supply chain hiccups linked to China’s zero-Covid policy.\n\nCustomers walk past a digital display of an Apple iPhone 13 pro inside the Apple Store on 5th Avenue in Manhattan, in New York City, on March 18.\n\nFinally, there has been some chatter that Apple could remove the iPhone’s Lightning port in new models and opt for a design with charging via wireless MagSafe. There have also been rumors that some US models may launch without a physical SIM slot, as Apple moves towards an eSIM-only design.\n\nApple Watches, iOS 16 release date, and more\n\nNew Apple Watch models are expected to be unveiled on Wednesday, including a higher-end offering. An official release date for iOS 16, the much-hyped latest update that will let users personalize their iPhone lock screens (like Android does) and features a revamped iMessage, is also expected to be announced.\n\nWhat not to expect\n\nWith the new iPhone expected to take center stage, many analysts don’t expect Apple to release new iPads or Mac computers until October. Of course, the rumor mill can always be wrong about these things. Apple is also unlikely to debut its previously rumored and much-anticipated AR headset on Wednesday.\n\nDespite rival Samsung’s love affair with foldable devices, Apple is still not expected to unveil such an iPhone this fall.\n\nCNN Business will carry live coverage of Cook’s big production, so tune in here as the world’s most valuable tech company finally puts all rumors to rest and reveals some of its latest gadgets on the cusp of the busy holiday shopping season.", "authors": ["Catherine Thorbecke Samantha Murphy Kelly", "Catherine Thorbecke", "Samantha Murphy Kelly"], "publish_date": "2022/09/06"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/26/food-stamp-cuts-holidays-stress-food-banks/3751445/", "title": "Food stamp cuts, holidays stress food banks", "text": "Jake Grovum\n\nPew/Stateline Staff Writer\n\nThe %245 billion cut in food stamp benefits will affect about 48 million Americans\n\nFor those who help the hungry%2C 2013 is looking a lot like the years since the recession began\n\n15%25 of all Americans are considered %22food insecure%2C%22 and many of those people don%27t use food stamps\n\nFood banks across the country are bracing for what has become an annual occurrence during this season: a spike in demand as millions of Americans struggle to put holiday meals on their tables.\n\nFor those who help the hungry, 2013 is looking a lot like the years since the recession began—with the added challenge of a $5 billion cut in food stamp benefits, which took effect Nov. 1. About 48 million Americans will be hit by the reduction in the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), which will subtract $36 per month for a family of four. Total benefit amounts vary by state.\n\n\"Nobody's been able to catch their breath,\" said Ross Fraser of Feeding America, a nationwide network of 200 food banks that supplies 63,000 agencies around the country. \"Everyone's scared to death about these SNAP cuts.\"\n\nBad timing\n\nAs advocates for the hungry tell it, the reduction in food stamp benefits — the result of an expiration of a temporary boost enacted in 2009 — couldn't have come at worse time.\n\nThe Great Recession has already stretched food banks' ability to help the 15% of all Americans who are considered \"food insecure,\" according to an Agriculture Department report. Many of those people do not use food stamps.\n\nMany food banks are holding extra food drives, or asking companies to make special seasonal donations – turkeys, for example. Others food banks just buy more food; one reported buying 50% more this month compared to October.\n\nThe cut in food stamp benefits will only increase the demand.\n\nEnrollment in food stamps is almost three times what it was in 2000, but that hasn't lessened the dependence on food banks. Since 2006, the number of Americans receiving aid from food pantries and similar services is up almost 50%, according to Feeding America.\n\nA survey by the nonprofit Food Bank for New York City found that almost half of its food pantries and soup kitchens were forced to turn visitors away at some point last year, with 83% blaming a lack of food. At the same time, the group said their ranks shrank during the recession, with 247 of its partners closing since 2007.\n\nIn Indiana this year, lawmakers approved using state funds to pay for the processing of deer meat donated by hunters across the state. This was the first year the state chipped in to pay for the processing in an attempt to boost donations. In the past, hunters or processors covered the cost.\n\nThat led to a welcome infusion of meat donations to the state's food banks, supplementing the normal fare comprised largely of canned vegetables and other non-perishables, said Jake Bruner of the Hoosier Hills Food Bank in Bloomington, Ind.\n\nThose additional donations were well-timed. Hoosier Hills has already distributed more than 3.2 million pounds of food this year, Bruner said, more than in 2011 or 2012.\n\n\"Some pantries are serving thousands of people a week,\" he said.\n\nPerishables move\n\nThe spike in demand has led to an unexpected benefit: In the past, fresh food and produce often lingered on shelves so long it went bad. Now, that's not a concern.\n\n\"A lot of those are fairly rural counties,\" Bruner said of the areas his food bank serves. \"We're seeing agencies, a mom-and-pop food pantry, being able to take full bins of bananas and distribute them quickly.\"\n\nIn Fort Smith, Ark., near the Oklahoma border, the River Valley Food Bank is nearing the end of its own record-setting year, having distributed more than 8 million pounds of food in 2013, compared to 6.7 million last year.\n\nThe reason for the jump is a mix of still-increasing demand and the bank's ability to store more food, said its director, Ted Clemons. \"When you can distribute 8 million pounds and the pantries are still taking that food, that shows there is a demand,\" he said.\n\nUnlike past years, the food bank didn't receive any donated turkeys this year. So River Valley held a one-day \"turkey drive\" last week. Halfway through Friday's effort, Clemons, reached by phone while out collecting turkeys, said they'd already collected more than 300, with a goal of 800 for the day.\n\nStill not enough\n\nBut even the most robust food banks aren't able to fill the need, a fact that was true even before the recent food stamp cuts. By Feeding America's estimate, the benefit cuts will cost 1.9 million meals for low-income Americans next year—more than half the number of meals the organization distributes in a given year.\n\nEven at Washington, D.C.'s Capital Area Food Bank, which moves 45 million pounds of food each year from its 100,000-square-foot facility a few miles from the U.S. Capitol, organizers know they can't feed everybody who is hungry.\n\nThe facility covers parts of Virginia and Maryland, along with the nation's capital itself, where almost one in four residents is on food stamps. In preparation for the holidays, the food bank bought 50% more food this month than it did in October. Two weeks ago, it received a donation of 1,000 turkeys from a grocer.\n\n\"It would be great to put ourselves out of business,\" Page Crosland, director of media and events at the food bank, said last week. \"But I don't see that happening.\"", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/11/26"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_18", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2023/02/19/ricky-stenhouse-jr-wins-2023-daytona-500-overtime/11300709002/", "title": "Ricky Stenhouse Jr. wins 2023 Daytona 500, edging Joey Logano in ...", "text": "After all the adversity and a long stretch of futility, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. can now call himself a Daytona 500 champion.\n\nStenhouse, driving the No. 47 Chevrolet, edged reigning Cup Series champion Joey Logano on Sunday at Daytona International Speedway in double overtime to etch himself among the legends of racing with a victory in NASCAR's most famous race.\n\nStenhouse, who had been winless in the series since capturing the summer race at Daytona in 2017, notched his third career Cup victory 199 races after first celebrating at Daytona.\n\n\"I made a few mistakes but I was able to battle back,\" Stenhouse said. \"The whole team worked really hard this offseason.\n\n\"I hope you all had fun. That was a heck of a race.\"\n\nWINNERS: Every driver who has won the Daytona 500 by year\n\nThe 65th annual Daytona 500 — the longest race by laps (212) and miles (530) in history — ended under caution when a multi-car crash broke out after the white flag flew. Stenhouse, who was the leader at the start of the second overtime, put just enough distance between himself and Logano, in the No. 22 Team Penske Ford, to be declared the winner by NASCAR as the yellow flag flew.\n\nChristopher Bell finished third, Chris Buescher fourth and pole-sitter Alex Bowman fifth.\n\n\"Second is the worst, man. You're so close,\" Logano, who won the 2015 race said. \"Congratulations to Ricky. There's nothing like winning the Daytona 500. That's why it stings so much finishing second.\"\n\n'NEVER ENOUGH':Reigning NASCAR champ Logano on the hunt for more trophies\n\nRAJAH CARUTH:HBCU student breaking new barriers as he ascends NASCAR ladder\n\nStenhouse, 35, also gave single-car team JTG Daugherty Racing its biggest moment in racing. Tad Geschickter and his wife Jodi – the JTG in the name – joined with former NBA All-Star center Brad Daugherty to form the team in 2009, and prior to Sunday, the team had tasted victory just once – at Watkins Glen in 2014 with driver AJ Allmendinger.\n\nJTG Daugherty Racing was the first single-car team to win the race since The Wood Brothers Racing did it with Trevor Bayne in 2011.\n\n\"WELL DONE @StenhouseJr x @JTGRacing. So proud of this entire team! #DAYTONA500,\" Daugherty, who became the first Black owner to win a Daytona 500, tweeted.\n\nAllmendinger, now driving for Kaulig Racing, was caught up in the final crash along with three former Cup Series champions: Kyle Larson (2021), Brad Keselowski (2012), Kyle Busch (2015, 2019). Aric Almirola, Denny Hamlin, Ryan Blaney, Bubba Wallace, Travis Pastrana were also involved in the incident that helped seal the deal for Stenhouse at Daytona.\n\nLarson was collected in the race-ending crash after he jumped out of line too early in an attempt to win the race.\n\n“Happy that Ricky won. I’m super happy. That’s all I could think about after I crashed, waiting to hear that he won,” Larson said. “He’s one of my best friends, so I was like yelling into my helmet when I helped push him to the lead there. I was hoping it was going to stay green so it would have been me or him win.\"\n\nOvertime No. 1\n\nIn the first overtime, Austin Dillon, the 2018 Daytona 500 winner, spun out in his No. 3 Chevrolet when the front of the inside line got stacked up behind him. Dillon got bumped by William Byron in the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, setting off a chain reaction, which collected 13 cars, including three other Daytona 500 winners – Hamlin (a three-time winner), Jimmie Johnson, who won it twice, and last year's winner Austin Cindric – though Hamlin had minimal damage. Also involved: Stage 2 winner Ross Chastain, Keselowski, Riley Herbst, Harrison Burton, Justin Haley, Zane Smith, Todd Gilliland and Noah Gragson.\n\nDaniel Suarez, in the No. 99 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet, spun out with three laps remaining in the race to set up the first overtime finish. Two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Busch (No. 8 Chevrolet), seeking his first Daytona 500 win in his illustrious career, was leading Dillon, his Richard Childress Racing teammate, when the caution flag flew.\n\nPit stops breed calamity\n\nShortly after the final green-flag pit stops began on Lap 176 of 200, a couple of former Cup Series champions and a Daytona 500 winner got caught in some on-track chaos. As cars were spread out and trying to get back up to speed, Michael McDowell, the 2021 Daytona 500 champ, made contact with Ryan Preece, running 14th and 15th, causing Preece to spin and triggering a multi-car incident.\n\nMartin Truex Jr., the 2017 series champion, and Kevin Harvick, who won the 2014 title, found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, as did Harvick's Stewart-Haas Racing teammate Chase Briscoe in the No. 14 Ford.\n\nStage 2\n\nChastain, in the No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet, edged Bowman (No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet) at the line to win the second stage. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. drove the JTG Daugherty Racing No. 47 Chevrolet to third, Reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano (No. 22 Team Penske Ford) was fourth and Logano's teammate, Austin Cindric, the 2022 Daytona 500 winner, was fifth in the No. 2 Ford.\n\nRounding out the top 10: Truex (No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota), Byron, AJ Allmendinger (No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet), Buescher (No. 17 Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing Ford) and Bell (No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota).\n\nWelcome to the jungle\n\nThe first major incident occurred on Lap 118 of 200 when Tyler Reddick, battling for fourth in the No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota, got loose after a bump from Kevin Harvick in the Stewart-Haas Racing No. 4 Ford. Reddick then careened into Blaney in the No. 12 Team Penske Ford and both cars spun out, setting off an eight-car accident.\n\nHarvick, Larson (No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet), Chase Elliott (No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet), Truex, Erik Jones (No. 43 Legacy Motor Club Chevrolet) and Daniel Suarez (No. 99 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet) all got a piece of the crash with Reddick, Elliott and Jones, in a Guns N' Roses paint scheme, suffering the biggest damage and retiring from the race.\n\nStage 1\n\nHendrick Motorsports teammates Bowman, who won the pole, and Larson, led the field to the green flag in the opening stage. The Chevrolet drivers looked strong early, but following green flag pit stops starting on Lap 37 of 65, Toyota drivers took control of the race. Ford would have the final say, however, with the manufacturer's drivers claiming the top five spots and seven of the Top 10.\n\nOwner/driver Brad Keselowski surged to the lead on the final lap in the Roush Fenway Keselowski No. 6, Stewart-Haas Racing's Ryan Preece (41) finished second, Keselowski's RFK teammate Buescher was third, Preece' teammate Harvick was fourth, and 2021 Daytona 500 champ Michael McDowell (34) of Front Row Motorsports was fifth.\n\nTy Gibbs of Joe Gibbs Racing (54) was the highest-finishing Toyota in sixth. He was followed by Jimmie Johnson (84), who returned to Daytona as a driver/owner of Legacy Motorsports Club as the top-finishing Chevrolet, SHR's Almirola (No. 10 Ford), Truex and FRM's Todd Gilliland (No. 38 Ford).\n\nTy Dillon, in the Spire Motorsports No. 77 Chevrolet, was the first team to encounter an issue. On lap 27 Dillon was forced to drive his car to pit road and then to the garage as smoke billowed from his engine.\n\nLegendary command\n\nMost races have one Grand Marshal. The Daytona 500 isn't most races.\n\nDelivering today's starting command was a baseball team full of Grand Marshals – nine drivers who have won both a Cup Series championship and a Daytona 500.\n\nThat starts with the King, Richard Petty, who won seven of each, and Jimmie Johnson, who tied Petty with seven championships, while winning the Daytona 500 twice. Jeff Gordon, now a co-team owner at Hendrick Motorsports, has four championships and three 500 wins. Bobby Allison and Dale Jarrett won the Daytona 500 three times apiece and each one a Cup championship, while Bill Elliott celebrated a Daytona 500 win twice along with the 1988 Cup title. The just-retired Kurt Busch finally earned a 500 victory in 2017 to go along with his 2004 Cup championship, while Kevin Harvick, who announced this season will be his last as a full-time Cup driver, paired a 2007 Daytona win with his 2014 championship. Last but not least is two-time Cup champion Joey Logano, who took the Daytona checkered flag in 2015.\n\nContributing: Daytona Beach News-Journal and the Associated Press", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/19"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2023/02/15/daytona-500-winners-by-year-drivers/11266985002/", "title": "Daytona 500 winners by year: Every driver who has won NASCAR's ...", "text": "The Daytona 500 has produced kings, kicked off championship dynasties, cemented legacies and lifted relative unknowns into the biggest spotlight.\n\nThe \"Great American Race\" has been held 64 times, with the patriarch of the Petty family, Lee Petty, taking the first Daytona 500 checkered flag in 1959. His son, Richard \"The King\" Petty, holds the record for most Daytona 500 victories, winning the first of his seven Harley J. Earl trophies in 1964.\n\nFive other drivers have won NASCAR's premier event at least three times: Cale Yarborough (four), Bobby Allison (three), Dale Jarrett (three), Jeff Gordon (three) and Denny Hamlin (three).\n\nJimmie Johnson, who won twice, began a run of five consecutive Cup Series championships after winning the 2006 race, while his Daytona triumph in 2013 kicked off a season that led to his sixth Cup title at the end of the year (Johnson would later add a record-tying seventh Cup championship in 2016).\n\nRicky Stenhouse Jr. snapped a 199-race winless streak when he won the 2023 Daytona 500 on Sunday.\n\nMeanwhile, the previous two drivers to triumph in the Daytona 500 — Michael McDowell (2021) and Austin Cindric (2022) — also scored their very first victories in the Cup Series.\n\nNASCAR'S GREATEST RACE:Unpredictability makes Daytona 500 special\n\n'YOU BECOME A LEGEND': Daytona 500 signals green flag for NASCAR's 75th season\n\nNEWSLETTER: Sign up to get sports news and features delivered daily\n\nHere are the Daytona 500 winners by year:\n\n1959: Lee Petty\n\n1960: Junior Johnson\n\n1961: Marvin Panch\n\n1962: Fireball Roberts\n\n1963: Tiny Lund\n\n1964: Richard Petty\n\n1965: Fred Lorenzen\n\n1966: Richard Petty\n\n1967: Mario Andretti\n\n1968: Cale Yarborough\n\n1969: LeeRoy Yarbrough\n\n1970: Pete Hamilton\n\n1971: Richard Petty\n\n1972: A.J. Foyt\n\n1973: Richard Petty\n\n1974: Richard Petty\n\n1975: Benny Parsons\n\n1976: David Pearson\n\n1977: Cale Yarborough\n\n1978: Bobby Allison\n\n1979: Richard Petty\n\n1980: Buddy Baker\n\n1981: Richard Petty\n\n1982: Bobby Allison\n\n1983: Cale Yarborough\n\n1984: Cale Yarborough\n\n1985: Bill Elliott\n\n1986: Geoff Bodine\n\n1987: Bill Elliott\n\n1988: Bobby Allison\n\n1989: Darrell Waltrip\n\n1990: Derrike Cope\n\n1991: Ernie Irvan\n\n1992: Davey Allison\n\n1993: Dale Jarrett\n\n1994: Sterling Marlin\n\n1995: Sterling Marlin\n\n1996: Dale Jarrett\n\n1997: Jeff Gordon\n\n1998: Dale Earnhardt Sr.\n\n1999: Jeff Gordon\n\n2000: Dale Jarrett\n\n2001: Michael Waltrip\n\n2002: Ward Burton\n\n2003: Michael Waltrip\n\n2004: Dale Earnhardt Jr.\n\n2005: Jeff Gordon\n\n2006: Jimmie Johnson\n\n2007: Kevin Harvick\n\n2008: Ryan Newman\n\n2009: Matt Kenseth\n\n2010: Jamie McMurray\n\n2011: Trevor Bayne\n\n2012: Matt Kenseth\n\n2013: Jimmie Johnson\n\n2014: Dale Earnhardt Jr.\n\n2015: Joey Logano\n\n2016: Denny Hamlin\n\n2017: Kurt Busch\n\n2018: Austin Dillon\n\n2019: Denny Hamlin\n\n2020: Denny Hamlin\n\n2021: Michael McDowell\n\n2022: Austin Cindric\n\n2023: Ricky Stenhouse Jr.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/15"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2017/02/26/the-latest-hamlin-trying-to-join-exclusive-daytona-500-club/98443340/", "title": "The Latest: Kurt Busch wins Daytona 500 for Stewart-Haas", "text": "AP\n\nDAYTONA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — The Latest on the Daytona 500 (all times local):\n\n6:25 p.m.\n\nKurt Busch has won the Daytona 500, surviving a crash-filled season opener to win the race for the first time in 16 tries.\n\nBusch passed Kyle Larson final lap before cruising to the victory. Larson ran out gas shortly after passing Chase Elliott, who also came up short on fuel.\n\nBusch led only one lap — the only one that mattered. He won in the No. 41 Ford that was partly sponsored by Monster Energy, the new title sponsor for NASCAR.\n\nBusch prevailed in a race that saw many of NASCAR biggest stars knocked out in crashes. Seven-time and defensive Cup series champion Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr., Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch, Danica Patrick, Jamie McMurray and Brad Keselowski were among those eliminated long before the checkered flag flew.\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\n5:20 p.m.\n\nNASCAR's biggest stars continue to crash out of the Daytona 500.\n\nSeven-time and defending Cup champion Jimmie Johnson wrecked, and at least 16 other cars suffered some sort of damage. Stewart-Haas Racing teammates Danica Patrick and Clint Bowyer were involved, ending their race.\n\nSHR drivers Kurt Busch and Kevin Harvick were involved in the melee but stayed on the track.\n\nDale Earnhardt Jr., Kyle Busch and Matt Kenseth are among the favorites knocked out earlier in the race.\n\nThe race returned to green, and there was yet another wreck that collected Roush Fenway Racing drivers Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and former Daytona 500 champion Trevor Bayne.\n\n—Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n5:05 p.m.\n\nKevin Harvick has won the second stage of the Daytona 500, earning key points under NASCAR's revamped race format.\n\nHarvick earned one playoff point and 10 driver points for leading the race through the first 120 laps.\n\nThe stages in NASCAR's biggest race are scheduled to end on laps 60, 120 and 200. Kyle Busch won the first stage but triggered a multi-car wreck and was knocked out of the race in the second.\n\nThe top 10 drivers at the end of Stage 1 and Stage 2 will be awarded points on a 10-through-1 scale. The third portion of the race will be for the overall victory, and although traditional point scoring will be applied for that stage, the win will be worth 40 points.\n\nJoey Logano was second through the second stage, followed by Kurt Busch, Brad Keselowski and Danica Patrick. Harvick, Busch and Patrick are all driving Fords for the first time for Stewart-Haas Racing.\n\n— Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n4:55 p.m.\n\nDale Earnhardt Jr. is out of the Daytona 500 in his first Cup race since July.\n\nEarnhardt was caught up in multi-car accident triggered by Kyle Busch. Busch spun to start the accident, and collected not only his Toyota teammates, but Earnhardt as well.\n\nThe 42-year-old Earnhardt, a two-time Daytona 500 champion, brought the No. 88 Chevrolet to the garage. Under new rules, cars that go to the garage aren't allowed to return to race.\n\n\"I had a good car, boy. Sorry about that,\" Earnhardt said over the radio.\n\n\"Nothing you could do,\" crew chief Greg Ives said.\n\nThe race was stopped for 17 minutes because of the debris from the wreck that also knocked out Matt Kenseth and Erik Jones. Earnhardt's Hendrick Motorsports crew tried to repair the damage, but the 88 was unsalvageable.\n\nEarnhardt made his comeback during Speedweeks after missing the second half of last season.\n\n— Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n4:20 p.m.\n\nKyle Busch spun to start a multi-car accident that collected not only his Toyota teammates, but fan favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr., as well.\n\nBusch may have had a tire problem that triggered his spin. He turned directly in the path of Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Matt Kenseth, but Erik Jones, a de facto Gibbs driver at Furniture Row Racing.\n\n\"Fantastic. Right rear went down entering Turn 3,\" Busch said as he headed to the garage.\n\nEarnhardt went to pit road, where he had just five minutes to repair the damage to his car or risk being parked for the remainder of the race.\n\n\"Man, tore up three JGR cars and Junior as well,\" Busch said. \"Goodyear tires just aren't any good at holding air.\"\n\nBusch had won the first stage of the race.\n\n— Jenna Fryer\n\n___\n\n4:11 p.m.\n\nFan favorite Dale Earnhardt Jr. is leading at the halfway mark of the Daytona 500.\n\nNASCAR's most popular driver crossed the finish line first on Lap 100, just ahead of Elliott Sadler and seven-time and defending NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson.\n\nEarnhardt is trying to make a triumphant return from his fifth documented concussion, the latest costing him half of last season.\n\nAll 40 cars remain in the 500-mile race, although only 33 remain on the lead lap.\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\n3:30 p.m.\n\nKyle Busch won the first stage of the Daytona 500, the first one completed under NASCAR's revamped race format.\n\nBusch earned one playoff point and 10 driver points for leading the race through the first 60 laps.\n\nThe stages in NASCAR's biggest race are scheduled to end on laps 60, 120 and 200.\n\nThe top 10 drivers at the end of Stage 1 and Stage 2 will be awarded points on a 10-through-1 scale. The third portion of the race will be for the overall victory, and although traditional point scoring will be applied for that stage, the win will be worth 40 points.\n\nKevin Harvick was second in the first stage, followed by Ryan Blaney, Brad Keselowski and Dale Earnhardt Jr.\n\n— Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n3:15 p.m.\n\nHendrick Motorsports used teamwork to help Chase Elliott settle into the Daytona 500.\n\nElliott started on the pole but struggled to hold the lead during the first stage of the race. During a caution period, veteran Dale Earnhardt Jr. was asked by his crew if he could relay any advice to how Elliott was attacking the race.\n\nEarnhardt said Elliott needed to understand when to side draft and when to jump into a gap to deliberately slow a line of traffic.\n\nEarnhardt is a two-time Daytona 500 winner and started on the front row next to Elliott.\n\n— Jenna Fryer\n\n___\n\n3:05 p.m.\n\nCorey LaJoie created the first caution of the Daytona 500.\n\nLaJoie seemingly made a late call to try to get on pit road, locked up his brakes and then slid across the track and slammed into the outside wall. LaJoie's No. 83 Toyota sustained damaged to its front-ride fender, but managed to stay in the race.\n\n\"What the hell was he doing?\" fellow driver Clint Bowyer said over his radio. \"Glad he went the other way.\"\n\nFormer NASCAR champion Kurt Busch was penalized during the caution flag for speeding on pit road.\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\n2:55 p.m.\n\nRookie Daniel Suarez made a rare mistake in his first Daytona 500.\n\nSuarez was caught speeding on pit road as the Toyota drivers all made their first pit stops at the same time. The idea was to keep the Toyota drivers together, but the speeding penalty forced the rookie back to pit road.\n\nThe mistake cost Suarez a lap, and he was running last in the 40-car field.\n\nSuarez is the only foreign-born, full-time driver in NASCAR's Cup Series. The Mexican won the Xfinity Series championship last year and got an unexpected promotion to NASCAR's top level when Carl Edwards decided not to return to Joe Gibbs Racing.\n\nSuarez is a rookie in the Daytona 500, which is the longest race of his career.\n\n— Jenna Fryer\n\n___\n\n2:40 p.m.\n\nThe 59th running of the Daytona 500 is underway, with pole-sitter Chase Elliott leading the 40-car field to the green flag waved by Pro Football Hall of Famer LaDainian Tomlinson.\n\nElliott started on the pole for the second consecutive year, with Hendrick Motorsports teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. also on the front row. Earnhardt is trying to make a triumphant return from his fifth documented concussion, the latest costing him half of last season.\n\nTwo-time race winner Michael Waltrip is making his final NASCAR start. Four drivers — rookies Daniel Suarez and Erik Jones as well as Corey LaJoie and D.J. Kennington — are making their first start in \"The Great American Race.\"\n\nDenny Hamlin is the defending Daytona 500 winner, and his Joe Gibbs Racing teammates are among others to watch. So are Team Penske teammates Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano, who three of four restrictor-plate races last season.\n\nThree drivers dropped to the back of the field because of engine changes: seven-time and defending NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson, Paul Menard and Ryan Blaney.\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\n1: 15 p.m.\n\nThe Gronk Spike has touched down at Daytona.\n\nRob Gronkowski, known as much for his off-field frivolity as his on-field talent for the New England Patriots, was the star of the show before the Daytona 500.\n\nHe had Monster Energy drinks and Monster girls all around him, a winning party combo for Gronk.\n\n\"I'm a fan of both of 'em,\" Gronkowski said. \"I make the girls make my own drink so I get the benefit of both.\"\n\nGronkowski mingled with drivers in the garage, though he skipped riding the Monster Energy motorcycle \"Ball of Death\" in the fan zone.\n\n\"I got my one boy, Bobby Goons. He does all the stunt double (work) for me I'm not allowed to do,\" he said. \"He rode a bull about a couple of weeks ago in New York.\"\n\nGronkowski attended his first Daytona 500 as a guest of Monster Energy, the new title sponsor in NASCAR's Cup series. Gronkowski has an endorsement deal with Monster and wore a black T-shirt sporting a Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series logo.\n\nDaytona seemed the perfect fit for Gronk.\n\n\"I'm just having a blast,\" he said. \"I never really got to tailgate. I never really got to run-around (on Sundays). It's cool to run-around and meet people, enjoy the atmosphere, see what really goes down on this side of the stadium.\"\n\nGronkowski received the loudest ovation among all actors, athletes and other dignitaries introduced at the pre-race drivers meeting. Gronkowski had back surgery in December and missed New England's Super Bowl win over Atlanta.\n\n\"It's definitely tough, I ain't gonna lie,\" Gronkowski said. \"It makes me want to go harder. Makes me want to rehab, makes me want to get back out on the field and be out with the boys.\"\n\n— Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n12:10 p.m.\n\nNASCAR chairman Brian France issued a stern warning to drivers about blocking during the pre-race meeting for the Daytona 500.\n\nFrance rarely wades into competition issues, but used his time at the microphone to warn the field that NASCAR will not interject if a driver tries to block another and it goes wrong.\n\n\"Blocking is part of racing,\" France told drivers. \"It causes big crashes. When you block somebody, you better hope there is a good Samaritan behind you.\"\n\nIn other words, NASCAR won't penalize a driver who wrecks someone trying to block.\n\nBlocking caused multiple accidents in the Truck Series and Xfinity Series season openers at Daytona earlier this week.\n\n— Jenna Fryer\n\n___\n\n11:50 a.m.\n\nDaytona 500 crasher!\n\nOwen Wilson might need more time to rehearse his lines as the race's grand marshal. Wilson's quip that he should have an easy time instructing drivers to start their engines for the Daytona 500 backfired when he messed up one of the key words.\n\n\"Well, yeah, um, it shouldn't be too tricky. I think it's, 'Racers, start your engines?'\" Wilson said.\n\nTold it was, \"drivers,\" Wilson cracked, \"Oh, see, I already made a mistake.\"\n\nRule #76: No excuses. Give the command like a champion! Luckily for him, he gets a second take.\n\nWilson will voice Lightning McQueen in the upcoming movie \"Cars 3.\" Wilson said his former \"Cars\" co-star Paul Newman would have been the actor that would have been the best NASCAR driver. Newman, who died in 2008, was a passionate race fan, driver and team owner.\n\n\"I just saw a documentary on his racing and he seemed to have almost more of a passion for that than the stuff he was doing in the movies,\" Wilson said.\n\nWilson received some Daytona tips from \"Wedding Crashers\" co-star Vince Vaughn, who served as grand marshal two years ago.\n\n\"His big tip was not to watch his YouTube clip of him doing it because why see perfection?\" Wilson said.\n\nWith \"Zoolander 2\" out of the running for an Oscar, Wilson picked \"La La Land\" as the favorite to win some awards in tonight's ceremony.\n\n\"That 'La La Land' I thought was pretty good,\" he said. \"I went in seeing that, I was like, 'I don't know how much I'll like a musical.' But I felt that one was good pretty. And then, umm, yeah.\"\n\n— Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n11:45 a.m.\n\nA star-studded lineup of actors, musicians and celebrities is usually on hand for the Daytona 500. A handful of them have definitive roles for the season opener.\n\nThere are always more just taking in NASCAR biggest event.\n\nThe list this year includes actor Keanu Reeves, former NFL coach Rex Ryan, Hall of Fame outfielder Ken Griffey Jr., New England Patriots tight end Rob Gronkowski, New York Jets receiver Brandon Marshall, former Green Bay Packers general manager Ron Wolf, four-time IndyCar champion Dario Franchitti, comedian Larry The Cable Guy, home improvement celeb Ty Pennington and celebrity chef Guy Fieri.\n\nOthers include major league catcher A.J. Pierzynski, Orlando Magic players Nikola Vucevic and Jeff Green, actor/singer Jamie Lynn Spears, comedian Nate Bargatze, comedian Bill Burr, UFC fighter Anthony \"Rumble\" Johnson, rapper Waka Flocka Flame, hip hop disc jockey DJ Whoo Kid and Olympic gold medalist Laurie Hernandez, a gymnast who is the most recent winner of \"Dancing with the Stars.\"\n\nActor Owen Wilson, the grand marshal for the race, drew the biggest crowds.\n\nEven other celebrities took notice.\n\n\"What was it like having Owen Wilson up here?\" said Dave Haywood, one-third of the trio Lady Antebellum. \"I was kind of geeking out on that.\"\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\n11:20 a.m.\n\nNFL Hall of Famer LaDainian Tomlinson seems like the perfect person to wave the green flag to start the Daytona 500.\n\n\"Jimmie Johnson told me, 'Just don't drop it,'\" Tomlinson said. \"I wasn't a guy that fumbled a lot, so I'm not worried about dropping it today.\"\n\nThe flag should be in sure hands: Tomlinson fumbled just 30 times in nearly 4,000 touches over his 11-year NFL career.\n\nTomlinson is the honorary starter, and former \"American Idol\" contestant Jordin Sparks will sing the national anthem.\n\nSparks and Tomlinson, who star in the film \"God Bless The Broken Road,\" both called attending the race a bucket list item.\n\nSparks says she plans to shave almost 20 seconds of her anthem performance in the 2008 Super Bowl. She earned rave reviews for her rendition.\n\n\"Usually in a football stadium or a different stadium, half the crowd is behind me,\" she said. \"Now, I can see as far as my eye can see. Just a little more pressure.\"\n\nHer performance will be followed by a flyover from the famed U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds.\n\n—Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n10:45 a.m.\n\nMario Andretti is at Daytona as an honorary race official, 50 years after his victory in \"The Great American Race.\"\n\nAndretti won the 1967 Daytona 500 and is one of only four drivers to win both the 500 and the prestigious Rolex 24 sports car race. He joins AJ Foyt, Jamie McMurray and Jeff Gordon in that club.\n\nAndretti is a fixture in IndyCar, and his visits to NASCAR are rare. But he understands this race is the equivalent of the Indianapolis 500 and a Daytona 500 victory carries the same weight on a drivers' resume.\n\n\"There are many drivers who are deserving to win, and never win the big ones,\" Andretti said. \"I guarantee during the driver meeting, there is more tension than any other race. This is the crown jewel of NASCAR. The winner of today's race will have a big, big feather on his or her hat.\"\n\nDaytona International Speedway officials presented Andretti with a painting of his two winning cars at Daytona.\n\n— Jenna Fryer\n\n___\n\n10:20 a.m.\n\nDenny Hamlin is trying to join an exclusive club of repeat Daytona 500 champions.\n\nHamlin would become only the fourth driver to win consecutive Daytona 500s, and the first in 22 years. Richard Petty, a seven-time Daytona 500 champ, went back-to-back in 1973 and 1974. Cale Yarborough did the same in 1983 and 1984. Sterling Marlin was the last driver — in 1994 and 1995 — to have his name etched on the Harley J. Earl Trophy two straight years.\n\nHamlin defeated Martin Truex Jr. by 0.010 seconds last year, the closest finish in race history.\n\nHamlin is in solid shape in the No. 11 Toyota to be a contender to repeat. He won a 150-mile qualifying race last week and starts fourth.\n\n— Dan Gelston\n\n___\n\n10:15 a.m.\n\nThe Daytona 500 will have perfect weather.\n\nThe high is expected to be 67 degrees in Daytona Beach, with clear skies, plenty of sunshine and zero chance of rain.\n\nNASCAR's season opener was delayed by rain twice in the last five years, getting pushed into prime time in 2014 and postponed to Monday in 2012.\n\nThe exhibition Clash at Daytona last week was postponed a day because of heavy rain.\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\n10 a.m.\n\nIt's Daytona Day!\n\nThe 59th running of the Daytona 500 begins Sunday afternoon, with Chase Elliott on the pole for the second consecutive year. Although Elliott had the fastest car in qualifying, Hendrick Motorsports teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. is getting most of the attention. Earnhardt is returning from his fifth documented concussion, the latest costing him half of last season.\n\nEarnhardt will start alongside Elliott on the front row of \"The Great American Race.\"\n\nElliott won one of two qualifying races Thursday. Joe Gibbs Racing's Denny Hamlin, the defending Daytona 500 winner, won the other.\n\nOthers to watch in the season opener — NASCAR's most prestigious race — include Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano. The Team Penske teammates won three of four restrictor-plate races last season.\n\n— Mark Long\n\n___\n\nMore AP auto racing: www.racing.ap.org", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2017/02/26"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2015/11/21/buescher-wins-nascar-xfinity-series-title-at-homestead/76183998/", "title": "Buescher wins NASCAR Xfinity Series title at Homestead", "text": "AP\n\nHOMESTEAD, Fla. (AP) — Chris Buescher never made a major mistake, never got rattled and never even tried to contend for a victory.\n\nHe gladly settled for a championship.\n\nBuescher won the Xfinity Series title Saturday, helping offset the sting of an unsatisfying season in Sprint Cup for Roush Fenway Racing.\n\nThe 23-year-old Buescher won the championship by finishing 11th in the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway, bringing home a fifth second-tier series crown for team owner Jack Roush.\n\n\"I was a little bit nervous, but all things considered, that was exactly what we needed to do,\" Buescher said. \"And we knew that and we knew we were capable of doing this. We made it through and now we get to celebrate.\"\n\nBuescher was the last driver on the lead lap and finished 15.9 seconds behind race winner Kyle Larson.\n\nLarson had led most of the race early and cleared Austin Dillon for good with four laps left for his third career Xfinity win.\n\n\"I love this track,\" Larson said. \"I almost won the last two races here the last two years. It feels good to finally get it done.\"\n\nDillon, the 2013 series champion, was second, followed by Truck Series champ Erik Jones, Brian Scott and Ryan Blaney.\n\nBuescher needed to finish 13th or better without leading a lap to win the championship in Homestead. He also held off defending series champion Chase Elliott, Ty Dillon and Regan Smith, all within striking distance of knocking off Buescher.\n\nDillon was seventh, Elliott was eighth and Smith ninth.\n\nIn 33 starts in the No. 60 Mustang, Buescher posted wins at Iowa and Dover. He had 11 top-fives, and 20 top-10s.\n\n\"I'm not a points racer,\" he said. \"I don't like it. It's not the most fun way to run the last 10 races of the season. But it's important. This is what we've been fighting for since February and Daytona.\"\n\nNot as well-known as his closest three rivals, Buescher held the lead this season for 23 straight weeks. He denied Elliott's bid to go back-to-back in his final full Xfinity season. Elliott finished 15 points behind Buescher.\n\nElliott, the son of Hall of Fame inductee and 1988 NASCAR champion Bill Elliott, is taking over Jeff Gordon's ride in the No. 24 Chevrolet at Hendrick Motorsports next year. The team had to find a seat for him at NASCAR's top level or risk losing the 19-year-old to another organization.\n\nElliott planned to keep a low profile on Sunday.\n\n\"I definitely don't want to get in the middle of what they have going on,\" Elliott said. \"I'll be one of the biggest 24 fans here tomorrow night to see them compete for the championship.\"\n\nBuescher, a former ARCA champion in his second full Xfinity season, joined Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards and two-time champ Ricky Stenhouse Jr. as series championship drivers for Roush.\n\nRoush had put at least one driver in the Chase every season since its 2004 inception before missing the playoffs this season. Stenhouse, Biffle and 2011 Daytona 500 champion Trevor Bayne all struggled this season.\n\nRoger Penske claimed the owners' championship, and Chevrolet took its 17th manufactures' title. Daniel Suarez won rookie of the year with a sixth-place finish.\n\nLarson and Kyle Busch dominated the majority of the race and seemed poised for a hard battle down the stretch.\n\nBusch, who led 64 laps, finished 30th after a pair of late-race mishaps — a loose tire on pit road, then brushing the inside wall — and crippled his push at the checkered flag on the same track where he'll race for his first career Sprint Cup championship on Sunday. Busch posted the third-fastest qualifying lap, best among the Chase finalists.\n\nOnce hailed as the next big NASCAR star, Larson is winless in 74 career Cup starts and entered Homestead with two wins in 74 Xfinity starts.\n\nLarson showed class after the win, refusing to participate in the celebratory burnout.\n\n\"This is championship week and this is all about, the champions. So congrats to Chris Buescher,\" Larson said. \"I wanted him to celebrate. It's always kind of odd when I was sitting in the stands and there were two cars doing burnouts. I wanted Chris to have to his moment there", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2015/11/21"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2020/02/13/nascar-storylines-daytona-500-2020-season/4755468002/", "title": "NASCAR storylines to watch as Daytona 500 kicks off 2020 season", "text": "DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — After one of the shortest offseasons in sports, it's Daytona 500 time again, and the race kicks off the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season.\n\nKyle Busch is the defending series champion after winning his second title in November, and the top three Xfinity Series drivers, including 2019 champion Tyler Reddick, have moved up to the premier series.\n\nOh, and seven-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson is retiring at the end of the year.\n\nThere are several storylines to keep track of this season, so here are the top five questions we have going into the first race of the year.\n\n1. Will Jimmie Johnson win a race in his final season?\n\nThis will surely be one of the dominant stories of the 2020 season. Johnson's 19th full-time season will be his last, and despite his 83 wins, the Hendrick Motorsports driver is in the middle of the worst stretch of his career. He hasn't been to victory lane since 2017, when he won three races, and didn't make the playoffs in 2019.\n\nWHAT TO EXPECT:Dale Jr., Jeff Gordon and Danica's advice for Johnson\n\nNEXT UP:Which Hendrick driver fills the void after Johnson retires?\n\nBut this is his first full season with crew chief Cliff Daniels, who took over in the middle of last season, and Johnson told NBC Sports at the time he brings \"a spark there that I'm not sure we were aware we were missing.\"\n\nWhen USA TODAY Sports asked Johnson on Wednesday at Daytona International Speedway if he would be OK without winning at least one more, he said simply: \"I wouldn’t have a choice.\"\n\nJohnson’s No. 48 Chevrolet had some speed during qualifying for the Daytona 500 last Sunday, coming in fourth behind pole winner Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Hendrick teammates Alex Bowman and Chase Elliott. He'll be starting next to Aric Almirola in Row 3 on Sunday.\n\nSo maybe that's the first sign of hope for Johnson and his team. Whether you're a 48 fan or not, it's hard to deny the poetic finish of Johnson winning at least one more race and qualifying for the playoffs. But we won't know if his car has lasting and versatile speed for a few more weeks.\n\n2. Will Joe Gibbs Racing continue its ridiculous dominance?\n\nJoe Gibbs Racing opened the 2019 season with Denny Hamlin winning the Daytona 500 and closed it with Kyle Busch winning his second championship, beating out teammates Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr., along with Stewart-Haas Racing's Kevin Harvick. Along with Erik Jones, the JGR drivers combined to win 19 of 36 races last season. But can they keep it up?\n\n\"It's almost impossible,\" said Hamlin. \"I enjoy the challenge of us going out there. I like our chances any time there are changes, that our organization adapts quicker than anyone.\"\n\nLast season was unprecedented for a team's dominance, so that's a high bar to clear. However, there's no reason to think Busch's and Hamlin's teams won't pick up right where they left off. Truex will need to adjust to a new crew chief in James Small, formerly the team's lead engineer, after the often brilliant Cole Pearn announced his surprise retirement at the end of last year.\n\nAnd in his third season with the powerhouse team, Jones, who won the Busch Clash exhibition race Sunday, looks poised to start pulling his weight with more than one win a season.\n\n3. How will the 2020 Cup Series schedule changes impact the competition?\n\nHomestead-Miami Speedway is in March, Pocono Raceway has two races in two days, Daytona's summer race is the regular-season finale, Darlington Raceway and Bristol Motor Speedway are on the playoff schedule – with Bristol hosting the first elimination race — and Phoenix Raceway is hosting championship weekend in November.\n\nNASCAR spiced up the 36-race schedule a little, drivers dig it and things could get wild, especially in the latter half.\n\n4. Will Silly Season start early?\n\nAlmost certainly, and it practically already has with NASCAR's potential future free agents and their contracts being a popular topic going into the Daytona 500. Several of the sport’s biggest names could end up switching teams at the end of the 2020 season, including Chip Ganassi Racing's Kyle Larson, Team Penske's Brad Keselowski and Ryan Blaney, Hendrick’s Bowman, JGR’s Jones and Stewart-Haas Racing's Clint Bowyer.\n\nPlus, with Johnson retiring, there's a guaranteed opening with Hendrick, and a lot of potential for movement should these guys, and more, become free agents.\n\n“There are always rides available, but there are usually limited amounts of very good rides, and this year there are several of them,\" Bowyer said Wednesday at Daytona International Speedway.\n\n\"We all know that you are only as good as your last race. You can’t go on a swing of bad races or have a bad year or whatever else. You have to be the total package and that is probably more so today’s day in age than ever. You have to be the total package in that race car and out of it as well.\"\n\n5. Which driver will win his first race?\n\nI’d bet on William Byron, who’s in his third season with Hendrick Motorsports. He and crew chief Chad Knaus have one year together under their belts, and it wouldn’t surprise anyone if they make it to victory lane at least once.\n\nAnother option is Matt DiBenedetto, who came close at Bristol Motor Speedway in 2019 before finishing second and is now in his first season in the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford.\n\nOr maybe it's Cole Custer, a rookie who’s taking over the No. 41 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/02/13"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2017/07/10/nascar-cup-series-first-half-regular-season-surprises/465471001/", "title": "NASCAR: Surprises from the first half of the 2017 Cup season", "text": "As the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series makes the turn for home, with 18 races complete and 18 to go, here’s a look at some surprising story lines so far:\n\nNew names in victory lane: Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Austin Dillon and Ryan Blaney. All are familiar to die-hard NASCAR fans, but they probably weren’t in the lexicon of new viewers.\n\nStenhouse was better known as Danica Patrick’s boyfriend for some, but in his fifth full-time season with Roush Fenway Racing, he changed that. His first career win finally came at Talladega Superspeedway in May, which also earned him his first playoff slot. And his next-to-last-lap pass during an overtime finish at Daytona International Speedway earlier this month proved his team finally has found its groove.\n\nDillon, who made headlines when he took the No. 3 made famous by seven-time champion Dale Earnhardt Sr. to the Daytona 500 pole as a rookie in 2014, also got his first win. He broke through in NASCAR’s longest test — the Coca-Cola 600 in May.\n\nMORE NASCAR:\n\nIntermediate tracks key as Kyle Larson, Martin Truex Jr. battle for regular-season title\n\nQ&A: Dale Earnhardt Jr. talks NASCAR playoffs, retirement, replacement, more\n\nMatt Kenseth likely done at Joe Gibbs Racing after this season\n\nAnd then there’s Blaney. His victory at Pocono Raceway last month put the Wood Brothers back in victory lane for the first time since Trevor Bayne won the 2011 Daytona 500. There has been chatter that Team Penske is looking to make room for Blaney in a third car. The Wood Brothers are considered a satellite team and Blaney, in this third season with them, probably will find himself under the Team Penske umbrella sooner rather than later.\n\n2017 NASCAR CUP SERIES RACE WINNERS\n\nBlaney’s star on rise: Speaking of Blaney, the 23-year-old is a hit off the track, too. His social media game is strong. Blaney has made headlines for his 2-minute recap of every Star Wars movie — not surprising considering part of his Twitter bio reads ‘Aspiring Jedi’ — to his back-and-forth chatter with close friend Dale Earnhardt Jr.\n\nJoe Gibbs Racing: This four-car team makes the list, but for all the wrong reasons. In 2016, JGR rang up 12 wins in 36 races and saw two drivers — Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards — advance to the championship race. While a repeat of that feat would have been difficult, everyone expected the team to have won a race by now. But 18 races in, Busch, Matt Kenseth, Denny Hamlin and rookie Daniel Suarez — who replaced the retired Edwards — still haven’t visited victory lane.\n\nStage racing: The concept may have been confusing to viewers at first and the TV interviews may sometimes be stilted, but there’s no question the intensity of the racing has picked up as drivers vie for those precious points awarded to stage winners and those in the top 10. Martin Truex Jr. has proven a master, with 16 stage wins – including three race victories — at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Kansas Speedway and Kentucky Speedway. His 28 playoff points has him lapping the field, with seven-time series champion Jimmie Johnson next-closest with 16.\n\nDale Earnhardt Jr.: NASCAR’s 14-time most popular driver was under intense scrutiny at the beginning of the season as he returned to the sport after missing half of 2016 with concussions. He got married in the offseason to longtime girlfriend Amy Reimann and there was speculation this year could be his last. But he seemed to put that notion to bed when he returned at Daytona, again detailing all of the hard work and rehabilitation that went into getting him prepared to be back in the car. He told reporters before the Daytona 500: \"There’s motivations to racing: the fans and camaraderie and all the great things you get to experience, but if I’m gonna come back I have to be racing because I want to be out there.\"\n\nBut just two months later, Earnhardt announced he was stepping away from full-time driving at the end of this season, sending Junior Nation into shock and landing another blow to a sport that has seen four-time champion Jeff Gordon and three-time titlist Tony Stewart leave since 2015. While he has been competitive, Earnhardt still lacks a win that would put him in the playoffs and give his fall retirement tour more juice.\n\nFollow Tucker on Twitter @HeatherR_Tucker\n\nPHOTOS: BEST SHOTS OF THE 2017 CUP SEASON", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2017/07/10"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2019/02/15/drivers-competing-in-the-2019-daytona-500/39064529/", "title": "Drivers competing in the 2019 Daytona 500", "text": "AP\n\nThe 40 drivers competing in the 2019 Daytona 500, in order of starting position:\n\n___\n\nNo. 24 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: William Byron\n\nBORN: Nov. 29, 1996\n\nHOMETOWN: Charlotte, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: Chad Knaus\n\nSPONSOR: AXALTA\n\nTWITTER: @williambyron\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Daytona 500 pole-sitter and 2018 rookie of the year. Winless with four top-10 finishes in rookie season with Hendrick Motorsports.\n\n___\n\nNo. 88 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Alex Bowman\n\nBORN: April 25, 1993\n\nHOMETOWN: Tucson, Arizona\n\nCREW CHIEF: Greg Ives\n\nSPONSOR: Nationwide\n\nTWITTER: @AlexBowman88\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Bowman starts on the front row for the second straight year. Won the pole in 2018 and starts behind Hendrick teammate William Byron on Sunday.\n\n___\n\nNo. 4 Ford, Stewart-Haas Racing\n\nDRIVER: Kevin Harvick\n\nBORN: Dec. 8, 1975\n\nHOMETOWN: Bakersfield, California\n\nCREW CHIEF: Rodney Childers\n\nSPONSOR: Busch Beer Car2Can\n\nTWITTER: @KevinHarvick\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Won 2007 Daytona 500 with Richard Childress Racing. Third in points for the second straight season in 2018. Won a series-leading eight times, giving him 45 in his career.\n\n___\n\nNo. 22 Ford, Team Penske\n\nDRIVER: Joey Logano\n\nBORN: May 24, 1990\n\nHOMETOWN: Middletown, Connecticut\n\nCREW CHIEF: Todd Gordon\n\nSPONSOR: Shell Pennzoil\n\nTWITTER: @joeylogano\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Defending series champion and Team Penske star is looking to become the first since Jimmie Johnson in 2010 to win consecutive Cup titles.\n\n___\n\nNo. 17 Ford, Roush Fenway Racing\n\nDRIVER: Ricky Stenhouse Jr.\n\nBORN: Oct. 2, 1987\n\nHOMETOWN: Olive Branch, Mississippi\n\nCREW CHIEF: Brian Pattie\n\nSPONSOR: Fastenal\n\nTWITTER: @StenhouseJr\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Suffered slump after breakthrough 2017. Failed to win a race and finished 18th a year after making playoffs.\n\n___\n\nNo. 14 Ford, Stewart-Haas Racing\n\nDRIVER: Clint Bowyer\n\nBORN: May 30, 1979\n\nHOMETOWN: Emporia, Kansas\n\nCREW CHIEF: Mike Bugarewicz\n\nSPONSOR: Rush Truck Centers/Mobil 1\n\nTWITTER: @ClintBowyer\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Made strides in second year at Stewart-Haas Racing. Won two races last season, his first since 2012. Winless in 13 Daytona 500 starts.\n\n___\n\nNo. 21 Ford, Wood Brothers\n\nDRIVER: Paul Menard\n\nBORN: Aug. 21, 1980\n\nHOMETOWN: Eau Claire, Wisconsin\n\nCREW CHIEF: Greg Erwin\n\nSPONSOR: Motorcraft/Quick Lane\n\nTWITTER: @RCR27PMenard\n\nNOTEWORTHY: One win in 435 Cup starts. Winless since taking checkered flag at Brickyard 400 in 2011. Wrecked by Jimmie Johnson with the lead at the exhibition Clash last weekend.\n\n___\n\nNo. 10 Ford, Stewart-Haas Racing\n\nDRIVER: Aric Almirola\n\nBORN: March 14, 1984\n\nHOMETOWN: Tampa, Florida\n\nCREW CHIEF: John Klausmeier\n\nSPONSOR: Smithfield Foods\n\nTWITTER: @aric_almirola\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Won his first race since 2014, ending 149-race winless streak. Starts second season with Stewart-Haas Racing. Led 2018 Daytona 500 until last-lap accident.\n\n___\n\nNo. 95 Chevrolet, Leavine Family Racing\n\nDRIVER: Matt DiBenedetto\n\nBORN: July 27, 1991\n\nHOMETOWN: Grass Valley, California\n\nCREW CHIEF: Michael Wheeler\n\nSPONSOR: Procore\n\nTWITTER: @mattdracing\n\nNOTEWORTHY: No top five finishes in 140 career starts.\n\n___\n\nNo. 11 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing\n\nDRIVER: Denny Hamlin\n\nBORN: Nov. 18, 1980\n\nHOMETOWN: Chesterfield, Virginia\n\nCREW CHIEF: Chris Gabehart\n\nSPONSOR: FedEx Express\n\nTWITTER: @dennyhamlin\n\nNOTEWORTHY: 2016 Daytona 500 champion. Won closest finish in race history, barely edging Martin Truex Jr.\n\n___\n\nNo. 19 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing\n\nDRIVER: Martin Truex Jr.\n\nBORN: June 29, 1980\n\nHOMETOWN: Mayetta, New Jersey\n\nCREW CHIEF: Cole Pearn\n\nSPONSOR: Bass Pro Shops\n\nTWITTER: @MartinTruexJr56\n\nNOTEWORTHY: 2017 NASCAR Cup Series champion. Won four races and was runner-up to Joey Logano for championship in 2018. Starts first season with Joe Gibbs Racing after Furniture Row Racing folded.\n\n___\n\nNo. 1 Ford, Chip Ganassi Racing\n\nDRIVER: Kurt Busch\n\nBORN: Aug. 4, 1978\n\nHOMETOWN: Las Vegas\n\nCREW CHIEF: Matt McCall\n\nSPONSOR: Monster Energy\n\nTWITTER: @KurtBusch\n\nNOTEWORTHY: 2017 Daytona 500 champion with Stewart-Haas Racing. Well-traveled driver making move to Chip Ganassi for 2019. Missed 2015 race because of suspension.\n\n___\n\nNo. 43 Chevrolet, Richard Petty Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Darrell \"Bubba\" Wallace Jr.\n\nBORN: Oct. 8, 1993\n\nHOMETOWN: Mobile, Alabama\n\nCREW CHIEF: Derek Stamets\n\nSPONSOR: AfterShokz\n\nTWITTER: @BubbaWallace\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Was first black driver last year to start Daytona 500 since Wendell Scott in 1969. Finished second behind winner Austin Dillon.\n\n___\n\nNo. 12 Ford, Team Penske\n\nDRIVER: Ryan Blaney\n\nBORN: Dec. 31, 1993\n\nHOMETOWN: High Point, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: Jeremy Bullins\n\nSPONSOR: Menards/Peak\n\nTWITTER: @Blaney\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Won second career Cup race last season at Charlotte \"roval.\" Starts second season driving for team owner Roger Penske.\n\n___\n\nNo. 37 Chevrolet, JTG Daugherty Racing\n\nDRIVER: Chris Buescher\n\nBORN: Oct. 29, 1992\n\nHOMETOWN: Prosper, Texas\n\nCREW CHIEF: Trent Owens\n\nSPONSOR: Kleenex Wet Wipes\n\nTWITTER: @Chris_Buescher\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Entering fourth full-time season. Only win came in rain-shortened race in 2016. Had only two top-10 finishes in 2018.\n\n___\n\nNo. 40 Chevrolet, Spire Sports\n\nDRIVER: Jamie McMurray\n\nBORN: June 3, 1976\n\nHOMETOWN: Joplin, Missouri\n\nCREW CHIEF: Scott Eggleston\n\nSPONSOR: McDonald's/Cessna/Bass Pro\n\nTWITTER: @jamiemcmurray\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Won 2010 Daytona 500, same year he also won Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis. Expected to make final NASCAR start. Will transition to TV analyst for Fox Sports.\n\n___\n\nNo. 48 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Jimmie Johnson\n\nBORN: Sept. 17, 1975\n\nHOMETOWN: El Cajon, California\n\nCREW CHIEF: Kevin Meendering\n\nSPONSOR: Ally\n\nTWITTER: @JimmieJohnson\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Seven-time NASCAR champion. An eighth title would push him past the late Dale Earnhardt and Richard Petty for most ever, leaving him alone as NASCAR's greatest.\n\n___\n\nNo. 9 Chevrolet, Hendrick Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Chase Elliott\n\nBORN: Nov. 28, 1995\n\nHOMETOWN: Dawsonville, Georgia\n\nCREW CHIEF: Alan Gustafson\n\nSPONSOR: NAPA Auto Parts\n\nTWITTER: @ChaseElliott\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Son of two-time Daytona 500 champ and Hall of Fame driver Bill Elliott won three times last season. Voted NASCAR's most popular driver in 2018.\n\n___\n\nNo. 6 Ford, Roush Fenway Racing\n\nDRIVER: Ryan Newman\n\nBORN: Dec. 8, 1977\n\nHOMETOWN: South Bend, Indiana\n\nCREW CHIEF: Scott Graves\n\nSPONSOR: Oscar Mayer Deli Fresh\n\nTWITTER: @RyanJNewman\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Starts first season driving for Jack Roush. Failed to post a top-five finish for first time in his career.\n\n___\n\nNo. 3 Chevrolet, Richard Childress Racing\n\nDRIVER: Austin Dillon\n\nBORN: April 27, 1990\n\nHOMETOWN: Welcome, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: Danny Stockman Jr.\n\nSPONSOR: Dow\n\nTWITTER: @austindillon3\n\nNOTEWORTHY: 2018 Daytona 500 champion. Won driving the iconic No. 3 Chevrolet that Dale Earnhardt piloted for most of his career. Spun Aric Almirola on the last lap to pull off the win. No driver has won two straight Daytona 500s since Sterling Marlin in 1994 and 1995.\n\n___\n\nNo. 47 Chevrolet, JTG Daugherty Racing\n\nDRIVER: Ryan Preece\n\nBORN: Oct. 25, 1990\n\nHOMETOWN: Hartford, Connecticut\n\nCREW CHIEF: Tristan Smith\n\nSPONSOR: Kroger.com\n\nTWITTER:@RyanPreece—\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Made five Cup starts last season. Takes over for AJ Allmendinger in the 47. Candidate for NASCAR rookie of the year.\n\n___\n\nNo. 13 Chevrolet, Germain Racing\n\nDRIVER: Ty Dillon\n\nBORN: Feb. 27, 1992\n\nHOMETOWN: Lewisville, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: Matt Borland\n\nSPONSOR: GEICO\n\nTWITTER: @tydillon\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Younger brother of Austin Dillon. Grandson of team owner Richard Childress.\n\n___\n\nNo. 41 Ford, Stewart-Haas Racing\n\nDRIVER: Daniel Suarez\n\nBORN: Jan. 7, 1992\n\nHOMETOWN: Monterrey, Mexico\n\nCREW CHIEF: Billy Scott\n\nSPONSOR: Haas Automation\n\nTWITTER: @Daniel_SuarezG\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Makes move to Stewart-Hass Racing. Pushed out at Joe Gibbs Racing to make room for Martin Truex Jr. Won first Cup pole at Pocono. Won Xfinity Series title in 2016, becoming NASCAR's first foreign champion.\n\n___\n\nNo. 38 Ford, Front Row Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: David Ragan\n\nBORN: Dec. 24, 1985\n\nHOMETOWN: Unadilla, Georgia\n\nCREW CHIEF: Seth Barbour\n\nSPONSOR: SelectBlinds.com\n\nTWITTER: @DavidRagan\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Won only Cup races in 2011 and 2013. Had just one top-10 finish last four years. Finished 30th at Daytona last season.\n\n___\n\nNo. 96, Toyota, Gaunt Brothers Racing\n\nDRIVER: Parker Kligerman\n\nBORN: Aug 8, 1990\n\nHOMETOWN: Stamford, Connecticut\n\nCREW CHIEF: Mark Hillman\n\nSPONSOR: Gaunt Brothers Racing\n\nTWIITER: @pkligerman\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Doubles as NBC Sports broadcaster. Winless in 14 career starts.\n\n___\n\nNo. 42 Chevrolet, Chip Ganassi Racing\n\nDRIVER: Kyle Larson\n\nBORN: July 31, 1992\n\nHOMETOWN: Elk Grove, California\n\nCREW CHIEF: Chad Johnston\n\nSPONSOR: Credit One Bank\n\nTWITTER: @KyleLarsonRacin\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Followed breakthrough 2017 season with winless 2018. Fell from four wins to none but made playoffs for third straight season.\n\n___\n\nNo. 00 Chevrolet, StarCom Racing\n\nDRIVER: Landon Cassill\n\nBORN: July 7, 1989\n\nHOMETOWN: Cedar Rapids, Iowa\n\nCREW CHIEF: Wayne Carroll\n\nSPONSOR: Permatex\n\nTWITTER: @landoncassill\n\nNOTEWORTY: Made 29 starts for StarCom in 2018. Winless in 288 career starts.\n\n___\n\nNo. 20 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing\n\nDRIVER: Erik Jones\n\nBORN: May 30, 1996\n\nHOMETOWN: Byron, Michigan\n\nCREW CHIEF: Chris Gayle\n\nSPONSOR: Sport Clips\n\nTWITTER: @erik_jones\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Won at Daytona in July for first career Cup win. Had nine top-fives and finished 15th in standings in first season at Joe Gibbs Racing.\n\n___\n\nNo. 8 Chevrolet, Richard Childress Racing\n\nDRIVER: Daniel Hemric\n\nBORN: Jan. 27, 1991\n\nHOMETOWN: Kannapolis, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: Luke Lambert\n\nSPONSOR: Bass Pro Shops/Caterpillar\n\nTWITTER: @DanielHemric\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Made two starts for RCR last season. First driver to race the No. 8 since Dale Earnhardt Jr. Hails from same hometown as the Earnhardts.\n\n___\n\nNo. 62 Chevrolet, Beard Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Brendan Gaughan\n\nBORN: July 10, 1975\n\nHOMETOWN: Las Vegas\n\nCREW CHIEF: Darren Shaw\n\nSPONSOR: Beard Oil/South Point Casino\n\nTWITTER: @Brendan62\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Winless in 58 Cup starts. Played college football and basketball at Georgetown, guarding Allen Iverson on practice court and becoming all-Big East kicker on gridiron. Earned one of the final transfer spots for the Daytona 500.\n\n___\n\nNo. 18 Toyota, Joe Gibbs Racing\n\nDRIVER: Kyle Busch\n\nBORN: May 2, 1985\n\nHOMETOWN: Las Vegas\n\nCREW CHIEF: Adam Stevens\n\nSPONSOR: M&M's Chocolate Bar\n\nTWITTER: @KyleBusch\n\nNOTEWORTHY: 2015 Cup Series champion has yet to win Daytona 500, a streak that stands at 13. Won eight races last season and finished fourth in season standings.\n\n___\n\nNo. 32 Ford, GO FAS Racing\n\nDRIVER: Corey LaJoie\n\nBORN: Sept. 25, 1991\n\nHOMETOWN: Charlotte, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: Randy Cox\n\nSPONSOR: Old Spice\n\nTWITTER: @CoreyLaJoie\n\nNOTEWORTHY: No top-10 finishes in 57 career starts. Son of two-time NASCAR second-tier series champion Randy LaJoie. Has his face painted on the hood of his car for Daytona 500.\n\n___\n\nNo. 36 Ford, Front Row Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Matt Tifft\n\nBORN: June 26, 1996\n\nHOMETOWN: Hinckley, Ohio\n\nCREW CHIEF: Michael Kelley\n\nSPONSOR: Speedco\n\nTWITTER: @matt_tifft\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Cup rookie missed part of the 2016 season after being diagnosed with a brain tumor, which was discovered during treatment for a back injury. Returned to racing 11 weeks after the tumor was removed. Has since become a spokesman for the National Brain Tumor Society. Raced full time in the Xfinity Series the last two years.\n\n___\n\nNo. 34 Ford, Front Row Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Michael McDowell\n\nBORN: Dec. 21, 1984\n\nHOMETOWN: Glendale, Arizona\n\nCREW CHIEF: Drew Blickensderfer\n\nSPONSOR: Love's Travel Stops\n\nTWITTER: @Mc_Driver\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Winless in 285 Cup starts. Shines at Daytona. Finished fourth in 2017 Daytona 500, and ninth in 2018. Were his only top-10s each season.\n\n___\n\nNo. 2 Ford, Team Penske\n\nDRIVER: Brad Keselowski\n\nBORN: Feb. 12, 1984\n\nHOMETOWN: Rochester Hills, Michigan\n\nCREW CHIEF: Paul Wolfe\n\nSPONSOR: Discount Tire\n\nTWITTER: @keselowski\n\nNOTEWORTHY: 2012 series champion still looking for first Daytona 500 victory. Has at least three victories in each of the last three years at Team Penske, including three in a row late last year.\n\n___\n\nNo. 15 Chevrolet, Premium Motorsports\n\nDRIVER: Ross Chastain\n\nBORN: Dec. 4, 1992\n\nHOMETOWN: Alva, Florida\n\nCREW CHIEF: Peter Sospenzo\n\nSPONSOR: Nutrien Ag Solutions\n\nTWITTER: @RossChastain\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Eight-generation watermelon farmer making Daytona 500 debut. Landed sponsorship to race in Xfinity Series this season, but FBI raid on that company derailed his plans. He's now cobbled together races across all three national series.\n\n___\n\nNo. 52 Chevrolet, Rick Ware Racing\n\nDRIVER: Cody Ware\n\nBORN: Nov. 7, 1995\n\nHOMETOWN: Greensboro, North Carolina\n\nCREW CHIEF: George Church\n\nSPONSOR: Winn-Dixie\n\nTWITTER: @CodyShaneWare\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Making Daytona 500 debut for RWR, which bought NASCAR charter from Front Row Motorsports. Cars came from FRM and Leavine Family Racing.\n\n___\n\nNo. 51 Chevrolet, Rick Ware Racing\n\nDRIVER: B.J. McLeod\n\nBORN: Nov. 17, 1983\n\nHOMETOWN: Wauchula, Florida\n\nCREW CHIEF: Michael Hillman\n\nSPONSOR: Jacob Companies\n\nTWITTER: @bjmcleod78\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Making Daytona 500 debut for RWR, which bought NASCAR charter from Richard Petty Motorsports. Cars came from FRM and Leavine Family Racing.\n\n____\n\nNo. 31 Chevrolet, Richard Childress Racing\n\nDRIVER: Tyler Reddick\n\nBORN: Jan. 11, 1996\n\nHOMETOWN: Corning, California\n\nCREW CHIEF: Justin Alexander\n\nSPONSOR: Symbicort\n\nTWITTER: @TylerReddick\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Driving a third car for RCR, a one-off ride for the Daytona 500. Reigning Xfinity champion left JR Motorsports to drive for RCR in the second-tier series.\n\n___\n\nNo. 27 Chevrolet, Germain Racing\n\nDRIVER: Casey Mears\n\nBORN: March 12, 1978\n\nHOMETOWN: Bakersfield, California\n\nCREW CHIEF: Pat Tryson\n\nSPONSOR: Rim Ryderz\n\nTWITTER: @CJMearsGang\n\nNOTEWORTHY: Making his first Cup start since 2016. Has one victory in 488 Cup starts. Finished second in the 2006 Daytona 500.\n\n___\n\nMore AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/apf-AutoRacing and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2019/02/15"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2018/02/18/austin-dillon-wins-2018-daytona-500/349516002/", "title": "Daytona 500: Austin Dillon wins in No. 3 after overtime crash", "text": "Bob Velin\n\nUSA TODAY\n\nDAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — How the 60th annual Daytona 500 played out Sunday at Daytona International Speedway:\n\nWinner: Austin Dillon won NASCAR's most prestigious race, driving the No. 3 to victory lane 20 years after Dale Earnhardt Sr. captured his lone Daytona 500 title in the same car. Dillon drives for grandfather Richard Childress, who was the team owner for Earnhardt during six of his record-tying seven Cup Series championships.\n\nDillon took the checkered flag in overtime when race leader Aric Almirola crashed after being pushed by Dillon while taking the white flag. The final lap was the only one Dillon led the entire race.\n\n\"I did what I had to do at the end; I hated for the 10 (Almirola's Stewart-Haas Racing) guys,\" Dillon said immediately after performing a series of burnouts. \"It's so awesome to take the 3 car back to victory lane 20 years after Earnhardt did it. \"This is for Dale Sr. and all those Earnhardt fans. We're going to keep kicking butt the rest of the year.\"\n\nChildress was visibly overcome with emotions during a TV interview with Fox.\n\n\"Being able to win with the 3 car 20 years after Dale won in ’98, is so special,\" Childress said. \"I can’t let the fans know enough how special this is.\"\n\nDarrell Wallace Jr., driving for seven-time series champion and seven-time Daytona 500 winner Richard Petty, finished second.\n\n\"I got so many emotions right now,\" Wallace said. \"All in all a great day. Just an incredible experience for me to be here. Thank you to The King (Petty) for giving me this opportunity. Hell of an ending for us tonight. P2 for my first Daytona 500, I'll take it.\"\n\nDenny Hamlin finished third, followed by Joey Logano and Chris Buescher.\n\nBig One at the end: Defending Daytona 500 champion Kurt Busch tried to pass race leader Hamlin with two laps to go but contact from behind by Ryan Blaney turned Busch, leading to a huge multi-car crash. Alex Bowman, Brendan Gaughan, Matt DiBenedetto and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. were also invovled. The race then headed to overtime with Hamlin and Aric Almirola on the front row.\n\nBlaney captures Stage 2: Blaney, 24, in the No. 12 Ford for Team Penske, collects the 10 points for winning the second stage. The caution flag was out for eight laps.\n\nHuge crash brings out fifth caution: A major wreck on turn 3 of lap 101 involved Chase Elliott, one of the favorites, Danica Patrick, racing for the final time in NASCAR, Brad Keselowski, Kevin Harvick, David Ragan and Kasey Kahne. The caution flag was out for laps 103 through 108. So far, 11 cars are out of the race. Keselowski was not happy. “The 24 got loose and spun out in front of us all and I got caught up in it,\" the pre-race favorite said. It just really sucks. We had a great car and were in a great position. I guess that’s the way it goes. I went to pass the 24 on the bottom and he came down. I can’t tell if I made contact or not, but obviously he turned and there was nothing I could do. We were all wrecked.”\n\nPATRICK:NASCAR career comes to a close with Daytona 500 crash\n\nFourth caution flag: On lap 93, the caution flag came out for debris on the track, from William Byron's No. 24 car. The caution lasts from lap 94 to 97, four laps. Martin Truex Jr. took the lead after choosing not to make a pit stop.\n\nMajor wreck ends stage 1: 2017 Daytona 500 winner Kurt Busch won Stage 1, his first stage win ever, which is worth 10 points toward seasonal standings. But he missed his box coming in to the pits and was penalized. The crash during lap 60 involved seven cars, including Byron, Erik Jones, Ty Dillon, Daniel Suarez, Jimmie Johnson, Truex and Kyle Larson. It was the third car Johnson wrecked this week. Johnson, Suarez, Jones and Dillon are out of the race. \"It is disappointing for this Lowes team and everyone at Hendrick Motorsports for all the work they put into it,\" Johnson said. \"But we'll get this Camaro ZL1 dialed in for Atlanta and take it over there.\" Said Suarez: “It looked like the 17 (Ricky Stenhouse Jr.) just got freed up there by the 12 (Blaney), unfortunately. We tried to check up and everybody got stacked up, and caused a big wreck. It’s unfortunate because the DEWALT Camry was definitely fast – we just didn’t get to the end to see what we could really do. We were in position I thought to have a good race. We were staying upfront and out of trouble, it just didn’t work out.”\n\nSecond caution flag: Kyle Busch spun out, apparently due to the same tire problem he had on lap 30. The first 10 cars did not stop to pit, waiting instead for the end of the first stage,\n\nBusch flat: On lap 30, Kyle Busch's left rear tire went flat, and he dropped from 5th to 38th to get the tire changed.\n\nFirst caution flag: Came on lap nine as Corey LaJoie apparently blew an engine in Turn 2. Hamlin's 11 car was penalized one lap for pitting outside the box during the caution. The flag was out for three laps.\n\nJoey's new spotter: Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s longtime spotter T.J. Majors is now the spotter for Joey Logano, which is why Earnhardt picked Logano to win the race.\n\nPatrick's finale: Patrick looked to be fully focused on the task at hand as she was introduced for the final NASCAR race of her career and the first half of the \"Danica Double.\" She is expected to get a ride in the Indianapolis 500 in May. Patrick was dressed in her familiar green Go-Daddy driving suit and tweeted “Ready to go!!!!!!” a few hours before the race at Daytona International Speedway. Patrick posted a photo on Instagram on Saturday of her and her new boyfriend Aaron Rodgers with her family at the beach. She wrote ”Doing Daytona with all the people that mean the most to me.” An emotional Patrick hugged and kissed her family before strapping in for the final time to her Go-Daddy Chevrolet for Premium Motorsports.\n\nEARNHARDT JR:Finds life in post-racing career more fun, less stressful\n\nHonorary starter: Academy Award-winning actress Charlize Theron was selected as the honorary starter for the race, and waved the green flag. She said she was pulling for Patrick, 35, the only woman to start the Daytona 500 from the pole position and is the highest-finishing woman in the race's 60 years. \"As a woman, that just seems pretty incredible,” Theron said Sunday. ”For me to be able to witness her last race, that feels very special. The girl in me is secretly obviously cheering for her.\"\n\nJunior and Peyton: Earnhardt Jr., the most popular driver in NASCAR for the last 15 years, is the grand marshal, and gave the order, \"Drivers, start your engines.\" And future NFL Hall of Fame quarterback Peyton Manning drove the pace car.\n\nHammerin' Hank to Bubba: Darrell \"Bubba\" Wallace Jr., the first African American full-time NASCAR Cup driver since 1971, received a phone call from baseball legend Hank Aaron. \"From one Mobile (Ala.) son to another, always believe in your dreams and anything is possible, Aaron told Wallace, who is driving the iconic No. 43 Chevrolet for Richard Petty Motorsports.\n\nDAYTONA 500 RESULTS\n\nSunday from the 2.5-mile Daytona International Speedway (starting position in parentheses):\n\n1. (14) Austin Dillon, Chevrolet, 207 laps, 0 rating, 42 points.\n\n2. (7) Darrell Wallace Jr, Chevrolet, 207, 0, 39.\n\n3. (2) Denny Hamlin, Toyota, 207, 0, 35.\n\n4. (5) Joey Logano, Ford, 207, 0, 41.\n\n5. (21) Chris Buescher, Chevrolet, 207, 0, 32.\n\n6. (16) Paul Menard, Ford, 207, 0, 42.\n\n7. (3) Ryan Blaney, Ford, 207, 0, 48.\n\n8. (13) Ryan Newman, Chevrolet, 207, 0, 29.\n\n9. (22) Michael McDowell, Ford, 207, 0, 39.\n\n10. (20) AJ Allmendinger, Chevrolet, 207, 0, 27.\n\n11. (37) Aric Almirola, Ford, 206, 0, 33.\n\n12. (29) Justin Marks, Chevrolet, 206, 0, 0.\n\n13. (18) Trevor Bayne, Ford, 206, 0, 28.\n\n14. (39) David Gilliland, Ford, 206, 0, 0.\n\n15. (10) Clint Bowyer, Ford, 206, 0, 22.\n\n16. (19) Jamie McMurray, Chevrolet, 205, 0, 21.\n\n17. (1) Alex Bowman, Chevrolet, 205, 0, 29.\n\n18. (24) Martin Truex Jr, Toyota, 205, 0, 30.\n\n19. (38) Kyle Larson, Chevrolet, 204, 0, 18.\n\n20. (34) Gray Gaulding, Toyota, 204, 0, 17.\n\n21. (27) Jeffrey Earnhardt, Chevrolet, 204, 0, 16.\n\n22. (40) Mark Thompson, Ford, 203, 0, 15.\n\n23. (33) William Byron, Chevrolet, 203, 0, 14.\n\n24. (30) D.J. Kennington, Toyota, 201, 0, 13.\n\n25. (12) Kyle Busch, Toyota, 200, 0, 12.\n\n26. (11) Kurt Busch, Ford, accident, 198, 0, 21.\n\n27. (36) Matt DiBenedetto, Ford, accident, 198, 0, 10.\n\n28. (25) Brendan Gaughan, Chevrolet, accident, 198, 0, 9.\n\n29. (9) Ricky Stenhouse Jr, Ford, accident, 197, 0, 15.\n\n30. (15) David Ragan, Ford, accident, 107, 0, 7.\n\n31. (6) Kevin Harvick, Ford, accident, 105, 0, 10.\n\n32. (31) Brad Keselowski, Ford, accident, 102, 0, 5.\n\n33. (4) Chase Elliott, Chevrolet, accident, 101, 0, 7.\n\n34. (26) Kasey Kahne, Chevrolet, accident, 101, 0, 3.\n\n35. (28) Danica Patrick, Chevrolet, accident, 101, 0, 2.\n\n36. (8) Erik Jones, Toyota, accident, 59, 0, 1.\n\n37. (17) Daniel Suarez, Toyota, accident, 59, 0, 1.\n\n38. (35) Jimmie Johnson, Chevrolet, accident, 59, 0, 1.\n\n39. (23) Ty Dillon, Chevrolet, accident, 59, 0, 1.\n\n40. (32) Corey Lajoie, Chevrolet, engine, 8, 0, 1.\n\n–––\n\nRace Statistics\n\nAverage Speed of Race Winner: 150.551 mph.\n\nTime of Race: 3 hours, 26 minutes, 15 seconds.\n\nMargin of Victory: 0.260 seconds.\n\nCaution Flags: 8 for 37 laps.\n\nLead Changes: 24 among 14 drivers.\n\nLap Leaders: A.Bowman 0; D.Hamlin 1-10; J.Marks 11; Ku.Busch 12-14; A.Bowman 15-22; E.Jones 23-33; R.Stenhouse 34-44; C.Elliott 45-48; J.Logano 49-51; Ku.Busch 52-62; A.Bowman 63-67; R.Blaney 68-93; P.Menard 94; M.Truex 95-98; R.Blaney 99-122; A.Allmendinger 123; R.Blaney 124-170; D.Hamlin 171-173; R.Blaney 174-193; D.Hamlin 194; Ku.Busch 195-196; R.Blaney 197; D.Hamlin 198-205; A.Almirola 206; A.Dillon 207\n\nLeaders Summary (Driver, Times Led, Laps Led): R.Blaney, 5 times for 113 laps; D.Hamlin, 4 times for 18 laps; Ku.Busch, 3 times for 13 laps; A.Bowman, 3 times for 11 laps; E.Jones, 1 time for 10 laps; R.Stenhouse, 1 time for 10 laps; C.Elliott, 1 time for 3 laps; M.Truex, 1 time for 3 laps; J.Logano, 1 time for 2 laps; A.Allmendinger, 1 time for 0 laps; A.Almirola, 1 time for 0 laps; A.Dillon, 1 time for 0 laps; J.Marks, 1 time for 0 laps; P.Menard, 1 time for 0 laps.\n\nWins: A.Dillon, 1.\n\nTop 16 in Points: 1. R.Blaney, 48; 2. A.Dillon, 42; 3. P.Menard, 42; 4. J.Logano, 41; 5. M.McDowell, 39; 6. D.Wallace, 39; 7. D.Hamlin, 35; 8. A.Almirola, 33; 9. C.Buescher, 32; 10. M.Truex, 30; 11. A.Bowman, 29; 12. R.Newman, 29; 13. T.Bayne, 28; 14. A.Allmendinger, 27; 15. C.Bowyer, 22; 16. Ku.Busch, 21.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2018/02/18"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2023/02/20/ricky-stenhouse-jr-celebrates-waffle-house-daytona-500-trophy/11309259002/", "title": "Ricky Stenhouse Jr. celebrates at Waffle House with Daytona 500 ...", "text": "Waffle House is becoming the go-to celebration stop for sports stars.\n\nThe latest patron is Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who won the Daytona 500 in double overtime on Sunday, his first win in 199 races. After partying for hours with his team in victory lane at Daytona International Speedway, Stenhouse took the trophy to the popular restaurant chain.\n\nStenhouse went to Waffle House with his wife, Madyson Joye Stenhouse, who documented the event on her Instagram stories. She posted a picture of the trophy on a table and Stenhouse wearing a Waffle House paper hat while holding up a No. 1 finger with a championship ring.\n\nPARTY TIME:Stenhouse, team celebrate 'perfect ending' with Daytona 500 win\n\nSTENHOUSE: Wins 2023 Daytona 500 to snap long winless drought\n\nAnother post by Blue Delta Jean Co. showed Stenhouse proudly sauntering into the diner gripping his very own replica of the Harley J. Earl Trophy — given annually to the winner of NASCAR's most famous race — with both hands. The Waffle House employees greeted him with applause.\n\nDINNER OF CHAMPIONS:Trevor Lawrence's love for the Waffle House is real, and it's spectacular\n\nJacksonville Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence also went to Waffle House last month after upsetting the Los Angeles Chargers in an AFC wild card game. His victory meal: a Texas bacon cheesesteak, hash browns with cheese and a pecan waffle.\n\nWaffle House was established in 1955 in Avondale Estates, Georgia as a local 24-hour diner and now has nearly 2,000 locations across the country.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/02/20"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nascar/2013/12/07/sprint-cup-awards-banquet-jimmie-johnson-jay-mohr/3901117/", "title": "Johnson saluted, but Mohr steals show at NASCAR awards", "text": "Nate Ryan\n\nUSA TODAY Sports\n\nJimmie Johnson closed his championship speech by quoting the late Nelson Mandela\n\nHost Jay Mohr drew glares from Danica Patrick and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. after delivering a zinger\n\nMohr returned as host after a seven-year absence and drew praise from most drivers\n\nLAS VEGAS — NASCAR saluted immortality with a dash of irreverence Friday night at its 2013 Sprint Cup Series awards ceremony.\n\nFor the sixth time, the focal point was Jimmie Johnson, who is one championship short of tying Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt for the all-time mark.\n\nThe Hendrick Motorsports driver downplayed his achievements, though, in a typically humble champion's address at the Wynn ballroom. Johnson said he found comfort in Earnhardt's speech after his sixth title.\n\n\"He was just as nervous up here as the rest of us are, and that built a lot of comfort up here in me tonight,\" he said. \"To do something only two men have done is crazy, wild and humbling, and I'm so thankful for the opportunity. We're all indebted to them for their contributions to the sport, so mad respect and props to them.\"\n\nIn a seven-minute speech, Johnson hardly focused on a season in which he notched six victories, his second Daytona 500 win and a payout of $5,226,405 from title sponsor Sprint.\n\n\"This was clearly a huge year professionally, but personally it was so much more,\" said Johnson, whose wife, Chandra, gave birth to their second daughter in September. \"Being a parent is the greatest thing I've ever experienced in my life, and I love my girls so much.\"\n\nHe closed with a quote from Nelson Mandela, the human rights activist and Nobel Prize winner who died Thursday.\n\n\"Sport has the power to change the world, it has the power to inspire, it has the power to unite people in a way that little else does,\" Johnson said. \"And that's NASCAR.\"\n\nIt was a rare instance of gravitas in a mostly light-hearted affair. Many Sprint Cup drivers said the ceremony's highlight was comedian Jay Mohr, who returned to host after a seven-year absence.\n\nThere were no sacred cows as Mohr tackled the season's biggest controversy and skewered some of the sport's biggest stars without mercy in a topical monologue:\n\n--Mohr joked that a Wynn valet attendant tweeted that Dale Earnhardt Jr. wanted him to park his car in victory lane, but his GPS couldn't find it.\n\n--There were several shots at Jeff Gordon being added as the 13th driver in this year's Chase after the team orders scandal at Richmond International Raceway, suggesting the four-time champion would be added to the Best Picture category in the Oscars. \"I have breaking news right here in my earpiece,\" Mohr said. \"This just in: Jeff Gordon has been added to the BCS championship game. It's going to be Jeff against Florida State.\"\n\nHe later said Jimmie Johnson should consider retiring or, \"do what Jeff Gordon did — win four (championships) and then quit.\"\n\n--Clint Bowyer also was lampooned for his spin that started the chicanery at Richmond and that he initially defended staunchly as being unintentional. \"Clint, Clint, Clint, how's that poison oak treating you, brother?\" Mohr asked, referring to Bowyer's crew chief telling him to \"itch\" his arm just before the spin. \"I guess I'm not the only bad actor here.\"\n\nOn Bowyer's recent engagement, Mohr said, \"You're going to be great at marriage since you're already good at apologizing at things you may or may not have done.\"\n\n--But the juiciest target was Danica Patrick, who was attending the ceremony with boyfriend and rookie of the year winner Ricky Stenhouse Jr. \"Danica, I hope you are not too uncomfortable tonight,\" Mohr said. \"I know you're not used to being this close to the front.\"\n\nThe news drew steely glares from Stenhouse and Patrick, who returned fire while accepting a Sprint award later in the show. \"I'd like to thank all of my fans, and I think it's pretty safe to say that Jay Mohr's not one of them.\"\n\nThe second half of the show began with an apology by Mohr, who said he \"could not be more of a Danica Patrick fan,\" bringing smiles from Patrick and Stenhouse.\n\nBut Mohr's humor went over well, even with those who bore the brunt of it such as Earnhardt, Kurt Busch and Kevin Harvick. Virtually all the top 10 drivers who were honored Saturday heartily endorsed the routine.\n\n\"He's had a hell of a night,\" Bowyer said. \"I don't know who's writing his stuff, but I'm impressed. Danica's going to kick his (butt).\"\n\nIn his speech, Gordon cracked he omitted a joke because he thought it wasn't funny but should have included it because \"Jay Mohr's been doing it for years.\"\n\nThe four-time champion later said Mohr was a good friend who did well and added he liked when the NASCAR industry could laugh at itself.\n\n\"We're a sport that just doesn't get it sometimes,\" Gordon said. \"I don't think Jay Mohr expects everyone in this audience to laugh, because some of those things are sort of true. That's the tough part about being a comedian and why I don't put jokes into my speech.\"\n\nJoey Logano said Mohr was \"hilarious, the best part of the show\" and took his own shot at Tony Stewart, who had accused Logano of having a privileged upbringing after a March altercation at Auto Club Speedway.\n\n\"All you guys have silver spoons,\" Logano told the crowd. \"I'm confused that Tony Stewart's not here giving you a hard time about that.\"\n\nMohr's humor seemed infectious as many drivers' speeches were filled with quips. Among the best were from Matt Kenseth, who finished runner-up in the standings despite a series-high seven wins.\n\n\"Jimmie, I hope you seriously contemplate retirement,\" Kenseth said. \"Buy yourself an island. Take up some new hobbies. Enjoy yourself! We'll all chip in.\"\n\nFollow Ryan on Twitter @nateryan", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/12/07"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_19", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_20", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/world-news/959737/godzilla-the-alligator-found-in-new-york-park-lake", "title": "Godzilla the alligator found in New York park | The Week UK", "text": "We will use the details you have shared to manage your registration. You agree to the processing, storage, sharing and use of this information for the purpose of managing your registration as described in our Privacy Policy.\n\nWould you like to receive The WeekDay newsletter ?\n\nThe WeekDay newsletter provides you with a daily digest of news and analysis.\n\nWe will use the details you have shared to manage your newsletter subscription. You agree to the processing, storage, sharing and use of this information for the purpose of managing your subscription as described in our Privacy Policy.\n\nWe will use the information you have shared for carefully considered and specific purposes, where we believe we have a legitimate case to do so, for example to send you communications about similar products and services we offer. You can find out more about our legitimate interest activity in our Privacy Policy.\n\nIf you wish to object to the use of your data in this way, please tick here.\n\n'We' includes The Week and other Future Publishing Limited brands as detailed here.", "authors": ["Jamie Timson"], "publish_date": "2023/02/20"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_21", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_22", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/science-health/959787/how-naked-mole-rats-could-hold-the-secret-to-reversing-the-menopause", "title": "How naked mole rats could hold the secret to reversing the ...", "text": "Naked mole rats could hold the key to reversing the menopause, a new study suggests.\n\nFemale naked mole rats are able to produce new eggs throughout their lifetime, the study found, unlike other mammals which have a finite number of eggs. That discovery could lead to dramatic “improvements in human infertility research”, said New Scientist.\n\nScientists at Cornell University and the University of Pittsburgh conducted the study by comparing the ovaries of naked mole rats and mice at different stages of development. They found that naked mole rats were not only born with an extraordinary number of egg cells (95 times more than mice), but also that depletion of these cells was also slower. The most telling finding however was that at ten years old naked mole rats still developed new egg cells, suggesting that production could continue throughout their lifetime of more than 30 years.\n\nThe next step is for scientists to “find out what genetic process is triggering the continued production of eggs”, said The Telegraph, with the hope that this can eventually be applied to humans and “help women to continue to have their own children later in life”.\n\nIn humans, the number of eggs cells is “capped at birth” with an initial “one-to-two million egg cells” then dropping to “300,000-500,000 by puberty”, explained New Atlas. The number of egg cells then continues to decline until menopause.\n\nThe study’s findings give “very useful insight” that could “reset the whole paradigm for how we treat menopause” if it can be transformed into a clinical application, Scott Sills at the Center for Advanced Genetics in California told New Scientist.\n\nPeople should remain ”cautious” though about concluding that this is an “answer to the menopause”, warned Aspasia Destouni at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in Greece, “they’re not there yet”.", "authors": ["Richard Windsor"], "publish_date": "2023/02/22"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/09/03/heart-disease-stroke-deaths-avoided/2755663/", "title": "Many deaths from heart disease, stroke could be avoided", "text": "Nanci Hellmich\n\nUSA TODAY\n\nAbout 800%2C000 people die each year from cardiovascular disease\n\nAbout 200%2C000 of the deaths a year from heart disease%2C stroke could be avoided\n\nMany people need to make healthy changes including exercising%2C not smoking\n\nAbout 800,000 people die each year from cardiovascular disease. But as many as 200,000 of the deaths from heart disease and stroke could be prevented if people made healthy changes including stopping smoking, maintaining a healthy weight, doing more physical activity, eating less salt and managing their high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes, says a government report out today.\n\nAlthough the rate of death (deaths per 100,000 people) from cardiovascular disease declined by 29% between 2001 and 2010, it's still the leading cause of death in the USA, says the report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It accounts for one in three deaths in this country.\n\n\"These findings are really striking because we are talking about hundreds of thousands of deaths that don't have to happen when they happen,\" says Thomas Frieden, director of the CDC.\n\nFor the latest analysis, CDC researchers looked at National Vital Statistics System mortality data from the period 2001-2010.\n\nPreventable/avoidable deaths were defined as all deaths from heart disease and stroke in people under age 75 because if their risk factors (smoking, blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, physical inactivity) had been under control they should have lived longer, says the lead author Linda Schieb, a CDC epidemiologist. The current life expectancy in the USA is age 78 so if people died sooner than that it is considered early or premature, she says.\n\n• About 56% of preventable deaths from cardiovascular disease (112,000 deaths) in 2010 occurred in people under 65 years old. That number remained about the same between 2001 and 2010.\n\n• The number of preventable deaths from heart disease and stroke decreased by 25% between 2001 and 2010 for people ages 65 to 74.\n\n• Still, the highest overall death rate from cardiovascular disease was in the 65-74 age group with 401.5 deaths from cardiovascular disease per 100,000 people.\n\n• Men have the highest risk of death from heart disease and stroke across all races and ethnic groups. Black men are most at risk.\n\n• Blacks are nearly twice as likely as whites to die early from heart disease and stroke.\n\n• Compared with whites, blacks have a higher prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors including high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, obesity, physical inactivity, low consumption of fruit and vegetables and poor control of bad (LDL) cholesterol.\n\n• Rates of preventable death from heart disease and stroke are highest in the South.\n\nIt's unfortunate that your longevity may be influenced more by your \"ZIP code\" than \"genetic code,\" Frieden says.\n\nHe says preventable death rates may decrease when more people have health coverage and access to screening and treatment through the Affordable Care Act.\n\n\"This report shows we're making some improvements, but we're not making enough improvements especially for people at high risk such as black men and women,\" says preventive cardiologist Gina Lundberg, an assistant professor of medicine at the Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta.\n\n\"Americans need to take better control of their health and be more aggressive in controlling their blood pressure, their cholesterol, their weight, their exercise habits — and to stop smoking,\" she says.\n\nCardiologist Mariell Jessup, president of the American Heart Association, says the biggest barriers to success in changing this trend are projected increases in obesity and type 2 diabetes, and only modest improvements in diet and physical activity. \"Despite progress in smoking, high cholesterol and high blood pressure rates, obesity and diabetes are on the rise and must be addressed for heart disease and stroke deaths to drop 20% by 2020, a major American Heart Association goal.\"\n\nThe CDC recommends:\n\n• People have a conversation with a health care provider about the ABCS (aspirin when appropriate, blood pressure control, cholesterol management and smoking cessation) of heart health to help control blood pressure and high cholesterol, including taking medications as directed.\n\n• If you don't smoke, don't start. If you do smoke get help to quit.\n\n• Try going for a brisk 10-minute walk, three times a day, five days a week.\n\n• Eat a heart-healthy diet, high in fruits and vegetables and low in sodium and trans fats.\n\n• Work to maintain a healthy weight.\n\n• Know the signs and symptoms of heart attack and stroke and get help as needed.\n\nAccording to the American Heart Association, most heart attacks involve discomfort in the center of the chest that lasts more than a few minutes, or that goes away and comes back. It can feel like uncomfortable pressure, squeezing, fullness or pain. Symptoms can include pain or discomfort in one or both arms, the back, neck, jaw or stomach. It may include shortness of breath with or without chest discomfort. Other signs may include breaking out in a cold sweat, nausea or lightheadedness.\n\nThe heart association says that signs of a stroke include face drooping, arm weakness or numbness and speech difficulty.\n\nFor more information, go to heart.org/warningsigns.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/09/03"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_23", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:40", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/02/24/europe/ukraine-russia-conflict-explainer-2-cmd-intl/index.html", "title": "What does Putin want in Ukraine? The conflict explained | CNN", "text": "CNN —\n\nRussia’s multi-pronged invasion of Ukraine has thrust the country into a conflict that many on the European continent had thought was one for the history books. Now the country is in the throes of war, with a humanitarian disaster unfolding.\n\nAfter months of military buildup and brinkmanship on Russia’s side of the border, Ukraine’s 44 million residents woke up to an all-out conflict on Thursday. Fighting has erupted in several cities across the country, including in the capital, Kyiv, and nearly a half a million people have fled to neighboring countries, according to the United Nations.\n\nRussia had been tightening its military grip around Ukraine since last year, amassing tens of thousands of soldiers, as well as equipment and artillery, on the country’s doorstep.\n\nBlack smoke rises from a military airport in Chuguyev near Kharkiv, the second-largest city in Ukraine, on Thursday. Aris Messinis/AFP/Getty Images\n\nFrenzied diplomatic efforts early this year failed to avert the worst-case scenario. Now those troops are engaged in combat with Ukrainians for control of the country.\n\nThe escalation in a years-long conflict between the nations has now triggered the greatest security crisis in Europe since the Cold War. Russia’s attack on the country has also sparked an intense showdown between Western powers and Moscow.\n\nSo how did we get here? The picture on the ground is shifting rapidly, but here’s a breakdown of what we know.\n\nHow did Russia invade Ukraine?\n\nSeveral areas across Ukraine came under attack on Thursday morning after Russian President Vladimir Putin declared the start of a “special military operation” and warned of bloodshed unless Ukrainian forces lay down their arms.\n\nThe move came after months of speculation about what Moscow’s intentions were with the troops it had massed on the Ukrainian border. At least 150,000 Russian troops encircled the country on three sides, like a sickle, according to estimates from US and Ukrainian intelligence officials.\n\nIn late 2021 and early 2022, fears heightened as satellite images revealed new Russian deployments of troops, tanks, artillery and other equipment cropping up in multiple locations, including near eastern Ukraine, Crimea and Belarus, where its forces were participating in joint drills with Moscow’s closest international ally.\n\nSome of those forces began pouring across the border, crossing into Ukraine from the north in Belarus and to the south from Crimea, according to the Ukrainian State Border Service. Elsewhere, explosions rang out in multiple cities, including the capital Kyiv.\n\nMissile strikes and street fighting have raged in the days since. Military aged men have been ordered to stay in Ukraine, while countless others have fled westwards towards Poland or Romania.\n\nRussia’s larger and far better-equipped military has, faced determined resistance across the country, as ordinary Ukrainians and reservists have joined efforts to defend their families and homes, frustrating Moscow’s attempts.\n\nThat resistance has been “stiffer than expected” and Russia has had unexpected difficulties supplying its forces, two senior US officials with direct knowledge told CNN. On the battlefield, Russia is suffering heavier losses in personnel and armor and aircraft than expected. This is due in part to the fact that Ukrainian air defenses have performed better than pre-invasion US intelligence assessments had anticipated.\n\nBut US intelligence and defense officials closely tracking the Russian campaign say that Putin still holds a number of moves in reserve that could devastate the Ukrainian resistance.\n\nThe US and its allies have said they have no intention of sending troops into Ukraine, which is not a NATO member. But Ukraine has received assistance in other forms from Europe, the US and beyond, as the West united in condemnation of Putin’s move. NATO’s Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg condemned the Russian attack as a “grave breach of international law, and a serious threat to Euro-Atlantic security.”\n\nAnd a raft of heavy sanctions have threatened to cripple Russia’s economy; Moscow has been virtually cut off from the Western financial apparatus and the value of its currency, the ruble, has tanked.\n\nThe coordinated assault came days after Putin announced that Moscow would officially recognize the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DNR and LNR), in eastern Ukraine’s Donbas region, ordering the deployment of Russian troops there in what was widely believed to be the opening salvo to a broader military confrontation.\n\nThe territory recognized by Putin extended beyond the areas controlled by pro-Russian separatists, raising red flags about Russia’s intended creep into Ukraine.\n\nWhat set the stage for the conflict?\n\nUkraine was a cornerstone of the Soviet Union until it voted overwhelmingly for independence in a democratic referendum in 1991, a milestone that turned out to be a death knell for the failing superpower.\n\nAfter the collapse of the Soviet Union, NATO pushed eastward, bringing into the fold most of the Eastern European nations that had been in the Communist orbit. In 2004, NATO added the former Soviet Baltic republics Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Four years later, it declared its intention to offer membership to Ukraine some day in the distant future – crossing a red line for Russia.\n\nPutin has seen NATO’s expansion as an existential threat, and the prospect of Ukraine joining the Western military alliance a “hostile act” – a view he invoked in a televised speech on Thursday, saying that Ukraine’s aspiration to join the military alliance was a dire threat to Russia.\n\nIn interviews and speeches, Putin has previously emphasized his view that Ukraine is part of Russia, culturally, linguistically and politically. While some of the mostly Russian-speaking population in Ukraine’s east feel the same, a more nationalist, Ukrainian-speaking population in the west has historically supported greater integration with Europe.\n\nIn early 2014, mass protests in the capital Kyiv known as Euromaidan forced out a Russia-friendly president after he refused to sign an EU association agreement. Russia responded by annexing the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and fomenting a separatist rebellion in Ukraine’s east, which seized control of part of the Donbas region. Despite a ceasefire agreement in 2015, the two sides have not seen a stable peace, and the front line has barely moved since. Nearly 14,000 people have died in the conflict, and there are 1.5 million people internally displaced in Ukraine, according to the Ukrainian government.\n\nIn the eight years since, Moscow has been accused of engaging in hybrid warfare against Ukraine, using cyberattacks, economic pressure and propaganda to whip up discord. Those tactics have escalated in recent months, and in early February the State Department claimed Putin was preparing a false-flag operation to create “a pretext for an invasion.”\n\nWhat does Putin want?\n\nIn a lengthy essay penned in July 2021, Putin referred to Russians and Ukrainians as “one people,” and suggested the West had corrupted Ukraine and yanked it out of Russia’s orbit through a “forced change of identity.”\n\nThat type of historical revisionism was on full display in Putin’s emotional and grievance-packed address to the nation last Monday announcing his decision to recognize the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics, while casting doubt on Ukraine’s own sovereignty.\n\nBut Ukrainians, who in the last three decades have sought to align more closely with Western institutions like the European Union and NATO, have pushed back against the notion that they are little more than the West’s “puppet.”\n\nIn fact, Putin’s efforts to bring Ukraine back into Russia’s sphere have been met with a backlash, with several recent polls showing that a majority of Ukrainians now favor membership of the US-led transatlantic military alliance.\n\nIn December, Putin presented the US and NATO with a list of security demands. Chief among them was a guarantee that Ukraine will never enter NATO and that the alliance rolls back its military footprint in Eastern and Central Europe – proposals that the US and its allies have repeatedly said are non-starters.\n\nPutin indicated he was not interested in lengthy negotiations on the topic. “It is you who must give us guarantees, and you must do it immediately, right now,” he said at his annual news conference late last year. “Are we deploying missiles near the US border? No, we are not. It is the United States that has come to our home with its missiles and is already standing at our doorstep.”\n\nHigh-level talks between the West and Russia wrapped in January without any breakthroughs. The standoff left Europe’s leaders to engage in a frenzy of shuttle diplomacy, exploring whether a negotiating channel established between France, Germany, Russia and Ukraine to resolve the conflict in Ukraine’s east – known as the Normandy Format talks – could provide an avenue for calming the current crisis.\n\nIn a news conference with the new German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on February 16, Putin repeated unsubstantiated claims that Ukraine is carrying out a “genocide” against Russian speakers in the Donbas region and called for the conflict to be resolved through the Minsk peace progress – echoing similar rhetoric that was used as a pretext for annexing Crimea.\n\nBut less than a week later, after Russia’s upper house of parliament approved the deployment of military forces outside the country on February 22, Putin told reporters that the Minsk agreements “no longer exist,” adding: “What is there to implement if we have recognized these two entities?”\n\nThe agreements, known as Minsk 1 and Minsk 2 – which were hammered out in the Belarusian capital in a bid to end a bloody in eastern Ukraine – have never been fully implemented, with key issues remaining unresolved.\n\nMoscow and Kyiv have long been at odds over key elements of the peace deal, the second of which was inked in 2015 and lays out a plan for reintegrating the two breakaway republics into Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky recently stated that he did not like a single point of the Minsk accords, which require dialogue on local elections in the Russian-backed separatist regions and – although unclear in what sequence – would also restore the Ukrainian government’s control over its eastern borders. Critics say the agreement could give Moscow undue sway over Ukrainian politics.\n\nPutin previously responded in blunt terms by saying that regardless of whether Zelensky likes the plan, it must be implemented. “Like it or don’t like it, it’s your duty, my beauty,” Putin said in a news conference alongside French President Emmanuel Macron. Zelensky, a former comedian and TV star, won a 2019 election in a landslide on promises to end the war in Donbas, but little has changed. Responding to a question about Putin’s stark, undiplomatic language, Zelensky responded in Russian, saying bluntly: “We are not his.”\n\nHow has Ukraine responded?\n\nPresident Zelensky previously downplayed the danger of all-out war with Russia, noting that the threat has existed for years and that Ukraine is prepared for military aggression. But on Thursday, as Russia launched an assault on his country, Zelensky made an emotional address directly to the Ukrainian people, declaring martial law in the country.\n\n“Russia began an attack on Ukraine today. Putin began war against Ukraine, against the entire democratic world. He wants to destroy my country, our country, everything we’ve been building, everything we are living for,” Zelensky said in a video message posted on his official Facebook page.\n\nAcross the country, residents have been preparing for the worst – packing emergency evacuation kits and taking time out of their weekends to train as reservists.\n\nUkraine’s government insists that Moscow cannot prevent Kyiv from building closer ties with NATO, or otherwise interfere in its domestic or foreign politics. “Russia cannot stop Ukraine from getting closer with NATO and has no right to have any say in relevant discussions,” the Foreign Ministry said in a statement to CNN.\n\nZelensky has since requested Ukraine be admitted “urgently” to the European Union, and has implored Western leaders to help boost Ukrainian forces on the ground.\n\nDelegates from Ukraine and Russia held talks on Monday near the border of Belarus, a country which has assisted Putin’s invasion, and which Ukrainian officials fear could soon put its own boots on the ground in support of Russia.\n\nUkraine demanded a full Russian withdrawal in advance of those talks, but it is unclear whether the meetings will result in a Russian retreat. Zelensky downplayed the significance of the talks, which he did not attend in person. “I do not really believe in the result of this meeting, but let them try, so that no citizen of Ukraine would have any doubt that I, as president, did not try to stop the war when there was even a small chance,” he said Sunday,\n\nPeople in Quezon City, Philippines, light candles in the shape of a peace sign February 28 as they protest Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Ezra Acayan/Getty Images A woman from Ukraine takes part in an anti-war protest in Bangkok, Thailand, on February 28. Chalinee Thirasupa/Reuters An anti-war protest takes place outside the Russian Embassy in Mexico City on February 28. Luis Cortes/Reuters A boy holds a Ukrainian flag with a heart drawn on it as he attends a protest with his mother in Sydney on February 28. James D. Morgan/Getty Images Thousands of protesters gather in Berlin's Tiergarten park on February 27. Odd Andersen/AFP/Getty Images Lidiya Zhuravlyova, a Ukrainian performance artist, takes part in an anti-war protest in Bangkok on February 27. Chalinee Thirasupa/Reuters A \"Football Stands Together\" message is displayed in Ukrainian colors ahead of the League Cup final between Chelsea and Liverpool on February 27 The match was played at Wembley Stadium in London. Justin Tallis/AFP/Getty Images Silhouettes are seen through a Ukrainian flag during a demonstration in Madrid on February 27. Marcos del Mazo/LightRocket/Getty Images People gather for a demonstration in Prague, Czech Republic, on February 27. The event in Prague was particularly poignant given that many of its attendees experienced a Russian invasion firsthand. In 1968, Soviet-led armies of the Warsaw Pact invaded Czechoslovakia, crushing the so-called Prague Spring democratic reform movement and restoring the totalitarian communist regime. The troops stayed in Czechoslovakia for over two decades, with the last leaving in 1991. Ondrej Deml/CTK/AP Thousands of people show solidarity with Ukraine at Dam Square in Amsterdam, Netherlands, on February 27. Cris Toala Olivare/Getty Images Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa meets with demonstrators outside Belem Palace in Lisbon, Portugal, to show his support on February 26. Patricia De Melo Moreira/AFP/Getty Images A protester holds a sign that says \"help before it's too late\" during a rally in Brussels, Belgium, on February 26. Valeria Mongelli/AP New York's Empire State Building is illuminated in the colors of the Ukrainian flag on February 25. Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images People gather to protest outside the Russian Consulate in Istanbul on February 25. Burak Kara/Getty Images People photograph Paris' Eiffel Tower as it is lit with Ukraine's colors on February 25. Adrienne Surprenant/AP A child holds smoke bombs at a protest in Buenos Aires on February 25. Mariana Nedelcu/Reuters A demonstrator against the invasion is led away by police in Moscow on February 24. Hundreds of protesters in Russia have been detained in anti-war protests, independent protest monitoring site OVD-Info said. Russia's Investigative Committee warned that participation in any anti-war protest was illegal. It also said that offenses could be entered on participants' criminal records which would \"leave a mark on the person's future.\" Daniil Danchenko/NurPhoto/Getty Images Ukraine supporters march through the streets of New York with flags and signs on February 24. John Lamparski/NurPhoto/Associated Press Members of the Ukrainian community demonstrate outside the Federal Building in Los Angeles on February 24. Francine Orr/Los Angeles Times/Getty Images People protest in Rome on February 24. Alessandra Benedetti/Corbis/Getty Images Flinders Street Station in Melbourne is lit in yellow and blue on February 24 as public buildings were lit up in the national colors of Ukraine. Asanka Brendon Ratnayake/AFP/Getty Images A demonstrator in Barcelona, Spain, cries during a protest on February 24. Pau Barrena/AFP/Getty Images People protest in front of the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin on February 24. Hannibal Hanschke/Getty Images Protesters gather outside the Massachusetts State House in Boston on February 24. M. Scott Brauer/The New York Time/Redux Demonstrators rally at Times Square in New York on February 24. Kena Betancur/AFP/Getty Images A Ukraine supporter in Minneapolis attends a prayer service inside the St. Constantine Ukrainian Catholic Church on February 24. Stephen Maturen/Reuters Protesters chant and gather in front of the Texas State Capitol in downtown Austin on February 24. Sara Diggins/Austin American-Statesman/USA Today Network A vigil for Ukraine takes place in Montclair, New Jersey, on February 24. Kevin R. Wexler/NorthJersey.com/USA Today Network In pictures: The world rallies in support of Ukraine Prev Next\n\nTensions between the two countries had been exacerbated by a deepening Ukrainian energy crisis that Kyiv believes Moscow has purposefully provoked. Ukraine views the controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline – connecting Russian gas supplies directly to Germany – as a threat to its own security.\n\nNord Stream 2 is one of two pipelines that Russia has laid underwater in the Baltic Sea – in addition to its traditional land-based pipeline network that runs through eastern Europe, including Ukraine. Kyiv views the pipelines across Ukraine as an element of protection against invasion by Russia, since any military action could potentially disrupt the vital flow of gas to Europe.\n\nAfter requests from Zelensky and the US administration, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said on Tuesday that he would halt the certification of the pipeline following Putin’s decision to order troops into parts of eastern Ukraine.\n\nNord Stream 2 was just one of myriad challenges facing Zelensky’s government; the former actor, who played a president on Ukrainian television, had experienced a brutal baptism of fire into real-world politics since assuming office in 2019, thanks in part to the pandemic and ongoing tensions with Russia.\n\nBut in the days since the invasion, admiration for him has soared both inside and outside Ukraine; Zelensky refused to leave the country and has instead posted frequent videos from the streets of Kyiv, where he has been encouraging his fellow countrymen to resist Russian forces.", "authors": ["Eliza Mackintosh"], "publish_date": "2022/02/24"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/23/middleeast/why-arabs-are-furious-world-cup-mime-intl/index.html", "title": "Why Arabs and Muslims feel stung by coverage of the Qatar World ...", "text": "Editor’s Note: A version of this story first appeared in CNN’s Meanwhile in the Middle East newsletter, a three-times-a-week look inside the region’s biggest stories. Sign up here.\n\nAbu Dhabi, UAE CNN —\n\n“Today I feel Qatari. Today I feel Arab. Today I feel African. Today I feel gay. Today I feel disabled. Today I feel a migrant worker,” FIFA chief Gianni Infantino said in a fiery tirade on Saturday, comparing his own plight as a redhead son of migrants to that of marginalized communities.\n\nHis ostensible empathy with Qatar was due to the barrage of criticism the nation has faced in Western media for hosting the tournament.\n\nBut it’s hypocritical of the West to be giving lessons in morality to others, he said.\n\nThose statements on the eve of the World Cup went viral, inviting much anger and ridicule. But to many Arabs and Muslims, they resonated strongly.\n\nUS actor Morgan Freeman (2nd L), Qatari singer Dana al-Fardan (2nd R), and Qatari YouTuber Ghanim al Muftah (R) perform during the Qatar 2022 World Cup opening ceremony on Sunday. Odd Andersen/AFP/Getty Images\n\nOmar Alsaadi, a 21-year-old Qatari, told CNN that Infantino vocalized “from a Western point of view” what many of his compatriots have felt about being targets of racism.\n\nIn the run-up to the tournament, Western media coverage has been dominated by the controversies surrounding the event rather than the sport itself, including the Gulf nation’s treatment of migrant workers, its rules on LGBTQ people and its tight social restrictions. Britain’s public broadcaster, the BBC, refrained from airing the opening ceremony on television, opting instead to cover criticism of the host nation. The BBC said it did broadcast the ceremony on their video-on-demand service.\n\nThis year’s World Cup is certainly like no other before it. It is the first to be held in a Muslim country and Qatar has gone a long way to give the event a distinctly Arab and Muslim flavor.\n\nThe Bedouin-themed opening ceremony on Sunday began with a female singer donning a traditional burqa, a kind of face covering that has been banned in several European countries. It also cited a verse from the Quran about God creating humanity into “nations and tribes” so they can get to know each other.\n\nAccording to social media reports, some hotel rooms in the country offer visitors QR codes to learn about Islam, and Muslim volunteers have been teaching visitors about Islamic fashion.\n\nQatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy (SC), which is responsible for overseeing the infrastructure projects and planning for the World Cup, didn’t respond to CNN’s request for comment.\n\nBut in an earlier statement to CNN, the SC said it was committed to “an inclusive and discriminatory-free” World Cup.\n\n“Everyone is welcome in Qatar, but we are a conservative country and any public display of affection, regardless of orientation, is frowned upon. We simply ask for people to respect our culture.”\n\nThe visibility of Islamic symbols in Qatar hasn’t escaped those attending. An on-air joke by a French journalist about the presence of “a lot of mosques” in the country caused outrage among Muslims on social media.\n\nWestern news outlets have also been accused of peddling stereotypes about Arabs and Muslims.\n\nThe Times of London on Monday said “Qataris are unaccustomed to seeing women in Western dress in their country” in a photo caption that was later deleted after being flagged on social media. Around 87% of the country’s population of 2.9 million is made up of expatriates, many of whom are Western.\n\n“I think that the Western media is biased because they don’t want to see an Arabic success, a Muslim success in the delivering and hosting of a global cup for football in a third [world country],” Najd Al-Mohanadi, a 20-year-old Qatari, told CNN.\n\nBut some in the Western media have spoken out against stereotyping and alleged biases. Ayman Mohyeldin, an MSNBC host who previously worked for Qatar’s Al Jazeera, said recent coverage of Qatar shows “the depths of Western prejudice, performative moral outrage and, perhaps most significantly, gross double standards.”\n\nThe Economist and the New York Times have also run articles defending Qatar’s right to host the tournament. The Times of London ran an essay saying criticism of Qatar was “laced with hypocrisy.”\n\n“I always question the timing [of the criticism], as migrants throughout the region endure poor living arrangements for meager pay, while also working under strenuous physical and mental conditions,” said Mira Al Hussein, a postdoctoral researcher from the UAE who is studying at Oxford University in England.\n\n“Scrutiny is overdue and it makes no sense to tie it to global events where virtue-signaling becomes deeply problematic,” Al Hussein told CNN.\n\n“Especially when it comes from non-NGO entities that are themselves embroiled in human rights violations within and across their borders.”\n\nJames Lynch, director of the human rights group FairSquare and a former British diplomat in Qatar, said that while some of the coverage around Qatar in the West has reinforced negative stereotypes about the Arab Muslim world, most of the criticism has been “fair and proportionate.”\n\n“It’s absolutely right to call out instances of that kind of coverage, but wrong to generalize from those examples to imply that all, or most, criticism is driven by racism,” he said.\n\nWorkers in the country continue to “face harsh, abusive working conditions and severe exploitation, with domestic and construction workers among those most at risk,” he said, adding that Qatar’s women and LGBTQ people “face serious discrimination and repression, both in law and practice.”\n\nCritics of Western media coverage of Qatar have countered that other countries with questionable human rights records didn’t receive such scrutiny when hosting global sporting events.\n\n“At the risk of engaging in whataboutism… Qatar’s human rights records, as poor as they may be, cannot possibly be more outrageous than other countries, such as Russia, China and Israel,” said Al Hussein. “Qatar is certainly not engaging in ethnic cleansing, nor are migrants living in concentration camps, despite the poor living conditions.”\n\nMaryam AlHajri, a Qatari researcher at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, said some of the recent rhetoric around Qatar shows that some Western critics have been more concerned with feeding into an “orientalist discourse,” referring to language aimed at imposing Western worldviews, than human rights.\n\n“This should not be read as a justification to cease criticizing the migrant worker condition in Qatar,” she said. “Rather, it should be interpreted as an argument for the necessity to contextualize the migrant workers situation as part of a globalized economic order built on colonialism and racial capitalism.”\n\nShe noted however that some over-zealous defenders of the government on the Qatari side have neglected the country’s human rights shortcomings.\n\n“Many of the people defending Qatar are also using terrifyingly pro-government language,” she said, adding that it reaches a point that doesn’t help the cause of Qatar’s migrant workers.\n\n“The plight of migrant workers in places like the US or the UK does not take away from the fact that we have problems in Qatar,” AlHajri told CNN. “It shouldn’t be about whataboutism.”\n\nWith additional reporting from Mariam Dirar Alqasem in Doha\n\nIran protests\n\nVideo Ad Feedback CNN hears testimony from women who say they experienced sexual violence by Iranian regime 06:31 - Source: CNN\n\nSocial media videos have emerged allegedly showing Iranian security forces sexually assaulting female demonstrators on the streets.\n\nWith media access inside Iran severely constrained, CNN went to the region near Iraq’s border with Iran, interviewing eyewitnesses who’d left the country and verifying accounts from survivors and sources both in and outside Iran.\n\nThe covert testimonies revealed sexual assaults on male and female activists as a women-led uprising spreads throughout Iran.\n\nUS Special Envoy for Iran Rob Malley on Tuesday tweeted it is “a reminder of what is at stake for the Iranian people - and of the lengths to which the regime will go in its futile attempt to silence dissent.”\n\nRead the article here.\n\nHere’s the latest on the protests in Iran:\n\nUN human rights chief Volker Türk said on Tuesday that the rising number of protest-related deaths highlights the “critical” nature of the situation in the country. The UN said its sources had reported over 40 deaths “in mainly Kurdish cities in the past week.”\n\nForty foreign nationals “affiliated in riots” have been arrested in Iran since protests started in September, Iranian judiciary spokesperson Masood Satayshi said without revealing their nationalities.\n\nUS Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Tuesday the US is taking steps to “push back against actions Iran is taking to repress its own people.”\n\nMobile internet was restored in Iran after a major disruption on Monday, according to internet watchdog NetBlocks, which said that cellular data was down for about 3.5 hours as security forces cracked down on protesters in the Kurdish region of Iran.\n\nWorld Cup\n\nSaudi Arabia produced one of the biggest upsets in World Cup history Tuesday, beating Lionel Messi’s Argentina 2-1 in an astonishing Group C match.\n\nMany had expected the South American team, ranked third in the world, unbeaten for three years and among the favorites to win the tournament, to sweep aside its opponent, ranked 48 places below it in the world rankings.\n\nWatch CNN’s Becky Anderson speak to celebrating fans of the Saudi team:\n\nAlso read:\n\nThe digest\n\nTeenage student dies in twin explosions in Jerusalem\n\nTwo explosions shook Jerusalem early Wednesday, killing one person and injuring 18 others in a suspected “combined terror attack,” according to an Israeli police spokesperson. The first explosion occurred at a bus station near the entrance of Jerusalem, killing a 16-year-old student at a Jewish seminary, his family told local media. The second explosion occurred almost half an hour later at the city’s Ramot junction. Initial investigations indicated that explosive devices were placed at both blast sites and a search is underway for suspects, the police spokesperson said.\n\nBackground: The attack brings the number of people killed on the Israeli side of the conflict to at least 29 this year. This year has also been the deadliest for Palestinians in the West Bank since 2015.\n\nWhy it matters: Jerusalem has not seen a double bombing like this one in many years. Prime Minister Yair Lapid said after participating in a situation assessment with security officials that the incident was “different from what we have seen in recent years.” The explosions come after months of tensions in the occupied West Bank.\n\nRussia to build attack drones for Ukraine war with the help of Iran, intelligence assessment says\n\nIran and Russia have reached an agreement to begin the production of attack drones in Russia, according to a new intelligence assessment from a country that closely monitors Iran’s weapons program. Iran is beginning to transfer blueprints and components for the drones to Russia after the initial agreement was struck earlier this month, said a source familiar with the assessment.\n\nBackground: US officials have said that Russia has received hundreds of drones from Tehran which have had a deadly effect in Ukraine. Earlier this month, the Iranian government acknowledged for the first time that it had sent a limited number of drones to Russia in the months before the start of its invasion of Ukraine.\n\nWhy it matters: The move would further cement the partnership between Tehran and Moscow and likely provoke significant anger from Ukraine and its western allies including the US. Sources explained that the goal is for Russia to produce thousands of new attack drones using Iranian components and blueprints.\n\nSaudi Arabia says it may take steps to balance market\n\nOil rose on Tuesday after Saudi Arabia said OPEC+ was sticking with output cuts and could take further steps to balance the market, outweighing global recession worries and concern about China’s rising Covid-19 case numbers, Reuters reported. Saudi Arabian Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman on Monday was also cited by state news agency SPA as denying a Wall Street Journal report that said OPEC was considering boosting output.\n\nBackground: The Wall Street Journal earlier on Monday reported an output increase of 500,000 barrels per day was under discussion for the next meeting of OPEC and its allies, known as OPEC+, on December 4. The report cited unidentified OPEC delegates. The report sent oil prices plunging by more than 5%.\n\nWhy it matters: The oil cartel last month cut production by 2 million barrels per day in an effort to stabilize the market “in light of the uncertainty that surrounds the global economic and oil market outlooks.” The oil cut was made despite strong US pressure against it. Potential further cuts could exacerbate already tense relations between the US and Saudi Arabia.\n\nPhoto of the day", "authors": ["Nadeen Ebrahim Abbas Al Lawati", "Nadeen Ebrahim", "Abbas Al Lawati"], "publish_date": "2022/11/23"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/04/europe/ukraine-foreign-fighters-russia-intl-cmd/index.html", "title": "Ukraine: The foreign fighters and ukrainian expats taking up arms to ...", "text": "Shehyni, Ukraine CNN —\n\nThe gray asphalt road that leads to Ukraine’s Shehyni border crossing with Poland has for the past week seen 30-mile tailbacks as people try to flee the country, often saying tearful goodbyes to the family members and friends staying behind to fight the Russian invasion.\n\nWednesday brought a different sight: groups of young men, laden with heavy bags and military kit, entered Ukraine from Poland as they answered President Volodymyr Zelensky’s call for “citizens of the world” to fight “Russian war criminals.”\n\nAmong them, New York resident Vasyk Didyk, a 26-year-old carpenter wearing a fluorescent Carhartt beanie who is originally from Ukraine.\n\n“This is our motherland,” he told CNN in Shehyni. “We couldn’t stay in our comfortable lives in America and watch what is happening here.”\n\nDidyk, accompanied by his friend Igor Harmaii, had spent 24 hours traveling from New York to Poland before crossing back into his homeland carrying a canvas backpack and pulling a suitcase on wheels.\n\nI haven’t been back to Ukraine in four years – but it wasn’t even a choice. Vasyk Didyk\n\nHe has no military training and came despite his parents, who do not live in Ukraine, weeping on the phone when they heard he was joining the fight.\n\n“I haven’t been back to Ukraine in four years – but it wasn’t even a choice,” he said. “I had to come and help my country.”\n\nThe world has watched in horror since Russia invaded Ukraine late last week, triggering what could be the largest land war in Europe since World War II. And Zelensky’s defiance has not only united Western opposition to Russia, but also inspired foreign volunteers and Ukrainians abroad to fight for the cause.\n\n“This is not just Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” Zelensky said on Sunday. “This is the beginning of a war against Europe, against European structures, against democracy, against basic human rights, against a global order of law, rules, and peaceful coexistence.”\n\nUkrainian embassies have been helping recruit foreign fighters, while at least one senior politician from a Western government that has previously prosecuted those who joined foreign wars indicated support for citizens taking up arms in Ukraine.\n\n“If people want to support that struggle, I will support them doing that,” UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss told the BBC on Sunday.\n\nAsked by CNN whether it consented to French foreign fighters in Ukraine, the French government said: “Ukraine is a war zone, classified as a red zone in the travel advice, updated on a permanent basis and available under the following link (Travel advice). As a result, we formally advise against any travel to Ukraine.”\n\nThe question was not directly answered by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken during a press briefing on Wednesday.\n\nWhen asked about American foreign fighters he said the US has been “clear for some time” in telling “Americans who may be thinking of traveling there not to go.”\n\nVasyk Didyk (left) and Igor Shehyni (right) arrive in Ukraine on Wednesday after more than 24 hours of travel from New York. AnneClaire Stapleton/CNN\n\nIf Americans want to help Ukraine, “there are many ways to do that, including by supporting and helping the many NGOs that are working to provide humanitarian assistance; providing resources themselves to groups that are trying to help Ukraine by being advocates for Ukraine,” he said.\n\nOn Thursday, Zelensky said the first of 16,000 foreign fighters were making their way to Ukraine “to protect freedom and life for us, and for all,” he said. CNN has not been able to confirm those numbers.\n\n“An attack on Europe”\n\nIn the English city of Milton Keynes, more than 1,200 miles west from Shehyni, British builder Jake Dale said the call for foreigners to join Ukraine’s International Legion inspired him to book a flight to Poland on Friday. He aims to cross into Ukraine by Saturday afternoon.\n\n“As soon as I heard his [Zelensky’s] call – it made me think he needs help,” the 29-year-old said from his home he shares with his girlfriend and two children. “I think it is a worthy cause to risk my life, and my girlfriend feels the same. Obviously, she gets upset, as anyone would, but she supports it as she can see I want to help.”\n\nBack in 2015, Dale wanted to join a Kurdish militia group, the People’s Protection Units, or YPG, which was leading the fight against ISIS in Syria, but decided against it due to warnings by the British government.\n\nThis time, he is not worried about the potential legal trouble he could face on his return from Ukraine. “I’m willing to deal with it,” he said after the British government distanced itself from Truss’s comments.\n\nDuring a trip to Poland, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the UK was not “actively” supporting volunteers going to fight. “I can understand why people feel as they do, but we have laws in our country about international conflicts and how they must be conducted,” Johnson told reporters.\n\nDale is heading to Ukraine with Peter Hurst, a 36-year-old former infantry soldier with the British Army, who did a tour of Afghanistan before leaving the military in 2011.\n\nThe father of five, who lives in the northern English town of Pontefract, spoke to CNN on a video call while he picked out kit from an army supplies store in a nearby town. He said wanted to fight to protect democratic values and freedoms.\n\nBritish citizen Jake Dale (left) is pictured with his family. Peter Hurst (right) is pictured with his wife on their wedding day. Both men plan to be in Ukraine by Saturday.\n\n“It feels like an attack on Europe. If you don’t help stop war there [in Ukraine], it will probably spread,” he said.\n\nBoth Hurst and Dale met this week on a Facebook group – created to help supply British medical and military aid to Ukraine. They have been working with a liaison – whose name is listed on an information pack sent by the Ukrainian embassy – who will provide them with body armor and vests in Poland.\n\nDale has spent £300 ($400) buying kit and plane tickets and worries about the financial impact of him not working. “It will be a strain on my family when I leave,” he said. “But I am sure we will be fine.”\n\nNot everyone is supportive of the idea of foreign fighters in Ukraine.\n\nUS-based extremist tracking organization SITE Intelligence Group has warned of the involvement of outfits such as Azov, a paramilitary group whose logo is the Wolfsangel, a symbol appropriated by Nazi Germany.\n\n“Following Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine, far-right communities online have rallied to the side of groups like Azov, both in terms of fundraising and stating their intent to fight alongside them,” a SITE report says.\n\nThe British government has told those without military training to avoid the fight.\n\nOn the Facebook group Hurst and Dale met on, one user warns: “That is absolutely no place to be for someone with no weapon handling skills and doesn’t speak the language. Apart from being a danger to others it’s not fair on the lads themselves.”\n\nDale says he is aware of such warnings but insists his skills as a qualified mechanic could be useful.\n\n“People can say it is wrong to go in without a military background, but I believe by fighting alongside Ukrainians, I am answering their call for help,” he said. “Putin’s regime is ruthless – it is not just Ukraine we are protecting.”\n\n“As long as we have to”\n\nUkrainian citizen Valery, who asked for his last name not to be published, lives in eastern France, but felt compelled to return to visit his elderly parents as Russia massed troops on Ukraine’s border.\n\nThe February 24 invasion began soon after he arrived in Kyiv, where it was heralded with pre-dawn warning sirens.\n\n“I woke up around five o’clock in the morning with the very strange sound,” he said. “I thought I was still dreaming. I couldn’t believe my ears. But the sound was so persistent I couldn’t fall asleep any further.”\n\nValery said his mind then turned to one thing: “How useful can I be to my country? The first thought was to join the army and check how useful I can be.”\n\nHow useful can I be to my country? The first thought was to join the army and check how useful I can be. Valery\n\nAfter enlisting at a conscription center, the 45-year-old said he “felt this sense of nausea” when he received his weapon, realizing normality had been shattered. “Kyiv has been a very peaceful town since 1943,” he said.\n\nValery is serving with five others in a military unit. “Many of them have families, have children. Nonetheless, they joined,” he said, adding that morale is high within the forces. “There is a lot of determination to defeat the enemy.”\n\nAll foreign fighters share that determination – but the people crossing into Ukraine vary wildly in terms of their organization and experience.\n\nCNN spoke to a group of six volunteers, made up of Americans and one Briton, with military equipment in a packed train station in Pzsemysl, Poland. “If more people would have joined the fight in 1936 we wouldn’t be dealing with fascism now,” the British man said. Most said they are veterans; one said he is not and has never fought in a war.\n\nNone speaks Ukrainian, Russian or Polish, and they did not have a translator or a plan to get to the conflict.\n\n“We’ve tried to get in touch with (the) embassy but (traffic) crashed all the websites,” one said. “There’s women and children dying indiscriminately and you know – we gotta be here,” said another.\n\nElsewhere, CNN spoke with a band of Brits and Canadians who had met each other in a Polish airport, all determined to cross the border and join the Ukrainians in battle.\n\nWali, who is French Canadian, said he had served as a sniper in Afghanistan and volunteered previously to fight against ISIS in 2015. He added that he has contacts in Ukraine who can supply him with weapons. “My friend … called me and said, OK, we really need you,” he said.\n\nBack at the border crossing in Shehyni, New Yorkers Didyk and Harmaii wrangle with their canvas backpacks and wheeled suitcases.\n\nWhen asked how long they plan on staying in Ukraine, they both pause and say almost at the same time: “As long as we have to.”", "authors": ["Tara John Anneclaire Stapleton Joseph Ataman", "Tara John", "Anneclaire Stapleton", "Joseph Ataman"], "publish_date": "2022/03/04"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/local/2022/06/02/graceland-elvis-presley-history-trivia/9810757002/", "title": "Graceland: The history of Elvis' home in Memphis. Here are 40 facts", "text": "Graceland opened to the public on June 7, 1982.\n\nThat was 40 years ago.\n\nForty!\n\nSeems like a significant number.\n\nWhen Elvis died on Aug. 16, 1977, he was only 42.\n\nHe had lived at Graceland for 20 years. So, the house, in a way, has been home to Elvis' legacy for twice as long as it was home to Elvis.\n\nHow to tell the story of Graceland? Here's one way: 40 facts to mark that 40th anniversary.\n\nActually, you'll find many more than 40 facts below. But the list is numbered 1 through 40, for the sake of symmetry and convenience. (In any case, math never was my strong suit; neither, according to his 6th-grade report card, was it Elvis'.)\n\nMEMPHIS TOURISM:Graceland made Memphis a tourism destination. Here's how it continues to impact the city\n\nGRACELAND HISTORY:Graceland felt like 'a twilight zone' when it opened in 1982. Now it's more like a home | Beifuss\n\n40 facts about Graceland\n\n1. The Graceland name predates the mansion. Owner Stephen C. Toof, a Memphis commercial printer, named his \"Graceland Farms\" property for his daughter, Grace, who inherited the land when her father died in 1894.\n\n2. Grace's niece, Ruth Moore, referred to in newspaper reports as a \"socialite\" and \"musical prodigy,\" and her husband, Thomas Moore, a doctor, built the Colonial Revival (sometimes called \"Classical Revival\") mansion in 1939. Before Elvis expanded it, the house contained 10,266 square feet.\n\n3. Elvis purchased Graceland — the house, the barn and the 13.8 acres of land — on March 19, 1957, for $102,500. The home's Whitehaven location was relatively isolated and rural, unlike Elvis' previous address at 1034 Audubon Drive in East Memphis. Elvis immediately began adding to the mansion, expanding the house to 17,552 square feet and 23 rooms. The mansion would be his Memphis home for 20 years.\n\n4. Lisa Marie Presley is the sole owner of the Graceland mansion and its original grounds. Under the terms of Elvis' will, she inherited the property in 1993, when she turned 25. (Meanwhile, Elvis Presley Enterprises, a corporate entity of the Elvis Presley Trust, manages Graceland's operations as well as most other business dealings related to Elvis, his legacy and his likeness.)\n\n5. Graceland was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on Nov. 7, 1991. It was the first rock-and-roll-related site to be so honored.\n\n6. Graceland was declared a National Historic Landmark on March 27, 2006. Again, it was the first rock-and-roll-related site to be so honored.\n\nELVIS TRIVIA:Think you know everything about the King? Try to answer these questions\n\nGRACELAND:Tips to help you take care of business when visiting Elvis' home\n\n7. The Historic Landmark documentation provides a detailed, even literary description of Graceland: \"The house was constructed at the top of a hill, almost at the center of the property in a grove of oaks, with rolling pastures in front and behind it, and a western exposure towards the Mississippi River. A curving driveway, bordered by a six-inch concrete curb lined with small electric lights along the outside edge, approaches from the state highway at the foot of the hill and forms a large loop that passes in front of the house and returns back down the hill.\"\n\n8. The document continues: \"The house is a two-story, five bay residence in the Classical Revival style with a side-facing gabled roof covered in asphalt shingles, a central two-story projecting pedimented portico, and one-story wings on its north and south sides. The front and side facades of the central block are veneered with Tishomingo limestone from Mississippi...\"\n\n9. The familiar pink Alabama fieldstone wall that fronts the property was erected in 1957, to protect Presley's privacy and discourage trespassing fans. (It has not been entirely successful; see fact No. 15.) Since Elvis' death, the wall has served as a graffiti magnet and message board, with fans scrawling sometimes very personal sentiments or adding artwork tributes to the King to almost every available space on the rough but conveniently pale stone.\n\n10. Built and erected by the Tennessee Fabricating Co. and Memphis' Dillard Door Co. at a total cost of about $2,700, the famous custom-built gates of Graceland — a \"special double drive way gate,\" to quote the work order — were installed on April 22, 1957. With their stylized representations of a guitar-strumming Elvis set against a pattern of musical staffs and notes, the gates suggest the entryway to a musical heaven. The gates were restored in 1990 by the National Ornamental Metal Museum.\n\n11. In a testimony to Elvis' influence, the City Council on June 29, 1971, unanimously approved a proposal to change the name of the five-mile stretch of South Bellevue between South Parkway and the Mississippi state line to \"Elvis Presley Boulevard\"; the street address of Graceland thus became 3764 Elvis Presley Boulevard. The first sign was put in place during a January 1972 ceremony that was attended by Mayor Wyeth Chandler and Elvis' father, Vernon Presley.\n\n12. A highlight of any Graceland tour, the ornamental stained-glass peacocks that flank the open doorway between the living room and the music room were added by the Laukhuff Stained Glass Company of Memphis in 1974.\n\n13. Also in 1974, Elvis remodeled two basement hang-out rooms. Painted and decorated in yellow and black, the \"TV Room\" is notable for the three television sets built into the south wall, so Elvis could watch all three commercial networks at once (presumably, he wasn't much of a PBS fan), and for the spooky white monkey statuette on its center table. (The figure inspired \"Porcelain Monkey,\" an Elvis lament by singer Warren Zevon: \"Hip-shakin', shoutin' in gold lamé/ That's how he earned his regal sobriquet/ Then he threw it all away/ For a porcelain monkey.\") Even more challenging to the eyeballs is the \"Pool Room,\" its claustrophobic interior dominated by a central pool table and its walls and low ceiling covered in close to 400 yards of vividly multi-colored pleated fabric.\n\n14. On Nov. 24, 1976, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis' contemporary and onetime rock-and-roll rival, was arrested at about 3 a.m. outside Graceland, after he drove up to the gates in his Lincoln Continental Mark IV and demanded to see Elvis, while \"screaming and yelling and waving a Derringer in the air\" (according to the testimony of a guard at the gates, as quoted in The Commercial Appeal). Police confirmed that the Killer's \"two-shot .38 caliber Derringer\" was loaded (as, apparently, was Lewis).\n\n15. A less troublesome trespasser was Bruce Springsteen, who, on April 29, 1976, after making his Memphis concert debut at the old Ellis Auditorium, took a taxi to Graceland, accompanied by E Street Band guitar player \"Miami\" Steve Van Zandt. According to an oft-repeated story, when the Boss saw a light on inside the mansion, he had an urge to meet the King. As Springsteen told a concert crowd in 1985, when introducing a cover of Elvis' \"Follow That Dream\": \"I said, 'Steve, man, I gotta go check it out.' And I jumped up over the wall and I started runnin' up the driveway, which when I look back on it now was kind of a stupid thing to do because I hate it when people do it at my house... Guards came out of the woods and they asked me what I wanted. And I said, 'Is Elvis home?' Then they said, 'No, no, Elvis isn't home, he's in Lake Tahoe'. [Which was true.] So, I started to tell 'em that I was a guitar player and that I had my own band, and that we played in town that night, and that I made some records. And I even told 'em I had my picture on the cover of Time and Newsweek. I had to pull out all the stops to try to make an impression, you know. I don't think he believed me, though, 'cause he just kinda stood there noddin' and then he took me by the arm and put me back out on the street with Steve.\"\n\n16. In addition to rock-and-rollers, Graceland attracted many animals. Pets owned by Elvis included Scatter, a chimpanzee, and Bambi, a squirrel monkey. Some exotic animal gifts were donated to the Memphis Zoo, including two wallabies, sent by Australian fans.\n\n17. The animals with the longest history at Graceland were horses. Elvis' reputed favorite was Rising Sun, a golden palomino. Mare Ingram was a mare, named after Memphis Mayor William B. Ingram. Some other horses owned by Elvis and housed in Graceland's air-conditioned barn included Flaming Star, Thundercloud, Star Trek and a Tennessee Walking Horse named Ebony's Double, which was the last horse Elvis bought.\n\nBAZ LUHRMANN'S'ELVIS' :'Elvis' movie shakes up Cannes. Here's what critics and the Presleys are saying.\n\nGRACELAND EXHIBITS:Elvis is 'Dressed to Rock': New exhibit of King's stage costumes opens at Graceland\n\n18. After rigging the Jungle Room into a home studio, Elvis made his final recordings inside Graceland, in February and October 1976. Featuring members of his touring band, including such legends as guitarist James Burton and drummer Ronnie Tutt, the sessions provided the foundation for the singer's last two studio albums, \"From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee\" and \"Moody Blue\" (which was released less than a month before the singer's death), and yielded the last three Top 40 pop chart singles of his lifetime: \"Hurt,\" \"Moody Blue\" and \"Way Down.\"\n\n19. Built in 1975, the two-story racquetball building behind the mansion contained an upright piano. Elvis sat at that piano not long before he died on Aug. 16, 1977, performing \"Unchained Melody\" and \"Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain.\" Later, upstairs at Graceland, Elvis' girlfriend, Ginger Alden, discovered Presley on his bathroom floor. He was taken to Baptist Hospital on Union Avenue and pronounced dead.\n\n20. Elvis' funeral was held on Aug. 18, 1977, at Graceland. The eulogy was delivered by Jackie Kahane, a standup comic who opened many Presley concerts in the 1970s. At Vernon Presley's request, a public viewing of the body was held in the foyer of the mansion the day before, attracting 10,000 to 25,000 mourners. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of other fans congregated during the week along Elvis Presley Boulevard.\n\n21. Originally interred about four miles north of Graceland inside the Forest Hill Cemetery Midtown mausoleum on Elvis Presley Boulevard, the bodies of Elvis and his mother, Gladys Presley, were moved to the Meditation Garden at Graceland on Oct. 2, 1977. The move came after the Aug. 29 arrest of three men in a plot to steal Elvis' body from Forest Hill and hold it for ransom. With its circular pool, fountains, stained-glass panels and Ancient World-looking columns, the Meditation Garden had been constructed in 1964 and '65.\n\n22. Five people are buried in the Meditation Garden. Using the spellings that appear on the grave markers, these people include Elvis Aaron Presley (\"Aron\" is the way the name appears on Elvis' birth certificate, marriage certificate and driver's licenses); Elvis' father, Vernon Elvis Presley; his mother, Gladys Love Smith Presley; his grandmother, Minnie Mae Presley; and the grandson he never met, Benjamin Storm Presley Keough, the son of Elvis' daughter, Lisa Marie Presley. The Garden also contains a marker for Elvis' stillborn twin, Jessie Garon Presley, who was buried in an unmarked grave in Tupelo. (\"Jessie\" is spelled \"Jesse\" in most other sources.)\n\n23. The gravesite is the focus of the annual Candlelight Vigil that draws thousands of fans to Graceland every year, to promenade to the Meditation Garden on the anniversary of Elvis' death. The vigil originally was a fan-generated event, but it soon was embraced by Elvis Presley Enterprises and made the centerpiece of Graceland's annual \"Elvis Week\" August activities. The first vigil was held in 1978, when fans from the Austin, Texas-based Elvis Country Fan Club traveled to Graceland to pay their respects to the King by lighting candles outside the gates.\n\n24. Family members continued to live at Graceland after Elvis' death, including Vernon Presley, who died in 1979, and Minnie Mae Presley, who died in 1980. But the hardiest post-Elvis Graceland resident was Delta Mae Presley Biggs, known to family and fans alike as \"Aunt Delta.\" The sister of Vernon Presley, Aunt Delta moved to Graceland in 1966, after the death of her husband, and continued to live in the mansion even after it was opened to the public, until her death on July 29, 1993, at 74. During this time, the Graceland kitchen and bedroom frequented by Delta remained off-limits to tourists; they were added to the tour after her death.\n\n25. Graceland was opened to the public on June 7, 1982. Admission was $5. Attendance through the end of that year exceeded 330,000 — well above projections. Now, the cheapest available Graceland ticket that includes the mansion tour is $77 (or $44 for a kid, 5-10); yearly attendance is about 500,000.\n\n26. On Feb. 22, 1984, Elvis’ two private jets — the Lisa Marie and the Hound Dog II — arrived in Memphis and were transported down Elvis Presley Boulevard to their present location, across the street from the mansion. The Lisa Marie is a Convair 880 with a cruising speed of about 615 mph that seats about 28 people; Elvis bought it from Delta Airlines in 1975 for $250,000 and fitted it with a private bedroom with a queen-size bed; four televisions; and a 52-speaker stereo system. The Hound Dog II, which can host only about 10 passengers, is a Lockheed JetStar.\n\n27. In 1994, the live tour guides that had been a fixture at Graceland were replaced by \"audio guides\" — audiotapes with headphones that visitors wear as they tour the mansion. The audio guides are available in nine languages: English, German, Italian, Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese and French.\n\n28. On May 30, 2016, Graceland welcomed its 20 millionth visitor since its conversion to a tourist attraction. Accompanied by husband Robert Greenoak, Tiffany Greenoak, 31, of London, England, was designated lucky No. 20,000,000. “We played Elvis music at our wedding, so for us as a couple, this trip to Memphis has tremendous meaning,\" said Mrs. Greenoak. The couple was given a private tour and received a congratulatory phone call from Priscilla Presley, who was married to Elvis from 1967 to 1973. (Priscilla's wedding took place not at Graceland but at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas.)\n\nELVIS IN THE MOVIES:Elvis is still a movie star. Here's a guide to his screen 'appearances'\n\nELVIS FANS:'Elvis has the perfect face': This Tennessee artist has created 20,000 images of the King\n\n29. On June 30, 2006, President George W. Bush became the first sitting U.S. President to visit Graceland when he, first lady Laura Bush and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi took a private tour of the mansion, led by Priscilla Presley and Lisa Marie. The reason: Koizumi — who shares Elvis' Jan. 8 birthday — is a Presley superfan. According to press reports, he said visiting Graceland was like a \"dream,\" and serenaded the Bushes and Presleys during the tour with song snippets, crooning, \"Hold me close, hold me tight,\" and \"Love me tender.\"\n\n30. As chronicled on the \"Celebrity Visitors to Graceland\" snapshot gallery on the Elvis website, other notables who have visited Graceland in recent years include — to name just a few — Dua Lipa, Vanilla Ice, Tom Brokaw, Gilbert Gottfried, Dolph Lundgren, Chris Tucker, Taylor Swift, Lana Del Rey, Bill Nye (the Science Guy), demonic Kiss bassist Gene Simmons, the Foo Fighters and the pre-divorce duo of Russell Brand and Katy Perry. (Not pictured: Prince William and Prince Harry, who visited Graceland in 2014.)\n\n31. Paul McCartney visited Graceland on May 26, 2013, and tweeted a picture of himself leaving a guitar pick on Elvis' grave. He reportedly told onlookers the gesture was \"so Elvis can play in heaven.\"\n\n32. The 450-room Guest House at Graceland opened on Oct. 27, 2016, north of the mansion on Elvis Presley Boulevard. The hotel space includes a 464-seat theater and four bars and restaurants. It effectively replaced the 128-room Heartbreak Hotel, a remodeled 1986 Wilson World lodge that Graceland remodeled and reopened in 1999.\n\n33. A casualty of Graceland expansion was the so-called Graceland Crossing shopping plaza, an L-shaped strip mall of independent Elvis souvenir shops located across the street and to the north of the mansion. A popular Elvis Week hangout for fans, who gathered in a tent in the plaza parking lot to listen to performances by tribute artists (this reporter once ran into Jackson Browne there), the space was bought by Graceland and closed in 2017.\n\n34. Located in a secluded space between the Guest House and the mansion, the Graceland Chapel in the Woods lived up to its \"Love Me Tender\" mission on Aug. 13, 2018, when Memphis-based Elvis fans Julie Guardado and Marc Caudel — who had met during Elvis Week 2015 — became the first couple to be married in the then-new chapel.\n\n35. Also among the structures now on the grounds of Graceland is the Elvis Presley archive: a climate-controlled cinderblock building that houses much of the estate's estimated 1.5 million documents, photographs, wardrobe items, musical instruments and other Elvis-connected objects.\n\n36. The ambitious centerpiece of an attempt to expand the Elvis experience beyond the mansion, Elvis Presley’s Memphis opened on March 2, 2017. Located on the Graceland campus across the street from the house, the $45 million, 40-acre complex includes restaurants, shops, exhibit space and The Soundstage at Graceland, which has become one of the city's busiest venues, hosting concerts by such artists as Tanya Tucker, X, the Monkees (with Michael Nesmith, just two months before his death) and the other Elvis, Costello.\n\n37. Graceland is closed to visitors only on Thanksgiving and Christmas. However, on March 20, 2020, Graceland closed — like many public places in Shelby County — due to Health Department mandates related to the coronavirus pandemic. It reopened May 21, with a number of whimsical Elvis-themed cautions in place. \"Don't Forget to Social Distance\" counseled the campus' illustrated signs, which represented the recommended six-feet-of-separation as a measurement equal to \"6 teddy bears,\" \"3 hound dogs,\" \"2 guitars\" or \"1 Elvis.\"\n\n38. Excluding the Guest House, Graceland has 231 employees — 160 of whom work fulltime.\n\n39. In 2018, the Hallmark Channel holiday movie \"Christmas at Graceland,\" starring American Idol contestant turned country music hit-maker Kellie Pickler, became the first fiction film to be shot on the grounds of the Elvis Presley estate. A ratings smash for the channel, it inspired two HCU (Hallmark Cinematic Universe) follow-ups, \"Wedding at Graceland\" and \"Christmas at Graceland: Home for the Holidays.\"\n\n40. From its 1982 public opening through May 2022, Graceland has attracted just under 23 million visitors, according to figures supplied by Graceland. With some 600,000 \"guests\" per year, the Elvis estate is the second most-visited \"house museum\" in the United States, according to Forbes. The first is the White House.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/06/02"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/50-states/2022/09/28/prairie-power-beer-pig-bystander-honor-news-around-states/50782545/", "title": "Prairie power, beer pig, bystander honor: News from around our 50 ...", "text": "From USA TODAY Network and wire reports\n\nAlabama\n\nMobile: A coastal environmental group filed suit Monday trying to block a decision by Alabama Power Co. to leave millions of tons of coal ash along a riverside in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta, where opponents say a spill could devastate a huge ecosystem. The federal lawsuit by Mobile Baykeeper was filed by the Southern Environmental Law Center, which announced plans to sue the electrical utility in July. The group wants to force Alabama Power to give up what it contends is an illegal plan to permanently leave more than 21 million tons of coal ash in an unlined pit at Plant Barry, located north of Mobile along the Mobile River. Environmentalists argue the ash pond is polluting groundwater and could destroy a verdant, biologically diverse region should it be breached by heavy flooding, a hurricane or some other disaster. “Plant Barry is the only coal ash lagoon of a major utility left in a low-lying coastal area of the Southeast that is not already cleaned up or on track to be recycled or removed to safe storage, away from waterways,” Barry Brock, director of the law center’s Alabama office, said in a statement. Alabama Power declined to comment on the lawsuit. Plant Barry opened in 1965 about 25 miles north of Mobile. The company contends moving the material farther away from the plant site would pose a hazard in itself.\n\nAlaska\n\nAnchorage: A U.S. Coast Guard ship on routine patrol in the Bering Sea came across a guided missile cruiser from China, officials said Monday. But it turned out the cruiser wasn’t alone as it sailed about 86 miles north of Alaska’s Kiska Island on Sept. 19. The patrol boat, known as a cutter called Kimball, later discovered there were two other Chinese naval ships and four Russian naval vessels, including a destroyer, all in single formation. The Honolulu-based Kimball, a 418-foot vessel, observed as the ships broke formation and dispersed. A C-130 Hercules provided air support for the Kimball from the Coast Guard station in Kodiak. “While the formation has operated in accordance with international rules and norms, we will meet presence with presence to ensure there are no disruptions to U.S. interests in the maritime environment around Alaska,” Rear Adm. Nathan Moore, Seventeenth Coast Guard District commander said. The Coast Guard said Operation Frontier Sentinel guidelines call for meeting “presence with presence” when strategic competitors operate in and around U.S. waters. The Kimball will continue to monitor the area. The Chinese and Russian formation came a month after NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg warned about China’s interest in the Arctic and Russia’s military buildup there.\n\nArizona\n\nPhoenix: A massive expansion of the state’s private school voucher system will likely go into effect after public school advocates failed to gather enough signatures to block the law, a conservative think tank that supports the expansion said Monday. The Goldwater Institute, a conservative and libertarian public policy think tank in Phoenix, said Save Our Schools Arizona “submitted just 88,866 signatures, according to petition sheets made available by the Secretary of State’s office.” That’s “significantly short of the requisite 118,843 signatures needed to overturn the reform via ballot referendum.” Although Save Our Schools Arizona said it “will await accurate numbers” from the Secretary of State’s office regarding its challenge to the law, the head of the grassroots group acknowledged it’s probably well below the threshold. Monday’s developments appear to be a major victory for “school choice” advocates in Arizona and across the nation who argue that parents should be able to use public tax dollars to send their children to schools that best serve their needs. Voucher opponents say they drain money from long-underfunded public schools that serve the vast majority of children, sending public money to unaccountable private and religious schools and mainly benefiting the wealthy.\n\nArkansas\n\nFort Smith: Deer season for archery is underway in western Arkansas, though drought may have affected the population and growth of deer this summer. A healthy population of deer and bear has been noted by those in the field during the opening days since the season began Saturday. Lack of vegetation can affect growth of deer during a drought. Young bucks may have smaller antlers, wildlife experts say, should the drought persist. That has not been the case in Arkansas this year. But the deer harvest this year in western Arkansas should be strong because the drought did not start until mid- to late June, said Ralph Meeker, the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission’s statewide deer program coordinator. The does were able to produce enough milk for fawns that can adapt. The number of deer harvested could increase because visibility increases for hunters when drought causes foliage to die off, taking away the cover for the deer. But the deer so far are healthy, Meeker said. Antler growth has not been affected, he has observed. “Whitetail deer are a very adaptable species,” Meeker said. “We had a good growing season before the drought started in mid to late June. Fawn production was phenomenal.” The bear population – for which archery season is underway – has also reportedly increased this year in western Arkansas.\n\nCalifornia\n\nSacramento: Beyond what they learn academically in kindergarten, students learn everyday routines: how to take care of class materials and how to be kind to their peers, according to Golden Empire Elementary School kindergarten teacher Carla Randazzo. And nearly two-thirds of students at the Sacramento school are English learners. “Those kids just start out having to climb uphill,” she said. “They need a lot of support to be successful.” Randazzo always thought it was “peculiar” that kindergarten is not mandatory in the state. For now, though, California won’t join 20 other states with mandatory kindergarten. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, vetoed legislation Sunday night that would have required children to attend kindergarten – whether through home-schooling or public or private school – before entering first grade at a public school. As he has with other recent legislative vetoes, Newsom cited the costs associated with providing mandatory kindergarten, about $268 million annually, which he said was not accounted for in the California budget. Newsom had supported similar legislation in the past. Proponents of mandatory kindergarten say it could help close the academic opportunity gap for low-income students and students of color, as well as help children develop important social skills before the first grade. Kindergarten enrollment in California dropped nearly 12% in the 2020-21 academic year compared to the previous year, according to the state Department of Education.\n\nColorado\n\nLoveland: A bystander who intervened during the rough arrest of an elderly woman with dementia has been recognized as the only one who “did the right thing.” Reidesel Mendoza had stopped his car to confront the police officers arresting 73-year-old Karen Garner on June 26, 2020, because “the way they were handling that situation was not the right way,” he said in an interview Sept. 17, after receiving a citizenship award for his actions that day. Garner was accused of leaving Walmart without paying for $13.88 worth of merchandise, but staff stopped her and retrieved the items before she left. Garner was walking home when Officer Austin Hopp stopped her, soon forcing Garner to the ground and trying to arrest her. Mendoza saw how Hopp and two other officers were treating Garner and decided he needed to intervene. “Do you have to use that much aggression?” Mendoza could be heard saying in Hopp’s body camera footage. Hopp told him: “Get out of here; this is not your business ... this is what happens when you fight the police.” Mendoza continued to speak up. The award was presented in part by the Community Trust Commission, formed by the Loveland City Council to aid in rebuilding trust with the community and its police department. Interim Loveland Police Chief Eric Stewart applauded Mendoza’s courage in stepping up that day and said the public plays a key role in successful policing. “We certainly didn’t do a great job that day,” Stewart said. “I’m sorry we let you down that day.”\n\nConnecticut\n\nWaterbury: Ian Hockley testified Tuesday that he was ridiculed online as a “party boy” and an actor after posting a video of the memorial service for his 6-year-old son, who was killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook school massacre. Hockley is the latest family member of the 26 victims of the shooting to testify at the defamation trial of Alex Jones, in which a jury is deciding how much the conspiracy theorist must pay for spreading the lie that the shooting was a hoax. Hockley, who lost his autistic son, Dylan, in the shooting, testified that he became the target of conspiracy theorists because he smiled during what he found as an uplifting memorial service. “That is what that video started to attract is people saying this must be fake,” he said. “ ‘He’s an actor. He’s smiling. Oh, you’re out of character’ – all of those things started to appear until we took our video down.” Earlier in the trial, other victims’ relatives gave often emotional testimony describing how they endured death threats, in-person harassment and abusive comments on social media by people calling the shooting a hoax. Some moved to avoid the abuse. The jury of six will determine how much in damages Jones and Infowars’ parent company, Free Speech Systems, should pay relatives of five children and three adults killed at the school for saying the shooting didn’t happen and inflicting emotional distress. An FBI agent who responded to the shooting also is a plaintiff.\n\nDelaware\n\nWilmington: A man was killed when he was pinned beneath a truck, police said. Officers were called to Beehler Court in the Wilmington area Sunday for a report of a person hit by a vehicle, New Castle County Police said in a news release. When officers arrived, they found a 46-year-old man pinned beneath a Ford F-350 pickup truck, police said. Officers and paramedics tried to resuscitate the man, but their efforts were unsuccessful, and police said he was pronounced dead on the scene. The initial investigation revealed that the man got out of the truck while it was still in gear, and he was hit by the truck, then became pinned beneath it, police said. His body was turned over to the Delaware Division of Forensic Sciences.\n\nDistrict of Columbia\n\nWashington: First lady Jill Biden paid tribute Friday to Jacqueline Kennedy, a predecessor 60 years ago, for her pivotal role in preventing the teardown of historic buildings on iconic Lafayette Square near the White House. Biden helped the White House Historical Association, an organization that Kennedy helped spearhead, unveil a medallion of the former first lady, designed by American artist Chas Fagan, in front of the association’s office on the square. The wife of President John F. Kennedy is widely credited with ushering in an emphasis on historic preservation at the White House during her 1,036 days as first lady. Lafayette Square, just north of the White House, over the years has become a gathering place for protesters, from suffragists in the early 20th century to Vietnam demonstrators in the 1960s to Americans speaking out for policing reform in 2020. In quieter daily times, it is a city oasis for tourists and for office workers on lunch breaks. The bas relief of Kennedy sits in a new garden at the front of the association’s office, known as Decatur House. It includes one of her best-known quotations: “The White House belongs to the American people.” Jill Biden said Kennedy worked to save the park and surrounding historic townhouses “because we all deserve to experience our rich history, the full, complex and beautiful story of who we are.”\n\nFlorida\n\nFort Lauderdale: Prosecutors in the penalty trial of school shooter Nikolas Cruz began their rebuttal of the defense case Tuesday by showing the jury swastikas he drew on a gun magazine and his boots, his online racism and misogyny, and his online searches for child pornography. Prosecutors are trying to show that Cruz’s murder of 17 people at Parkland’s Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School four years ago was driven by antisocial personality disorder – commonly known as being a sociopath – and not fetal alcohol spectrum disorder as the defense contends. Cruz, 24, pleaded guilty last October to the Feb. 14, 2018, murders – the trial is only to decide whether he is sentenced to death or life without the possibility of parole. Detective Nick Masters, an online investigator, then testified about racist and sexist searches and comments Cruz made starting about eight months before the shootings. Circuit Judge Elizabeth Scherer only allowed prosecutors to present a fraction of the searches and comments Cruz made, saying more would be excessively prejudicial. Jurors were told Cruz wrote that “the Nazi party will rise again.” He made searches and comments using a racial slur directed against Black people. He wrote that he punched his widowed mother and called her a slur used against women. He wrote that “women are less important than a dog.” He also made comments extolling animal abuse, saying he had killed 12 cats and writing: “I am glad when animals die. It makes me happy.”\n\nGeorgia\n\nAtlanta: State regulators began hearings Tuesday on Georgia Power Co.’s request to raise rates by 12% over the next three years, setting up clashes over how much profit the utility should earn, how much solar panel owners should be paid and how rates should be structured. The five elected members of the Public Service Commission are scheduled to decide in December on the company’s request to collect a cumulative $2.8 billion more from its 2.3 million customers beginning in January. Changes are likely before any vote. The company says it needs more money to improve the grid, retire old coal plants, acquire electricity from new sources and upgrade customer-facing computer systems. A residential customer who uses 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per month pays Georgia Power an average of $128 a month now, the company has said. Under the plan, that would rise by $14.32 a month in 2023, reaching a total of $16.29 more over the three-year period. That’s nearly $200 a year more by 2025. However, electricity bills are likely to go up even more. Commissioners have already approved plans for the company to increase rates by $3.78 a month when the first of two new nuclear units being built at Plant Vogtle starts generating electricity, likely early next year. A bigger increase could follow the second new reactor coming online, possibly in 2024.\n\nHawaii\n\nHonolulu: A man pleaded not guilty Monday to charges he kidnapped and sexually assaulted a 15-year-old girl and forced her to smoke meth. Duncan Mahi, 52, also requested a trial by jury. Judge Wendy M. DeWeese maintained bail for Mahi at $2 million and set his trial date for Feb. 7. According to an indictment filed Wednesday, Duncan forced the girl to tie up her boyfriend at a Anaehoomalu Beach in Waikoloa, put a knife to her throat and kidnapped her. He’s charged with 11 counts, including kidnapping, terroristic threatening, robbery, sexual assault and methamphetamine trafficking. If found guilty, he could face life in prison without the possibility of parole because he was convicted twice for two separate 2018 cases of terroristic threatening. Police issued an Maile Amber Alert, similar to the Amber Alert for missing children in other states, shortly after the girl’s kidnapping on Sept. 16. Police said the girl managed to get free one day later after she convinced Mahi to take her to a restaurant in Hilo to get something to eat, and people recognized her from the alert.\n\nIdaho\n\nBoise: Universities across the state are warning staffers not to refer students to abortion providers, and at least one public university is barring employees from telling students how to obtain emergency contraception or birth control as well. It’s the latest restriction in a state that already holds some of the strictest abortion laws in the nation. “This is going to have a very broad impact,” said Mike Satz, an attorney and former faculty member and interim dean at the University of Idaho’s College of Law. “It’s going to have a very strong chilling effect on free speech, and it’s going to scare people. I’m afraid it’s going to scare people from going to school here or sending their kids to school at Idaho institutions.” The prohibition against referring students to abortion providers or “promoting” abortion in any way comes from the “No Public Funds for Abortion Act,” passed by Idaho’s Republican-led Legislature in 2021. Boise State University, like the University of Idaho, told faculty members in a newsletter earlier this month that they could face felony charges for violating the law. Idaho State University did not respond to messages asking if it had issued similar guidance. The law also bars staffers and school-based health clinics from dispensing or telling students where to obtain emergency contraception, such as the Plan B pill, except for in cases of rape.\n\nIllinois\n\nSpringfield: Gov. J.B. Pritzker said Tuesday that the state’s relatively low jobless rate will help him keep his promise to pay off coronavirus-era debt in the Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund by year’s end. The Democrat announced he will transfer $450 million from the account set aside to pay jobless benefits toward the debt that ballooned to $4.5 billion during business closures forced by COVID-19. That decreases the remaining balance of the federal loan to $1.8 billion, which Pritzker pledged will be eliminated by the new year. Illinois joined dozens of other states in borrowing money to pay unemployment claims, which in Illinois surged in spring 2020 to levels not seen since 1982. “With the COVID-19 pandemic came a disaster of a different kind,” Pritzker said at a Chicago news conference. “All across the United States, to make sure eligible individuals could get access to unemployment benefits, extraordinary measures were taken by state unemployment trust funds because nearly none … were funded enough to cover that kind of an emergency.” The General Assembly, controlled by Democrats, and Pritzker agreed last spring to use $2.7 billion in federal pandemic relief funds to more than halve the debt. Republicans argued for paying the entire balance with federal money while it was available.\n\nIndiana\n\nIndianapolis: The Satanic Temple is suing the state on claims a near-total abortion ban violates the rights of its Hoosier members who want abortions after their birth control failed. A lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana by the Massachusetts-based religious association says it brought the lawsuit on behalf of anonymous women from Indiana who say they became pregnant by accident despite using contraceptives. Gov. Eric Holcomb and Indiana Attorney General Todd Rokita are listed as defendants. The new law bans abortions except in cases of rape or incest up to 10 weeks post-fertilization, when pregnancy poses a risk to the life or long-term health of the mother, or in cases of fatal fetal anomalies. Enforcement of the law was put on hold last week by a Monroe County judge who found that it may violate the Indiana Constitution. Rokita has already appealed the judge’s decision. The Satanic Temple has more than 11,300 members in Indiana, according to its lawsuit. The group “venerates, but does not worship,” the allegorical Satan as featured in the 17th-century epic poem “Paradise Lost” by John Milton. Members follow a set of tenets including the belief that a person’s body is subject to their will and their will alone, the lawsuit says, and that beliefs should “conform to one’s best scientific understanding of the world.”\n\nIowa\n\nDes Moines: Cattle producer Bryan Sievers thinks the black-eyed Susans, purple coneflowers and native grasses in his eastern Iowa prairie can help warm homes and tackle water pollution, erosion and other pressing environmental problems in the state. Thanks to a five-year, $80 million federal grant, Sievers will work with Missouri business Roeslein Alternative Energy, Iowa State University and a dozen other groups to test whether U.S. farmers can make money turning prairies and manure into renewable fuel. Sievers and his partners plan to mix harvested prairie, cover crops and conservation grassland with cattle manure in an anaerobic digester to make renewable natural gas that will go into a pipeline that feeds homes and businesses or be compressed to power trucks and other vehicles. The project is one of 70 that the U.S. Department of Agriculture recently awarded $2.8 billion, a total the federal agency nearly tripled after receiving about 450 requests. The projects seek to create new carbon markets that pay farmers for work to reduce the environmental impact of commodities like corn, soybeans, beef and pork. Sievers and his partners expect their project will help pave the way for more on-farm digesters that can reduce odor from cattle, pig and other livestock operations; cut harmful methane, carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions; and encourage farmers to plant prairies, conservation reserve grasses and annual cover crops on marginal farmland, as well as buffers along rivers, lakes and streams.\n\nKansas\n\nWichita: A man was sentenced Monday to 18 months in prison for his role in a hoax phone call that led police to shoot and kill an innocent man in 2017. Shane Gaskill was sentenced after pleading guilty in May to wire fraud, KSN reports. He was originally placed on probation but faced renewed prosecution after violating the terms of his probation. Prosecutors said Gaskill got into an argument in December 2017 with Ohio gamer Casey Viner over a $1.50 bet. Using an old Wichita address Gaskill had given him, Viner persuaded Tyler Barris in Los Angeles to call Wichita police and say a kidnapping and shooting had happened at the address, prosecutors said. It’s called “swatting,” a form of retaliation in which someone makes a false report to police to send first responders, including SWAT teams, to someone’s address. Andrew Finch, 28, who lived at the address, was shot and killed by police after he opened the front door to see what was going on outside. Barris was sentenced to 20 years in prison after pleading guilty to 51 counts of making fake emergency calls and threats around the country, including the one that led to Finch’s death. Viner served 15 months in prison after pleading guilty to conspiracy and obstruction of justice.\n\nKentucky\n\nFrankfort: The state Supreme Court ruled Thursday that a woman who shoplifted about $80 worth of items from a Walmart self-checkout station should not face a felony that carries five to 10 years in prison – a punishment that Attorney General Daniel Cameron defended. All seven justices instead agreed with the Kentucky Court of Appeals, which had said it was “inherently unfair to convict somebody of a class C felony for theft of goods worth $80,” and the high court sent the case back to Pulaski Circuit Court, where a jury had initially found Chasity Shirley guilty of “unlawful access to a computer.” Shirley, 34, will now likely receive a directed verdict, which would see her felony conviction dismissed in court. While shopping in 2018 at a Walmart in Somerset, Shirley pulled what retailers call a “switcheroo” by switching the bar codes from a toothbrush holder with those from a more expensive children’s rug and slipcover before checking herself out of the store. A loss-control associate caught her, and the cost difference between the item she paid for and the two items she tried to take was $80.80. She also allegedly “pushed and elbowed” a loss prevention manager as she exited the store but was later found not guilty of a fourth-degree assault charge at trial, the Kentucky Supreme Court noted.\n\nLouisiana\n\nNew Orleans: A social services nonprofit long called the Kingsley House renamed itself Tuesday, dropping the name of a Victorian clergyman who is perhaps best remembered as the author of a children’s fantasy novel but held profoundly racist views. For 126 years it was Kingsley House, named both for author and social reformer Charles Kingsley and for the founder’s son Kingsley Warner, who died as a toddler. Now the nonprofit will be called Clover. Officials knew Charles Kingsley had been a chaplain to Queen Victoria, tutor to the boy who became King George V, and had written about 20 books. “And he was quote-unquote a social reformer who helped create the settlement house movement,” said Keith Liederman, CEO of Clover, shortly before Tuesday’s announcement. The Rev. Beverly Warner of New Orleans’ Trinity Episcopal Church founded Kingsley House in 1896 as a settlement house, an inner-city institution dedicated to fighting poverty. The organization’s programs now help children in need, families and community. Its prominence made it a stop in Democrat John Edwards’ unsuccessful campaign for president in 2007. Its community outreach was why former Presidents Bill Clinton and George Bush visited there in 2006 to announce $9.7 million in grants to help victims of Hurricane Katrina.\n\nMaine\n\nPortland: Congressional candidates in a hotly contested race snipped at each other Tuesday about a contribution from the leader of a conservation group that has discouraged consumers from buying lobster. Democratic U.S. Rep. Jared Golden is defending his seat in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District against Republican former U.S. Rep. Bruce Poliquin and independent candidate Tiffany Bond. Poliquin’s campaign on Tuesday called on Golden to return a contribution of $667 from Julie Packard, the executive director of Seafood Watch. The group based at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in California that Packard helped found added American and Canadian lobster to its “red list” of seafood species to avoid this summer because of the risk fishing gear poses to endangered whales. Poliquin’s camp said that listing has caused economic hardship for fishermen in Maine, where most of the nation’s domestic lobster comes to the docks. “Seafood Watch’s warning to consumers to avoid Maine lobster, on top of forty-year high inflation and fuel prices, have gouged Maine lobstermen’s paychecks,” said Roy Matthews, a Poliquin spokesperson. Golden’s campaign said he has no intention to return the money and cited Golden’s opposition to new National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration whale protection regulations as evidence that he has the fishing industry’s interests at heart.\n\nMaryland\n\nAnnapolis: A judge granted an emergency petition Friday filed by the Maryland State Board of Elections to enable the counting of mail-in ballots earlier than they were during the state’s July primary. Montgomery County Circuit Court Judge James Bonifant granted the petition, which will allow local elections officials across the state to begin canvassing mail-in ballots on Oct. 1. Bonifant wrote that with so many mail-in ballots, local boards of election would not be able to verify the vote count within 10 days of the general election as required. “There is no doubt that the increased number of mail-in ballots will have an enormous affect on the process of this election,” Bonifant wrote in his ruling. “Mandatory deadlines will be missed if the Court takes no action.” The state elections board said the ruling provides election officials with additional time to canvass and tabulate mail-in ballots to ensure that all critical election-related deadlines established by law are met. “It also enables elections officials to return to a well-established process of canvassing mail-in ballots prior to Election Day, which was allowed in the 2020 General Election,” the board said in a statement.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nProvincetown: A Harwich pig that had long been overshadowed by a diva sibling has risen to celebrity status and beer label glory. A stirring portrait of Bartholomew, a 200-pound half-Julianna, half-mini pig, now graces the cans of a new offering from the Provincetown Brewing Co. The high hog honor has not affected Bart one bit. “He’s kind of like an old man in a sport coat with sneakers on,” owner Emma Bankman said. “He doesn’t care what anyone thinks.” “Bartholobrew,” billed as “a classic wheat ale with sweet, caramelly notes,” is the frothy result of a summer-long pet label contest to benefit Provincetown’s Carrie A. Seaman Animal Shelter. Sherry Brec, CASAS board president, said there were more than 65 animal entries, and the donate-to-vote system generated more than $17,000 for the no-kill facility that places dogs and cats with folks on the Outer Cape. Meanwhile, in Harwich, Bartholomew has finally eclipsed the renown of his domineering half-sister Matilda. According to Bankman, Matilda has long been the boss hog in the house and often shuts the door on Bart, leaving him outside. And Matilda even tried to nose in on Bart’s bowl of celebratory Bartholobrew, a sudsy incursion that was nipped in the bud by an alert Bankman.\n\nMichigan\n\nDetroit: General Motors is stepping back a bit on a return-to-work policy after a backlash from salaried employees. CEO Mary Barra sent out a note to the salaried workforce Tuesday offering an apology of sorts for the timing of putting out a new policy late in the day Friday saying employees would have to return to working in the office three days a week. She said in the update that GM’s plan still will include a more regular in-person presence, but it will not implement any changes to its return-to-the-office policy this year as the company continues to listen to worker feedback. The plan still will ask employees to work in-office three days each week. “The initial letter was a notification, and the purpose of the update is to provide clarification and additional details,” GM spokeswoman Maria Raynal said Tuesday. “The timing has shifted slightly; however, the overall plan has not changed.” In Tuesday’s note sent to employees, Barra wrote: “We want to take the opportunity to address some of the questions, concerns, and misconceptions that we’ve heard. We acknowledge that the timing of the message, late on a Friday afternoon, was unfortunate. It was also unintentional.” GM will communicate more information on its plan next month, Barra said.\n\nMinnesota\n\nSt. Paul: Republicans attacked Democratic Gov. Tim Walz on Monday after a judge took the rare step of disputing the administration’s claim that the judge prevented the state from cutting off payments to Feeding Our Future, which is the target of a $250 million federal fraud case. The GOP candidates for governor, attorney general and state auditor – Scott Jensen, Jim Schultz and Ryan Wilson – said Walz and other top Democrats should have done more to stop the alleged fraud before it became what federal prosecutors last week called the largest pandemic-related fraud in the country. But the warring political sides disagree on how far Ramsey County District Judge John Guthmann went toward compelling the Minnesota Department of Education to resume payments to Feeding Our Future. A court statement issued late Friday said the judge “never issued an order” for the state to resume payments, but the department produced a hearing transcript showing the judge threatened to hold one attorney in contempt if the state failed to restore the flow of funds. The Republican candidates largely accepted the judge’s version of events. Jensen called for an independent investigation to report back before he and Walz hold their next debate Oct. 18.\n\nMississippi\n\nJackson: The federal government wants to work with officials in the city to reach a legal agreement that ensures Jackson can sustain its water system in the future, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan said Monday. Federal attorneys also sent a letter to city officials Monday threatening legal action if Jackson does not agree to negotiations related to its water system. Regan returned to Mississippi’s capital city Monday to meet with Jackson officials about the city’s troubled water system. At the meeting with Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba and U.S. Assistant Attorney General Todd Kim, Regan said the federal government would work with the city to “deliver long overdue relief for Jackson residents.” “The people of Jackson, Mississippi, have lacked access to safe and reliable water for decades. After years of neglect, Jackson’s water system finally reached a breaking point this summer, leaving tens of thousands of people without any running water for weeks,” Regan said. “These conditions are unacceptable in the United States of America.” In a Monday letter sent to city officials and obtained by the news station WLBT-TV, Kim and attorneys for DOJ’s Environmental Enforcement Section said they were “prepared to file an action” against the city under the Safe Drinking Water Act but hoped the matter could be resolved through an “enforceable agreement.”\n\nMissouri\n\nSt. Louis: As abuse allegations mount against a Christian boarding school, the way “troubled” children are often whisked away to facilities far from home is under fire. Within what’s known as the secure transport industry, it’s called “gooning.” Brawny men show up under the cover of darkness and force a teenager into a vehicle, taking them against their will to a boarding school, foster home or treatment center. They might be restrained with handcuffs or zip ties. They could be blindfolded or hooded. Criminal charges are rare because the little-known industry is virtually unregulated. In Missouri alone, more than 100 Christian boarding schools promise hope for wayward teens. The former doctor at Agape Boarding School, in Stockton, which serves about 60 teenage boys, was charged last year with multiple counts of sexual abuse of children, and five staff members are charged with abuse. In nearby Humansville, Circle of Hope, a Christian boarding school for girls, closed amid an investigation in 2020. The husband-and-wife co-founders were charged with 99 abuse counts last year, including sexual abuse. The allegations of wrongdoing at Agape and Circle of Hope led state Rep. Keri Ingle, a Democrat, to sponsor a measure signed into law last year that requires more rigorous oversight in Missouri. Now, Ingle said she’ll seek stricter regulations on companies transporting the kids against their will.\n\nMontana\n\nKalispell: Authorities said Tuesday that they were investigating the shooting of a 6-month-old dog by a woman who skinned the animal and posted pictures of herself with the pelt, apparently believing she had killed a young wolf. The animal was among more than a dozen dogs that local residents reported abandoned last week on national forest land in northwestern Montana near Kalispell, according to the Flathead County Sheriff’s Office. The hunter who shot one of the dogs posted images of herself smiling on social media in front of the animal’s head and hide, which were taken by the sheriff’s office and turned over to a state wildlife biologist, said Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks spokesperson Greg Lemon. The biologist determined the remains belonged to a domestic dog about 6 months old, Lemon said. Officials were investigating if the woman was properly licensed to hunt wolves, he said. The sheriff’s office is investigating both the shooting of the dog and the abandonment of the other dogs but declined Tuesday to release any further information. Lemon said accurately identifying animals before they are shot is a core tenet of hunting. “The vast majority of hunters are very deliberate about when they pull the trigger that the animal in their sights is the animal they are licensed to hunt,” he said.\n\nNebraska\n\nLincoln: With Memorial Stadium on the cusp of its 100th anniversary, the University of Nebraska athletic department on Thursday set the stage for a massive renovation that will make the venue more fan-friendly for decades to come. University leaders also announced a new multimedia rights deal that would bring in more than $300 million over 15 years and said that alcohol would be sold at men’s and women’s basketball games at Pinnacle Bank Arena starting this season. The athletic department must get approval from the university Board of Regents, which is expected to approve the plans. The next board meeting is Friday. Nebraska is scheduled to open a $160 million football facility next year, and the Big Ten’s billion-dollar-a-year media rights deal announced this summer will bring unprecedented windfalls to league members. The announcements came less than two weeks after Nebraska began its search for a new football coach following the firing of Scott Frost. Athletic director Trev Alberts said discussions about stadium upgrades and the rights deal have been going on for months, and the timing is coincidental. The Cornhuskers have played in Memorial Stadium since 1923, and incremental improvements have been made over the years, including luxury suites in 1999 and an expansion to more than 85,000 seats in 2013.\n\nNevada\n\nLas Vegas: A dolphin habitat at a hotel on the Las Vegas Strip has been temporarily closed after the third mammal death at the attraction in five months. Officials at the Mirage Secret Garden and Habitat said an 11-year-old bottlenose dolphin named K2 died Saturday. The cause of death remains unclear, but officials told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that the mammal had been receiving treatment for a respiratory illness. They say Maverick, a 19-year-old bottlenose dolphin, died Sept. 2 following treatment for a lung infection, while 13-year-old Bella died in April after undergoing treatment for gastroenteritis. According to the international organization Alliance of Marine Mammal Parks and Aquariums’ website, a bottlenose dolphin’s life expectancy is about 28 to 29 years. Mirage interim President Franz Kallao said officials were working closely with veterinary and pathology experts to determine the cause of death for K2, who was born at the Secret Garden. “We are also working with additional outside veterinary, water quality, behavioral, animal welfare, and environmental experts to help us conduct a thorough review and inspection of both the animals and the facility,” Kallao said.\n\nNew Hampshire\n\nDover: A local woman who found herself with an unexpected inheritance and the desire to “do the most good” with the money is helping to make housing for domestic abuse survivors possible. She received more than half a million dollars following the sale of real estate her late uncle’s family business owned. Knowing her family was financially comfortable and living within their means, she did something unexpected: She became an angel investor with a $500,000 investment into Dover Housing Authority-owned property. This income assures the future of the Haven at the Falls project to house domestic abuse survivors, said Ryan Crosby, executive director of the authority. The investment will serve as seed funding to build the affordable housing units. The proposed six-unit apartment development is planned in the Dover Housing Authority’s Whittier Falls neighborhood. The new project was born out of a partnership between the Dover Housing Authority and Haven, a domestic and sexual violence prevention agency. “Our angel investor is a lot like me – frustrated with how little affordable housing there is and how little there is we can do about it,” Crosby said. “This investment allows us to both make a direct, measurable impact in that fight. We both share the belief that housing is a human right.”\n\nNew Jersey\n\nTrenton: After months of calls to eliminate a state-mandated expensive teacher licensing test blamed for worsening the teacher shortage, Gov. Phil Murphy did away with it – sort of. The Murphy administration said the educative Teacher Performance Assessment would no longer be required in New Jersey, but it must be replaced by a similar test to be used to certify graduates. Murphy issued a conditional veto Thursday to legislation that shifts the burden of certifying teachers from the state’s shoulders to the colleges that train them. Starting in spring 2024, colleges and universities will be required to use their own tests as a final step to certify graduates before they may join the workforce. The conditional veto was welcomed by many of the state’s education-related groups, including the state superintendents’ association, teachers’ unions and school principals’ associations. Some said Murphy waited too long to make a decision about the test. The New Jersey Education Association, the state’s largest teachers’ union, welcomed the move to remove the edTPA but indicated in its statement that the decision could have come earlier and that it continues to delay teacher candidates who are otherwise ready to start working.\n\nNew Mexico\n\nSanta Fe: Legislators are reconsidering how they evaluate complaints of sexual misconduct against colleagues, amid outrage about the handling of a complaint against an influential senator. A panel of leading lawmakers met Monday to discuss possible changes to ground rules for harassment investigations at the Legislature. “It has become clear that our anti-harassment policy is not working,” said Democratic state Rep. Daymon Ely of Corrales, co-chairman of a legislative ethics committee. “This is intended to start a discussion.” Harassment complaints against lawmakers are often assigned for an initial investigation to a panel of four legislators, which may deadlock on a 2-2 vote. Ely proposed the changes that would assign an outside expert to break any tie vote, with public notice of the outcome. Ely outlined proposals that would remove secrecy provisions that currently prevent people who complain of harassment by legislators from publicly discussing any investigation that has been dismissed without a finding of probable cause. “How do we fix that so that we have closure for those people?” said Democratic Sen. George Muñoz, of Gallup. “It can’t come out in a tie. There has to be closure for both sides.”\n\nNew York\n\nAlbany: State investigators have substantiated more than 1,600 instances of corporal punishment in New York schools over the past five years, The Times Union in Albany reports. A substantial number of the complaints were in New York City public schools, according to the newspaper. Other incidents included a substitute teacher in Watertown who was fired and arrested for grabbing a student by the throat and forcing him against a wall and a teaching assistant in Syracuse who was transferred and retrained for spanking a nonverbal student. Corporal punishment is generally banned and can be classified as child abuse. In all, the state Education Department documented nearly 18,000 complaints of corporal punishment in public and charter schools from 2016 through 2021, according to the Times Union. The newspaper said it found that school districts have underreported cases of corporal punishment to the federal government and that state Education Department records are not readily available to the public.\n\nNorth Carolina\n\nRaleigh: Four people pleaded guilty Monday to misdemeanors for their roles in absentee ballot fraud in rural North Carolina during the 2016 and 2018 elections. The convictions stemmed from an investigation that in part resulted in a do-over congressional election. Superior Court Judge Paul Ridgeway accepted the plea agreements, which resulted in no active prison or jail time, in Wake County court. Cases against six other defendants remained pending, with hearings scheduled through the end of next month, Wake County District Attorney Lorrin Freeman said. All 10 defendants, according to indictments handed up in 2019, had a common involvement with Leslie McCrae Dowless Jr., a longtime political operative in rural Bladen County. Dowless also was indicted on more than a dozen state charges, with his case scheduled last year to go to trial last month. He rejected a plea agreement and looked forward to his day in court, according to a friend. But he died in April after being diagnosed with lung cancer. Freeman said at the time that the prosecution of the other cases would continue. Dowless worked in the 2018 congressional race for then-Republican candidate Mark Harris, who appeared to have received the most votes in the general election for the 9th District seat in south-central North Carolina. But allegations against Dowless surfaced, and testimony and other information revealed at a State Board of Elections hearing described him running an illegal “ballot harvesting” operation.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nBismarck: A prison guard was fired over the suicide of a man who was serving life sentences for killing four people. Sgt. Deandre Adams violated corrections policy in failing to adequately check on Chad Isaak, according to a termination letter from the warden at North Dakota State Penitentiary. Adams was fired Thursday. Warden James Sayler noted that Adams had received two previous written reprimands, for failing to report that he had left a missing inmate in a recreational area and for not intervening when two prisoners were potentially exchanging contraband, the Bismarck Tribune reports. “Your credibility, professionalism, and the trust I had in you as a sergeant are irreparably damaged,” Sayler wrote. “This level of trust, which is expected of every team member, is something I no longer have in you, due to your misconduct.” Isaak, 48, died July 31. An investigative report from the state Highway Patrol released last month found that Adams said he failed to adequately check on Isaak twice. It also said Isaak had covered his cell with cardboard. Adams knew inmates were not allowed to cover their cell windows but allowed it as a “courtesy in case they were naked in their cells,” the report said. “He stated they could enforce it but that they would just get more window coverings.”\n\nOhio\n\nColumbus: The state has officially signed off on its biggest package of incentives tied to job creation – potentially totaling as much as $650 million over 30 years for Intel for its $20 billion investment in Licking County. The Ohio Tax Credit Authority on Monday approved the incentive package, one of six projects the panel approved. As is the case with most projects that come before the authority, there was little discussion about the Intel project before the four members approved it. The $650 million approved Monday is part of a total incentive package from Ohio to Intel that is expected to top $2 billion. Unlike the other state incentives for Intel, the one approved by the authority is based on how many jobs it creates. The incentive begins in 2024; Intel has said in anticipates production of semiconductors to begin in 2025. Intel announced in January its plan to create 3,000 jobs as part of its $20 billion investment in New Albany, the biggest single economic development project in state history. Those jobs will have an annual payroll of $405 million, according to Intel. Intel has said it expects to start recruiting this fall from college campus as it anticipates ramping up hiring in advance of the opening of the two plants.\n\nOklahoma\n\nOklahoma City: The state’s Pardon and Parole Board voted 4-1 Tuesday to deny clemency for a man sentenced to die for killing his 9-month-old daughter in 2002, moving him a step closer to his scheduled lethal injection next month. Attorneys for Benjamin Cole, 57, did not dispute that Cole killed Brianna Cole by forcibly bending the infant backward, breaking her spine and tearing her aorta, but they argued that he both is severely mentally ill and has a growing lesion on his brain that has continued to worsen while he has been in prison. Cole has refused medical attention and ignored his personal hygiene, hoarding food and living in a darkened cell with little to no communication with staff or fellow prisoners, his attorneys told the panel. “His condition has continued to decline over the course of this year,” Cole’s attorney Katrina Conrad-Legler said. The lesion on Cole’s brain, which is separate from his diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia, has grown in size in recent years and affects the part of his brain that deals with problem-solving, movement and social interaction, Conrad-Legler said. Cole declined to speak to the panel. Attorneys for the state and members of the victim’s family told the board that Cole’s symptoms of mental illness are exaggerated and that the brutal nature of his daughter’s killing merits his execution.\n\nOregon\n\nPortland: Two ships that have been abandoned in the Columbia River for years are being removed, and the U.S. Coast Guard is working with state agencies to clean up the fuel and oil that leaked from the vessels. The ships – a Navy tug called the Sakarissa and a Coast Guard cutter called the Alert – first arrived in Portland in 2006 and were brought near Hayden Island in hopes that they could be turned into a museum. But the funding for that project dried up, and they have been abandoned for more than a decade.Both of the ships sunk two years ago. Bill Ryan with the Oregon Department of State Lands said it’s not yet clear why the Alert sunk, but the Sakarissa foundered after someone salvaging metal cut through a pipe, causing it to flood. The Coast Guard raised the 100-foot Sakarissa from the river last week and towed it to a repair service to remove the remaining oil waste from the ship. Metro Council, a regional government agency that serves three counties in northwest Oregon, is spending $2 million to have the ships removed, and the Coast Guard is spending more than $1 million to clean up. The state estimates that there are more than 300 vessels abandoned around Oregon. Removing them all would cost an estimated $40 million.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nPhiladelphia: Mayor Jim Kenney signed an executive order Tuesday banning guns and deadly weapons from the city’s indoor and outdoor recreation spaces, including parks, basketball courts and pools. The order is the latest attempt by Philadelphia officials to regulate guns inside city limits – something made difficult by Pennsylvania’s preemption law that bars municipalities from enacting or enforcing their own stricter gun regulations. Attorneys for the city said the executive order is the city managing its facilities as a property owner, making it different from previous legislation passed by the City Council and struck down in court. The ceremonial signing also comes the day after Kenney spoke at the funeral for Tiffany Fletcher, a 41-year-old mother of three, who was struck and killed by crossfire earlier this month outside of the city recreation center where she worked. A 14-year-old, who was firing at another group of teens, has since been charged in Fletcher’s shooting death. “I watched (parks and recreation workers) yesterday line up on Lehigh Avenue like police officers burying one of their own. … I saw what I usually see when a police officer or firefighter dies in the line of duty. They were all out there lined up like they were on the front line, and they are,” Kenney said, fighting back his emotions.\n\nRhode Island\n\nBarrington: The owner of the historic Belton Court mansion has applied to demolish the deteriorating buildings on the 37-acre property. While the demolition permit has not been granted, there is little Barrington can do to prevent issuing the demolition permit once all the requirements are met, including such items as a plan to dispose of asbestos. Barrington Town Manager Phil Hervey said the mansion, once occupied by the Zion Bible College, was the centerpiece of the town’s 2016 master plan, as well as zoning rules passed specifically for the property that would allow it to become age-restricted housing. He is trying to set up a meeting with the project’s managers to discuss the demolition, but no date has been set. “We cannot prevent the teardown,” Hervey said. “If it meets the technical requirements, I don’t see any way to not issue it at a certain point.” The property has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1976. It was once an 800-acre estate, the country house of Frederick Peck, designed by the Providence architecture firm Martin & Hall. The property is owned by a Chinese investor and holdings company who bought it atpublic auction in 2011 for $3.85 million after town officials backed out of a plan to purchase it from the Zion Bible Institute for $5.2 million. Barrington College occupied the campus in the 1950s until it was bought in 1985 by the Zion Bible Institute, which vacated the property in 2007.\n\nSouth Carolina\n\nColumbia: Conservative lawmakers voted Tuesday not to make changes to the state’s abortion laws after this summer’s U.S. Supreme Court decision, meaning rules on abortion likely will not become more restrictive. South Carolina was for decades at the forefront of passing more restrictive abortion laws that challenged Roe v. Wade, before the landmark case was overturned this summer. But the state that helped lead the nation through requiring ultrasounds, parental consent and 24-hour waiting periods before abortions is at an impasse during a special session. The Senate could only muster enough votes to tweak South Carolina’s current six-week ban – which isn’t even in effect at the moment because of a state Supreme Court challenge. The House started its session Tuesday by rejecting a proposal by Democratic Rep. Gilda Cobb-Hunter to have the right to abortion placed before voters in a constitutional amendment. “Why are you afraid to let the people decide?” Cobb-Hunter asked. “Are you afraid you are going to be proven wrong? I think that’s it.” The rejection of the Senate’s version allows a group of three lawmakers from each chamber to work on a compromise between the Senate bill and the House version, which banned almost all abortions with exceptions for pregnancies caused by rape or incest or that threaten the life of the mother up to 12 weeks after conception.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nSioux Falls: For the first time this year, anthrax, a serious bacterial disease, has been found in a herd of livestock in western South Dakota. State Veterinarian Dr. Beth Thompson confirmed the presence of the disease in a press release from the South Dakota Animal Industry Board on Tuesday. The disease was found in several deceased cows that belonged to a herd of 160 unvaccinated cattle in Meade County. South Dakota State University’s animal disease laboratory confirmed the disease from samples submitted over the weekend. Anthrax is a pervasive disease that can devastate herds of livestock in a short amount of time, “and much of South Dakota has the potential of experiencing an outbreak,” Thompson said in the release. Cattle that catch anthrax may sudden perish without any visible symptoms. Russ Daly, state public health veterinarian with SDSU, said the general public is not at risk of infection, but farmers need to avoid making direct skin contact with carcasses containing anthrax. Drought, floods and winds can spread anthrax spores to grazing livestock. Spores can also persist indefinitely in contaminated soil and may vegetate in grazeland, which could further spread the infection among South Dakota’s cattle.\n\nTennessee\n\nNashville: The state’s textbook commission may need additional staff and its own attorney to deal with the aftermath of a new, controversial Tennessee law requiring schools to catalog and publicize a list of all available library and classroom materials. Textbook and Instructional Materials Quality Commission chair Linda Cash told a legislative subcommittee on Tuesday the law has added a lot of work “to people who already have a full load.” Cash suggested the commission should have an independent attorney who can answer commission questions, as the commission is currently seeking legal answers from the Tennessee Attorney General’s Office. “The way that we’re designed currently, it’s hard to get an opinion,” Cash said. The commission faces a Dec. 1 deadline to issue statewide guidance on the library materials law, which the General Assembly passed this year in response to pushback from conservatives alleging students were being exposed to “inappropriate” school materials. The commission must provide schools’ guidance on determining what is age-appropriate, which is not settled in state law, in addition to establishing an appeals process for local decisions on contested materials.\n\nTexas\n\nDallas: Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton ran out of his house and jumped into a truck driven by his wife, a state senator, to avoid being served a subpoena to testify Tuesday in an abortion access case, according to court documents. A process server wrote in an affidavit that he was attempting to deliver the federal court subpoena Monday at Paxton’s home and ultimately had to leave the document on the ground. He said the Republican avoided him for more than an hour from inside his house, then dashed toward the truck, and the couple drove off. Paxton, who is facing a variety of legal troubles as he seeks to win a third term in November, said he avoided the server out of safety concerns and said the news media should be ashamed for reporting on what happened. “It’s clear that the media wants to drum up another controversy involving my work as Attorney General, so they’re attacking me for having the audacity to avoid a stranger lingering outside my home and showing concern about the safety and well-being of my family,” Paxton wrote on Twitter on Monday night. On Tuesday, a judge hearing the lawsuit by nonprofit groups that want to help Texans pay for abortions out of state granted Paxton’s request to quash the subpoena.\n\nUtah\n\nSt. George: State wildlife officers are launching a new drone team to help prevent vandalism and provide law enforcement on public lands. Five Division of Wildlife Resources officers completed various licensing and training requirements with the Federal Aviation Administration to become certified law enforcement drone operators and staff the first Unmanned Aerial Systems team. “Using drones will help us more effectively solve wildlife crimes, and having trained law enforcement drone pilots will also allow us to assist other law enforcement agencies with search-and-rescue efforts or any other investigations,” DWR Captain Wade Hovinga said. The specialized drone officers function similarly to a K-9 officer team, called in to help with situations like search-and-rescue operations, searching for evidence of illegally taken wildlife, assisting biologists with wildlife surveys and investigating hunting-related shooting incidents. “Utah conservation officers are public servants, and these new tools will help us better serve the public, whether we’re solving poaching crimes or locating lost hunters,” Hovinga said. DWR officers patrol Utah’s mountains, lakes and unpopulated areas, often on foot or on off-road vehicles or even on horseback, investigating wildlife-related violations.\n\nVermont\n\nNorthfield: A student at a military college who sued top Pentagon officials after he was deemed unfit for service because he tested positive for HIV has settled his lawsuit and plans to pursue his dream of becoming an Army officer, his lawyers said Tuesday. “I am incredibly grateful to be back on track to obtain a contract with the ROTC and then commission as an officer,” Eddie Diaz, a student at Norwich University, said in a statement released by Lawyers for Civil Rights. “I just want an opportunity to serve my country, and I believe that should be available to all eligible Americans.” The plaintiff in the lawsuit filed in Burlington in May was listed as John Doe, but Diaz is now using his real name publicly. Diaz, 21, of Revere, Massachusetts, said in the complaint that he tested positive for HIV in October 2020 during his sophomore year at Norwich, the nation’s oldest private military college. He was deemed unfit for service and dropped from the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps and the Vermont National Guard in violation of the U.S. Constitution and federal law despite being “healthy, asymptomatic and on a treatment regimen that renders his viral load undetectable,” according to the suit. Military officials never asked him how he manages his HIV or spoke to his treating physician, and he was never examined by a military doctor, the suit said.\n\nVirginia\n\nCharlottesville: The Albemarle-Charlottesville Historical Society is creating a database with the information it has uncovered about enslaved people in the area so descendants can make connections. The goal is to allow descendants’ voices to guide the process for creating some kind of memorial for the site, The Daily Progress reports. Charlottesville native Diane Brown Townes knew some of her family history from records kept in an old tattered family Bible passed down for generations, and she knew she had ancestors who were enslaved in the region. But until recently, she had no idea some of her people may be buried in unmarked graves in a city park she’d spent lots of time in over the years or that she’s been living next door to relatives without knowing it. The Charlottesville officials believe there are at least 43 enslaved people buried at Pen Park in unmarked graves. The graves are adjacent to a cemetery belonging to the Gilmer family, which owned a tobacco plantation on the land where the city-owned park and golf course are today. The Albemarle-Charlottesville Historical Society started researching the probable identities of the people buried in the park last year. Members have been able to identify and connect with several area residents likely to have ancestors buried in the park. “For me, it’s finally being able to understand your feeling, a sense of being. I really never felt connected to history. I was always taught dates from a more white, patriarchal perspective,” Townes said.\n\nWashington\n\nSeattle: The National Transportation Safety Board and the U.S. Navy have started efforts to recover the wreckage of a floatplane that crashed in the Puget Sound earlier this month, killing all 10 people on board. A barge that’s been equipped to conduct the recovery entered the shipping channel Monday, KING-5 News reports. It was expected to drop anchors near the suspected wreckage location before a team arrived at the barge Tuesday. The U.S. Navy will use a remotely operated vehicle Deep Drone 8,000, a barge and a crane in recovery efforts. The remotely operated vehicle will collect smaller pieces of wreckage into baskets for the crane to lift, the NTSB said. Some items from the plane have already been recovered, including foam fragments, a seat cushion, a seat belt, dispatch paperwork, flooring structure remnants and some personal items belonging to the victims, according to the NTSB. The plane was traveling from Friday Harbor on San Juan Island to the Seattle suburb of Renton when it crashed Sept. 4. Only one body was found, identified as Gabby Hanna, of Seattle. Officials say determining the probable cause of the crash could take 12 to 24 months.\n\nWest Virginia\n\nCharleston: A protester who was forcefully removed from the House of Delegates gallery after allegedly disrupting debate on a bill to ban abortion earlier this month was arrested more than a week after she and others rallied against the ban at the state Capitol. Lindsey Jacobs, a 38-year-old lawyer from Morgantown, was arrested Friday and charged with three misdemeanors: obstructing an officer, willful disruption of governmental processes, and disorderly conduct against “the peace and dignity of the state,” according to a copy of the arrest warrant. Jacobs, who runs advocacy programs for a nonprofit legal services organization, was removed from the House chamber’s gallery Sept. 13 while listening to lawmakers discuss legislation that bans abortion at all stages of pregnancy, with few exceptions. Republican Del. Margitta Mazzocchi said people who want to protect against pregnancy can buy emergency contraceptives – known as “Plan B” pills – over the counter. “Not if you’re poor,” Jacobs shouted down at lawmakers, followed by shouts from others sitting in the gallery. Jacobs said she became frustrated listening to Mazzocchi’s speech because she felt like the lawmaker was overlooking that the pills cost between $40 and $50, an amount she said is “cost-prohibitive for a lot of people.”\n\nWisconsin\n\nMadison: All records from the closed Republican-ordered investigation into the 2020 presidential election in the state are being uploaded to a website “for all to see,” an attorney told a judge Tuesday. The investigation was led by former Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Michael Gableman, who was fired in August by Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos. He fired Gableman just days after Vos won his primary over an opponent whom Gableman and ex-President Donald Trump endorsed. But the office Gableman led still exists after he was fired. American Oversight, a liberal watchdog group, has filed four open records lawsuits against Gableman, Vos and the office seeking records created during the investigation. On Tuesday, during a hearing over a lawsuit American Oversight filed seeking to stop the deletion of records, attorney James Bopp said that all electronic and paper records from the office have been turned over to the Assembly chief clerk’s office. The files are being uploaded to a website that will soon be available “for all to see,” said Bopp, who represents the office, which he said has no employees. Hundreds of pages of documents have already been made public as the result of other American Oversight lawsuits. Bopp said the data yet-to-be made public that’s being processed now includes text messages on cellphones used in the course of the investigation.\n\nWyoming\n\nCasper: Gov. Mark Gordon plans to propose spending $25 million in federal pandemic relief on affordable housing projects, the Casper Star-Tribune reports. The governor’s office plans to submit its proposal to a legislative committee for a grant program aimed at funding “shovel-ready” projects with the American Rescue Plan Act money, according to the newspaper.\n\nFrom USA TODAY Network and wire reports", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/09/28"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/tv/2022/11/29/casey-anthony-documentary-docuseries-where-truth-lies-peacock/10792487002/", "title": "Casey Anthony documentary: Director confronts 'understandable ...", "text": "What if everything you knew about Casey Anthony – the woman once branded \"America's most hated mom\" amid suspicions she killed her 2-year-old daughter – was wrong?\n\nThat's the swing-for-the-fences thesis of a three-part docuseries, \"Casey Anthony: Where the Truth Lies,\" streaming now on Peacock. In it, Anthony, now 36, gives her first on-camera interview since her 2011 acquittal.\n\nAnthony being found not guilty in daughter Caylee's death shocked those who had convicted Casey in the court of public opinion. After all, she never reported her child missing in the summer of 2008, though she hadn't seen her for 31 days. She got a tattoo reading \"Bella Vita,\" Italian for \"beautiful life,\" and was convicted on four counts of providing false information to law enforcement, though two were later overturned.\n\nCasey Anthony is a 'pathological liar,' new series says. What does that really mean?\n\n'Casey Anthony: An American Murder Mystery': Docuseries revisits doubts of innocence\n\n\"So far, everyone has heard one side of the story,\" says docuseries director Alexandra Dean (\"This Is Paris,\" \"Secrets of Playboy\"). \"So of course they believe that's the only truth, and the outrage is understandable. I think when they watch the documentary and they hear the other side of the story, they’ll realize there are a lot of questions that haven't been answered.\"\n\nCasey asserts that she began lying as a coping mechanism to cover up sexual abuse at the hands of her father, George Anthony, and her brother, Lee. George has denied abusing his daughter and declined to talk to filmmakers. Lee, who testified during Casey's trial, did not speak for the documentary. Neither could be located by USA TODAY for comment.\n\nCasey says, \"I lied a lot more than I ever told the truth because the truth was too painful.\"\n\nShe believes her dad was abusing Caylee, and might've accidentally killed her while smothering her with a pillow so she couldn't fight him off – as Casey says George did with her. She claims he brought her Caylee's wet body and assured her the child \"would be OK\" before taking her to an unknown location.\n\n\"Just keep doing what I'm telling you to do,\" he supposedly told Casey, which included lying to police. \"You guys will be reunited soon.\"\n\nMore Casey Anthony:Dad George Anthony calls drowning theory 'a bunch of bull'\n\n\"I was convinced that she was OK, until December of 2008,\" when Caylee's remains were found, Casey says.\n\nDean reveals why she believes Anthony is telling the truth now, Casey's reason for sharing her side of the story, and what she hopes viewers take away from the series.\n\nEdited for length and clarity.\n\nQuestion: What is Casey's motivation for wanting to get her side of events out now?\n\nAlexandra Dean: Casey's been through 10 years of therapy, and she felt she had started to realize a lot of things about what had happened to her and what had happened to Caylee that she hadn't been able to understand before, and she wanted to tell the world.\n\n'Starving for Salvation':See Jennifer Grey's hair-raising transformation to embody Gwen Shamblin Lara\n\nYou say Casey's case wasn't properly investigated. In what way?\n\nWhere the documentary lands is that the police did not look at George as a suspect, and so they did not look at his phone records for geolocations, did not compare his story with Casey's phone records.\n\nYou mentioned approaching this as an investigative journalist. How did you decide who you would interview to tell a truthful story?\n\nOne of the most important sources for me was the transcripts of conversations that Casey had had with psychiatrists and psychologists in jail. And what I got was that the story she's telling me now is completely consistent with the story she was telling them back then. The fact that she told other people about the abuse was important.\n\nDozens of other documentaries say Casey was probably guilty. What (viewers) haven't heard is why so many of those pieces of evidence were dismissed in court, and I think we explained that pretty well.\n\n'Secrets of Playboy':The most appalling allegations in A&E's Hugh Hefner docuseries\n\n'We're all survivors': Paris Hilton alleges widespread abuse at her former school in new documentary\n\nPeople in the docuseries talk about Casey's habitual lying and manipulation, which Casey herself has acknowledged. How can you be confident that what she was telling you was the truth?\n\nThat wasn't easy. I talked to her employer, Pat McKenna (an investigator Casey met when he worked as part of Casey's defense team). He tells me she's been honest with him.\n\nI talked to a lot of psychologists and psychiatrists about whether it's possible for someone who was a pathological liar 10 years ago to go through therapy and to come to a point where they're not a liar anymore. And I was told by multiple experts that is very possible.\n\nDo you really know what schizophrenia is? Most people don't.\n\nIn the docuseries, Casey says she didn't want to leave her daughter alone with her father, out of fear her daughter would be abused. If she so feared this man, why wouldn't she have called the police when he allegedly took her?\n\nTrauma is complicated and difficult to understand. Casey is trying to explain that when you're traumatized from a very young age by somebody who abused you, you can still love them and want to believe they're not trying to harm you, even though they obviously have harmed you and can harm other people. But both realities can be true. I don't think any of us can understand that fully unless we too have been abused by people that we also love, like a parent.\n\nGaslighting is the 2022 word of the year. Here's what it is and how to address it.\n\nAfter spending time with Casey and speaking to former friends who described her as a good mom, experts, members of her defense team – what is your opinion?\n\nMy opinion is that the police should have looked at George as suspect.\n\nWhat was the biggest challenge in making this docuseries?\n\nThe biggest challenge for me was understanding the trauma brain. It's very complicated to understand how child abuse can alter the brain. And I talked to a lot of experts who did try to explain to me that you can end up with a child who, like Casey, seems like a pathological liar because of the way child abuse affects the brain, and you can also end up with a person who can hold two realities in their mind.\n\nWhat do you want viewers to take away from the docuseries?\n\nI want people to judge a little less quickly when they hear a complicated story like this one. I want people to realize that the media can create a circus around a person or try to create a reality television villain or a hero out of somebody because it's good television. But it doesn't necessarily mean that you've heard the whole story of their life.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/11/29"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/31/europe/russia-ukraine-new-years-eve-strikes-intl/index.html", "title": "Zelensky says Russia waging war so Putin can stay in power 'until ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nUkrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of “following the devil” and waging a war to ensure that its President Vladimir Putin remains in power “until the end of his life.”\n\nZelensky switched to speaking Russian in his nightly address on Saturday to send a message to the Kremlin and Russian citizens, as Moscow launched a series of deadly strikes that swept several regions of Ukraine ahead of New Year.\n\n“All this war that you are waging, you – Russia, it is not the war with NATO, as your propagandists lie,” Zelensky said. “It is not for something historical. It’s for one person to remain in power until the end of his life.\n\n“And what will be with all of you, citizens of Russia, does not concern him,” he added.\n\nZelensky said “Russian leader is hiding behind the troops, behind missiles, behind the walls of his residences and palaces” and behind his people. “He hides behind you and burns your country and your future. No one will ever forgive you for terror,” Zelensky emphasized.\n\nZelensky said “most of the Russian missiles intercepted by air defense forces.”\n\n“If it were not for air defense, the number of casualties would have been different. Much bigger,” he stressed. “And this is yet another proof for the world that support for Ukraine must be increased.”\n\nUkrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal earlier said Moscow wants to cause darkness and leave the country “in the dark for the New Year.”\n\nMoscow intends to “intimidate, leave us in the dark for the new year, cause as much damage to civilian infrastructure as possible,” Shmyhal said on Telegram.\n\n“There are attacks on civilian infrastructure in different regions of our country. Residential buildings, hotel, (a) shop, place for festivals were damaged. There are dead and injured,” he wrote.\n\n“Russians want to intimidate, leave us in the dark for the New Year, cause as much damage to civilian infrastructure as possible.”\n\nRussian shelling in recent weeks targeting critical infrastructure across Ukraine has left much of the country without access to heat and power, amid a harsh winter season.\n\nShmyhal said Russia wants to \"intimidate\" Kyiv, as strikes hit the capital on Saturday. Efrem Lukatsky/AP\n\nRussian shelling in Kyiv killed at least one person on Saturday. Vladyslav Sodel/Reuters\n\nOut of the 20 injured in the capital Kyiv, 14 were hospitalized, while six others were given medical care on the spot, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Telegram.\n\nSeveral school buildings in the capital suffered severe damage from the explosions, the mayor added.\n\nAir raid sirens were activated following the attacks in Kyiv, where air defenses later repelled 45 Iranian drones.\n\n“On the night of January 1, 2023, the Russian invaders attacked Ukraine with Iranian-made kamikaze drones Shahed-131/136,” the Air Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine said in a statement.\n\n“As a result of combat work by the air defense of the Air Force in cooperation with the anti-aircraft defense of other components of the Defense Forces of Ukraine, 45 attack UAVs were destroyed. 13 in 2022 and 32 in 2023.\n\n“They failed to spoil the holiday for the Ukrainians.”\n\nEmergency services were sent to the scene but according to preliminary information there were no casualties.\n\nFurther east in the Donetsk, Kharkiv and Chernihiv regions, Russian strikes killed at least six people.\n\nThree people died and three more were wounded in the Donetsk region, Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine Kyrylo Tymoshenko said on Telegram.\n\nOne person was wounded in the Zaporizhzhia region. Two were killed and one wounded in the Kharkiv region. Two people were wounded in the Kherson region, while one died in the Chernihiv region.\n\nRescuers worked at the site of explosions in Kyiv. Gleb Garanich/Reuters\n\nIt came after Russia launched five missiles and 29 air strikes on Friday, the General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces said Saturday.\n\n“26 of the enemy’s air strikes were on civilian infrastructure. In particular, the occupants used 10 Shahed-136 UAVs, but all of them were shot down. In addition, the enemy made 80 attacks from multiple rocket launchers, civilian settlements were also hit,” the General Staff said in its latest operational update.\n\nIt said that Russia “continues to conduct offensive actions at the Lyman and Bakhmut directions and is trying to improve the tactical situation at the Kupiansk and Avdiivka directions.”\n\nRussian forces fired on several towns and villages, including in Lyman, in the direction of Bakhmut, in the areas of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson.\n\n‘We will persevere’\n\nNearly a third of the capital, Kyiv, was left without power Saturday after emergency shutdowns. Kyodo News/Getty Images\n\nThirty percent of the capital was left without power due to emergency shutdowns, Klitschko said.\n\n“The municipal ‘life support system’ of the capital is operating normally. Currently, 30% of consumers are without electricity. Due to emergency shutdowns,” he said on Telegram.\n\n“Kyiv residents have water and heat,” he added.\n\nKlitschko also reported that the restrictions were applied to check the open section of the red metro line in the city “for the presence of remnants of missile debris.”\n\n“Specialists are on the way to that area,” he said. “We will inform you further about the resumption of traffic on the red line.”\n\nLocals in Kyiv told CNN how they planned to spend the New Year in the capital.\n\n“From 2023 I really want to win, and also to have more bright impressions and new emotions. I miss it very much. I also want to travel and open borders. And I also think about personal and professional growth, because one should not stand still. I have to develop and work for the benefit of the country,” said Alyona Bogulska, a 29-year-old financier.\n\nMedics and policemen worked next to houses which were partially destroyed by a Russian strike in the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, on New Year's Eve. Genya Savilov/AFP/Getty Images\n\n“This year, it’s a symbol, not that it’s a small victory, but a symbol that we survived the year,” said Tatiana Tkachuk, a 43-year-old pharmacy employee.\n\n“And I want to thank everyone who helps Ukraine. We’ve made a lot of friends. And in order to understand that we have a lot of good things, unfortunately, we had to go through terrible things. But so many people are doing real miracles for Ukraine.”\n\nUkrainian first lady Olena Zelenska said the country “will persevere,” following the strikes.\n\n“On New Year’s Eve, cities should be covered by wave of celebration, joy and hope. Ukrainian cities are again covered by missile wave from Russia,” Zelenska tweeted.\n\n“Ruining lives of others is a disgusting habit of our neighbors. But we will persevere and be even stronger – in spite of everything.”", "authors": ["Olga Voitovych Yulia Kesaieva Gul Tuysuz Denis Lapin Mariya Knight", "Olga Voitovych", "Yulia Kesaieva", "Gul Tuysuz", "Denis Lapin", "Mariya Knight"], "publish_date": "2022/12/31"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/50-states/2019/08/15/millionth-decorated-dog-tv-set-mystery-washington-mural-news-around-states/39962651/", "title": "News from around our 50 states", "text": "From USA TODAY Network and wire reports\n\nAlabama\n\nHuntsville: A man who traveled to all 50 states to mow lawns for free says he’s traveling cross-country again to bring together police officers and the community. Rodney Smith Jr. tweeted Monday to announce his “Mowing with Cops” tour started Wednesday in Apopka, Florida. Smith says on his website that he wants to mow at least one lawn in each state for the elderly, disabled, single parents or veterans, and he’s inviting police officers to mow with him. He had a special police-themed mower made. His website shows it’s painted black and white and has emergency lights. Smith was inspired to begin a free yard mowing service in 2015 after seeing an elderly man cutting his lawn. Individual and corporate donations have helped pay for hotel rooms and other expenses.\n\nAlaska\n\nAnchorage: Scientists say the chances of a polar bear encounter have increased, with the bears arriving on shore earlier and staying on land longer. Scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey found changes in sea ice habitat have coincided with evidence that polar bears’ use of land is increasing, the Anchorage Daily News reports. The bears come to land from the Beaufort Sea during the ice-melt season, the average duration of which has increased by 36 days since the late 1990s, researchers said. The bears are arriving “a little bit ahead of schedule,” said Todd Atwood, a research wildlife biologist leading the U.S. Geological Survey’s polar bear research program. Polar bears usually come to shore in mid-August, but residents have reported sightings as early as May in Kaktovik, a small town about 640 miles north of Anchorage, biologists said.\n\nArizona\n\nAjo: A humanitarian organization that provides aid to border crossers says it is opening an office to welcome visitors for a few hours on Thursday afternoons and Saturday mornings in the southern Arizona desert community of Ajo. The Ajo Samaritarans say they will first open the office in the border town Thursday to provide information about their work. The group says Ajo residents have provided water and other aid to travelers in the Sonora desert for generations. The office will be staffed from 4 to 6 p.m. Thursdays and from 10 a.m. to noon on Saturdays. Border volunteer Scott Warren, who is set to be retried in November on two felony counts of harboring migrants in the U.S. without permission, lives in the community and volunteers with the Ajo Samaritans.\n\nArkansas\n\nLittle Rock: A baby raccoon with a brain injury that hinders her mobility is walking again with the help of a wheelchair. Walkin’ Pets, which makes wheelchairs for animals, says the source of Vittles’ injury is unknown, but it prevented her from balancing and supporting herself. Susan Curtis is a wildlife rehabilitation specialist who helps the state’s bats and raccoons. The company says Curtis found Vittles when she was 8 weeks old. Walkin’ Pets project manager Jennifer Pratt says the wheelchair will adjust as Vittles grows. The company says Vittles can use the wheelchair to sharpen her balance and stability so she can walk on her own. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports the company says it’s unlikely Vittles will make a full recovery. But early intervention sparks hope.\n\nCalifornia\n\nSan Francisco: The city’s school board voted Tuesday to preserve but cover up a public high school mural depicting slavery and the killing of a Native American. After a public outcry, the board voted 4-3 to reverse its June vote to paint over the “Life of Washington” mural at George Washington High School. Instead, staff were directed to work out alternatives to cover the mural with panels or other materials depicting “the heroism of people of color in America” and their fight against racism and poverty, said board President Stevon Cook, who made the proposal. The cover-up will require an environmental review, and the mural will remain on display at least until then. The 1936 work painted directly on the school walls depicts the life of George Washington. Sections of the 1,600-square-foot work were intended to show the darker side of that history.\n\nColorado\n\nDenver: The state’s child abuse hotline will not change its policy to accept tips via social media, email or text. The Colorado Sun reports the recommendation came from a statewide task force that determined the hotline is set up to take tips only via phone. The review occurred after an internal memo a year ago raised concerns the child welfare division was not being responsive to texts, social media messages and emails about possible abuse and neglect. Officials say an email account for submitting reports went unchecked for more than four years. Officials determined five cases of possible neglect that were undiscovered until May needed immediate attention. The task force recommended caseworkers receiving written tips should record a report via the phone line before forwarding the written information to the hotline center.\n\nConnecticut\n\nStorrs: The new president of the University of Connecticut has begun implementing a plan he hopes will double research spending in the next decade, but he warns that unfunded pension liability could hurt the school’s ability to attract and keep top researchers. Thomas Katsouleas began his tenure at the state’s flagship school Aug. 1 and spoke Wednesday at his first Board of Trustees meeting. Elevating UConn’s status as a top research institution is among his top priorities, he said. He hopes to increase the school’s research money from about $265 million to more than $500 million in federal grants and other funding within a decade. But he also warned that UConn and its medical arm, UConn Health, are handicapped by an unfunded pension liability, which is estimated at $52 million this fiscal year.\n\nDelaware\n\nDover: The governor has signed into law a package of bills aimed at making it easier for formerly incarcerated people to get professional licenses in some trade fields. Delaware State News reports Gov. John Carney signed three bills Monday that supporters say they hope will improve employment access by removing roadblocks for ex-convicts facing reentry challenges after prison. The bills are designed to help job-seekers obtain licenses in trade fields as plumbers, electricians and massage therapists. The bills modify the impact of criminal history on applicants’ license eligibility by allowing the massage board and electrical examining board to grant waivers for people with certain felony convictions to obtain licenses. It also prohibits the boards from considering some convictions that are more than 10 years old.\n\nDistrict of Columbia\n\nWashington: A new survey from FutureBrand rates the District of Columbia as the No. 4 city in the world, WUSA-TV reports. The study examined culture, business, tourism, quality of life and value systems. It also noted tolerance and environmental friendliness. According to FutureBrand’s site, it unites global experts in strategy, design and innovation to future-proof businesses through brand experiences that drive profitable, long-term growth.\n\nFlorida\n\nKissimmee: A homeowner association says it’s against the rules for an Army veteran to fly a Puerto Rican flag outside her home. The Rolling Hills Estates HOA in Kissimmee recently told Frances Santiago that flags other than a U.S. flag, a military flag or a sports flag aren’t permitted. Santiago tells Orlando television station WFTV-TV that she and her husband, Efrain, decided to fly the flag to support protesters demanding the governor’s resignation in the U.S. territory. Three weeks later, she got a violation notice from the association in the Orlando suburb. The couple says it may be time for the HOA to revisit its rules, especially with Kissimmee’s growing Puerto Rican population. They’ve hired a lawyer and say they have no intention of lowering their flag.\n\nGeorgia\n\nAthens: Sports Illustrated is celebrating college football’s 150th season by ranking the top 10 all-time greatest mascots, putting the University of Georgia’s bulldog in first place. The magazine includes both real and costumed mascots in this week’s edition. Following Uga is the Duck at the University of Oregon, Mike the tiger at Louisiana State University, Bevo the longhorn bull at the University of Texas and Stanford University’s Tree. The University of Colorado’s 1,200-pound live buffalo named Ralphie, University of South Carolina’s costumed gamecock named Cocky, Western Kentucky University’s Big Red, Syracuse University’s orange named Otto and University of Tennessee’s bluetick coonhound named Smokey closed the list. The latest Uga is the 10th iteration of the mascot, which the magazine says has been a staple since 1956.\n\nHawaii\n\nHonolulu: The state Supreme Court has ruled Hawaii’s constitution requires reasonable access to Hawaiian language immersion programs. Hawaii News Now reports the justices ruled the programs are a necessary component in restoring Hawaiian language and culture. The case brought by the parent of two schoolchildren on Lanai says the island’s only public school did not offer a Hawaiian language immersion program. In a 4-to-1 decision, justices ruled that access to a Hawaiian language class only a few times per week was not sufficient. The ruling says steps must be taken to build an immersion program. In a written dissent, Justice Paula Nakayama says the state should provide “as many students as possible” with access to immersion programs but disagrees that the state constitution requires it.\n\nIdaho\n\nBoise: The U.S. Forest Service says $25,000 is being used for a federal-state project in eastern Idaho to identify road-killed animals in a major wildlife migration corridor to determine collision hotspots and potential locations for wildlife crossing structures. The agency says 75% of historical migration routes for elk, bison and pronghorn have been lost in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Freemont County has many of the remaining migration routes but a high rate of wildlife-vehicle collisions. The project started earlier this summer and uses volunteers to identify dead animals on U.S. Highway 20 and State Highway 87. Officials say the information can help the Idaho Transportation Department better understand wildlife-road conflicts through the Caribou-Targhee National Forest.\n\nIllinois\n\nAlton: A marker will be placed at the site where the state’s first soybeans were planted. Officials of the Illinois State Historical Society will join Lewis and Clark Community College representatives when the marker is dedicated Aug. 23 in Alton. The Telegraph reports Dr. Benjamin Franklin Edwards traveled to San Francisco in 1849 and helped shipwreck survivors from Japan. They reportedly showed Edwards their appreciation with a gift of “Japanese peas.” Edwards returned to Alton in April 1851 and gave six of the peas to a friend, who planted them in his home garden. The U.S. Agriculture Department reports Illinois’ 2018 soybean production totaled 688 million bushels. Alton Mayor Brant Walker says commemorating the soybean planting adds a new chapter to the city’s history.\n\nIndiana\n\nIndianapolis: The city’s police chief says a budget proposal dedicating $1.2 million toward officer body cameras doesn’t mean they’re coming quickly. A city spending plan released Monday by Mayor Joe Hogsett includes the body camera funding boost as the police department is in the midst of a pilot program in which some officers are using such cameras from three companies. Police Chief Bryan Roach says a decision on how to proceed with the cameras for the department’s some 1,100 street officers is months away. Roach says the $1.2 million would be enough to start a body camera program but estimates that’s about half of what would be needed each year. The fatal police shooting of a man earlier this month involved Indianapolis officers without body cameras.\n\nIowa\n\nDes Moines: Gov. Kim Reynolds held a news conference at the Iowa State Fair on Wednesday to make a special request of towns: Show the world your hometown pride for an opportunity to win a custom water tower. The “Home Town Water Tower Contest” encourages towns throughout the state to submit their own two-minute video that features a “water element” in their community. The winner of the contest will receive a new water tower complete with a one-of-a-kind design from a local artist. Video submissions will be accepted through Sept. 30. A public vote to be held Oct. 1-11 will determine the winning video. Iowans take a great deal of pride in their unique water towers. The “Ol’ Smiley” water tower in Adair has long been a roadside icon. Last year, Sioux City spent thousands painting the phrase “Home of Sioux City Sue” on their water tower.\n\nKansas\n\nRiverton: A Route 66 destination in southeast Kansas is receiving a cost-share grant from a federal preservation program that is expected to end this fall. The Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program awarded Nelson’s Old Riverton Store a $2,500 matching grant to upgrade its exterior. The Joplin Globe reports the Riverton store opened in 1925, one year before U.S. 66 was designated. Originally intended to last 10 years, the Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program was extended for another decade in 2009. It is set to expire in October. Bill Thomas, chairman of the Road Ahead board of directors, says supporters are working to ensure the passage of federal legislation to designate Route 66 as a National Historic Trail and to ensure the National Park Service oversees the trail.\n\nKentucky\n\nLouisville: University of Louisville trustees have approved the school’s purchase of a financially struggling hospital under a plan that would include a $50 million state loan. UofL trustees approved the transaction at a meeting on campus Wednesday. The deal will significantly increase UofL’s footprint in the medical sector of Kentucky’s largest city. Under the deal, UofL would purchase the greater Louisville market assets of KentuckyOne Health Inc., which includes Jewish Hospital. The deal includes the promise of state support though a $50 million loan. Half of the loan would be forgivable if job retention and other conditions are met. Trustees authorized UofL President Neeli Bendapudi to negotiate and finalize the agreement.\n\nLouisiana\n\nNew Orleans: Authorities have made an arrest in an attack on comedian Andy Dick outside a nightclub where he had performed. In a news release, New Orleans police spokesman Aaron Looney says 46-year-old David Hale was arrested early Wednesday and booked into jail on suspicion of second-degree battery and simple battery. Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office spokesman Philip Stelly said he did not know whether Hale had an attorney. Dick told The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate someone punched him early Saturday, knocking him out for 15 minutes. Dick was outside the French Quarter club when he was punched. Robert Couvillion, who promoted the show, says the performer didn’t have any reason to expect to be attacked. The comedian and musician is known for his role in the 1990s NBC TV show “NewsRadio.”\n\nMaine\n\nPortland: The state’s wild blueberry industry could be looking at another difficult summer, as the crop is projected to remain much smaller than just a few years ago. The Pine Tree State is America’s sole commercial producer of the wild berries, which are smaller than the more ubiquitous cultivated blueberries often seen in grocery stores. Maine’s crop exceeded 100 million pounds every year from 2014 to 2016 before plummeting to 50.4 million pounds last year. Horticulturist David Yarborough, emeritus wild blueberry specialist with the University of Maine, says a cold winter and wet and cold spring are likely to blame for the lower projections. He says the total harvest might again be only about 50 million pounds. The state’s wild blueberry industry is also struggling with Canadian competition and somewhat low prices to farmers.\n\nMaryland\n\nBaltimore: A teachers union is calling for fans to be donated to schools as sweltering heat pushes classroom temperatures into the triple digits, but the district says electrical infrastructure may not be equipped to handle it. The Baltimore Sun reports the union hopes to hand out 500 fans in response to a lack of functional air conditioning in city schools, some of which have none at all. But Baltimore Schools Chief Operations Officer Lynette Washington is warning against it, saying the buildings don’t have the electrical load to withstand it. The union is pushing back. President Diamonte Brown is quoted by the paper as responding: “If you’re so concerned about the electricity being overloaded, then fix it.” The paper reports the district has an almost $3 billion maintenance backlog from decades of underfunding.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nBoston: It’s a sight for sore eyes for commuters on the MBTA’s Orange Line. The first new trains in decades – six of them initially – are going into service Wednesday on the transit line, which runs from the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston to Oak Grove station in Malden. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority eventually plans to replace the entire existing Orange Line fleet with 152 new trains by 2022. The new vehicles are being built by the Chinese-owned company CRRC at a manufacturing plant in Springfield. The T says the new trains will have more spacious interiors, along with wider doors, more handrails, better lighting, and safety features including audio and visual warnings that the doors on the train are opening or closing.\n\nMichigan\n\nDetroit: Rapper Big Sean’s philanthropic foundation is hosting another weekend of events aimed at helping youth in his hometown. The 2nd annual Detroit’s On Now Weekend kicks off Saturday with the unveiling of the Sean Anderson Production Studio in the Dauch Campus Boys and Girls Club. It’s part of an effort to help Detroit children launch careers in the entertainment industry. Big Sean will host a discussion Sunday that focuses on mental health and the stigma around it in the black community. Scheduled guests include psychiatrist Jessica Clemons and sociologist and author Michael Eric Dyson. Other planned events include live performances, health screenings, apprenticeship opportunities and carnival rides, as well as free food, haircuts and braiding. The nonprofit Sean Anderson Foundation was organized in 2012.\n\nMinnesota\n\nSt. Paul: A record number of prison inmates in the state were placed in solitary confinement last year. The Minnesota Department of Corrections placed inmates in solitary more than 8,000 times in 2018. Minnesota Public Radio News reports the number of solitary sentences has been going up steadily for the past two years. Last session, the Legislature passed a law requiring mental health screening for inmates being placed in solitary. Republican Rep. Nick Zerwas of Elk River, one of the sponsors, says he’s concerned about the numbers. In June, the Corrections Department implemented new regulations that increase the maximum time allowed in solitary from 90 days to a year. Corrections Commissioner Paul Schnell says that ultimately, the department wants to provide incentives to help people get back into the general prison population.\n\nMississippi\n\nJackson: One of the four tests that the state’s public school students take in high school may be going away. A testing task force is recommending the state Board of Education scrap a now-required U.S. history test. Students formerly had to pass that test, plus exams in English, algebra and biology, to graduate. Now there are alternate routes to graduate, but some Mississippi students still don’t earn a diploma. Teacher groups and others who say Mississippi students take too many tests are pushing for change. The history test also counts in the grading system under which high schools and districts are assigned A-to-F grades. The recommendation will be considered next week by the state’s accreditation commission. If that group agrees, the state Board of Education would likely seek public comment before voting.\n\nMissouri\n\nChesterfield: The little girl from suburban St. Louis who became the inspiration behind the St. Louis Blues’ improbable run to the Stanley Cup championship is back in school for the first time in two years. Laila Anderson has a rare autoimmune disease that forced her to miss two school years. Until Tuesday. In a video posted by the Parkway School District, Laila says she hopes to inspire as many people as she can. She also jokes that as much as she loves her parents, “I need a break from their faces.” Laila had a bone marrow transplant in January, just as the Blues began their stunning worst-to-first turnaround. She was such a fan that the team flew her to playoff games and made her part of the victory celebration in June.\n\nMontana\n\nHelena: The state is looking to support the U.S. Forest Service in fighting off a lawsuit challenging a wildfire mitigation project. The Independent Record reports state Attorney General Tim Fox filed a request Monday to intervene in the litigation over the Ten Mile-South Helena Project. The project calls for forest thinning, logging and burning on more than 27 square miles in the Helena-Lewis and Clark National Forest. Helena Hunters and Anglers and the Montana Wildlife Federation filed a lawsuit earlier this year over concerns about the impact of mechanized logging on wildlife. The Alliance for the Wild Rockies and Native Ecosystems Council also filed a lawsuit, contending the federal agency erred in its environmental analysis for the project. The lawsuits have been consolidated into one case.\n\nNebraska\n\nCrete: A private university in this state where pot remains broadly illegal plans to offer an online program this fall that will cover the science, cultivation, processing and regulation of marijuana and hemp. Doane University in Crete will offer the three-course program. Chemistry professor Andrea Holmes will help teach the certificate program, and she told the Omaha World-Herald that the industry is growing rapidly. She cited jobs across the country for cultivators, technicians, scientists, geneticists, administrators, salespeople, marketers and advertisers. Nebraska bars recreational and medicinal marijuana, but lawmakers cleared the way this spring for a limited number of farmers to grow hemp, a low-THC version of the cannabis plant. THC is the compound that gives marijuana its high.\n\nNevada\n\nReno: A federal appeals court on Tuesday ruled against the state in a battle with the U.S. government over its secret shipment of weapons-grade plutonium to a site near Las Vegas, but the state’s attorney general says the fight isn’t over yet. A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals denied the state’s appeal after a judge refused to block any future shipments to Nevada. The court in San Francisco said the matter is moot because the Energy Department already sent the radioactive material and has promised that no more will be hauled there. “The remedy Nevada sought – stopping the government from shipping plutonium from South Carolina to Nevada under the proposed action – is no longer available,” the court wrote. Nevada also wanted the court to order the government to remove the plutonium it shipped last year but didn’t reveal had arrived there until January.\n\nNew Hampshire\n\nConcord: A state survey says 24% of high school-age youth reported having used electronic cigarettes and cigars, vaping and hookah devices in a 30-day period, compared to the national average of 13%. The data is from the 2017 New Hampshire Youth Risk Behavior Survey. Tricia Tilley, the state Health Department’s deputy director for its Division of Public Health Services, says the increase puts a new generation at risk for nicotine addiction. She notes a new state law that updates the definitions of electronic smoking devices and liquids and clarifies that all tobacco-related product devices are prohibited in any public education facility or grounds.\n\nNew Jersey\n\nSecaucus: For two days this fall, “Sopranos” fans can immerse themselves in the world of the hit show at SopranosCon. The convention, to be Nov. 23-24 at the Meadowlands Expo in Secaucus, will be an “interactive, street festival themed fan experience,” according to the event website. In the midst of the show’s 20-year anniversary and upcoming prequel, super fans will have the chance to meet cast members and even go to an official after-party. Exhibits, screenings, Q&As with cast members, trivia and costume contests are just some of the activities on the itinerary for the event. The layout of the convention will be inspired by the Feast of St Elzear and will celebrate Italian culture in New Jersey with food, drink, art, music, comedy and some show-related businesses, according to the website.\n\nNew Mexico\n\nFarmington: Some Navajo Nation officials are seeking to ask the state to rename a U.S. highway after one of the longest-serving Native American lawmakers in U.S. history. A Navajo legislative committee is requesting New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham name U.S. Highway 491 in honor of the late state Sen. John Pinto, who died in May at the age of 94 and had long sought to turn the deadly U.S. 666 into a four-lane highway and to change its name to U.S. 491. U.S. Highway 491 stretches about 194 miles from Gallup, New Mexico, through Colorado to Monticello, Utah. Pinto was a World War II Navajo code talker and served over four decades in the New Mexico Legislature.\n\nNew York\n\nNew York: Who’s a good dog? The American Kennel Club says there are now a million of them. The club announced Wednesday that a Bernese mountain dog named Fiona recently became its 1 millionth “canine good citizen,” including dogs past and present. Fiona and owner Nora Pavone had a special reason for pursuing the club’s mark of canine comportment: Fiona spends her days comforting people at the Pavone family’s Brooklyn funeral home. “We wanted her to have proper manners when she’s meeting with so many different people … for her to just be polite and gentle and always in control,” Pavone says. “To gently go up to someone and nudge their hand when they just need her to be next to them.” The club introduced the canine good citizen title in 1989 to promote polite doggy behavior and responsible pet ownership.\n\nNorth Carolina\n\nRaleigh: The trial is underway in a lawsuit that accuses novelist Nicholas Sparks of defaming the former headmaster of a private Christian school he founded in the state. Saul Hillel Benjamin accuses Sparks of telling Epiphany School parents, a job recruiter and others that Benjamin suffered from mental illness. The jury in the trial that began Wednesday in Raleigh will decide whether the private K-12 school in Spark’s hometown of New Bern, the author and the foundation Sparks created to support the school should pay damages. Benjamin’s lawsuit alleges that the author of “Message in a Bottle” and “The Notebook” defamed him and violated the Americans with Disabilities Act. Benjamin was in the headmaster’s position for less than five months and says he was forced out.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nBismarck: Traffic at the state’s eight commercial service airports is up 12% in July compared to last year. The state Aeronautics Commission says more than 110,000 people boarded planes at the airports in Bismarck, Minot, Williston, Dickinson, Grand Forks, Fargo, Devils Lake and Jamestown during the month. The Bismarck Tribune says Williston had the highest percentage increase, at nearly 27%. Year-to-date boardings for the eight airports are up more than 10%, to nearly 691,000 passengers. Travelers can reach nine nonstop destinations from North Dakota, though two are seasonal.\n\nOhio\n\nColumbus: Amid concern about the use of facial-recognition capabilities, Ohio’s attorney general says the state database of driver’s license and law enforcement photos hasn’t been used improperly for mass surveillance or broad dragnets. Even so, Republican Attorney General Dave Yost says he’s ordering training requirements for officers who use the facial-recognition system. He’s also requiring that requests for such searches be handled by the state crime lab until those requirements are met. Concerns have been raised about the potential for abuse as federal investigators have searched such databases unbeknownst to drivers whose photos were scanned. Yost says he’ll appoint advisers to help ensure Ohio’s system is an effective law-enforcement tool that also protects people’s privacy and rights.\n\nOklahoma\n\nMedford: No injuries were reported after a 3.4 magnitude earthquake shook a sparsely populated area of northern Oklahoma. The U.S. Geological Survey says the quake was recorded about 2:40 p.m. Tuesday about 8 miles south-southeast of Medford and at a depth of about 4 miles. No damage was immediately reported. Geologists say damage is unlikely in temblors below magnitude 4.0. Thousands of earthquakes in Oklahoma have been linked to underground injection of wastewater from oil and gas production. The USGS reports the number of magnitude 3.0 or greater earthquakes is on pace to decline for the fourth straight year after state regulators began directing producers to close some wells and reduce volumes in others.\n\nOregon\n\nSalem: A new law curbing use of the death penalty in the state now appears to go further than supporters intended, after a recent ruling that a former death row inmate cannot be sentenced to death upon retrial. Oregon Public Broadcasting reports that the state’s prosecutors are working to determine how many murder cases might be affected. Meanwhile, lawmakers behind the new law said Tuesday that they were surprised and would seek a fix as soon as possible – even asking the governor to call a one-day special session next month. In passing Senate Bill 1013 this year, lawmakers limited use of capital punishment to a narrow set of circumstances, including terrorist acts and murders of children or law enforcement officers. But officials also appeared to take pains to ensure those changes would apply to sentences moving forward.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nHarrisburg: State officials have announced plans to close two centers for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities over the next three years. The Department of Human Services says public meetings will be held next month to gather comment on the plans to close the Polk State Center in Venango County in western Pennsylvania and the White Haven State Center in northeastern Pennsylvania’s Luzerne County. The Polk center currently serves 194 residents and the White Haven center 112. Officials say the commonwealth has steadily closed most state centers since the 1960s, “when best practices turned toward community-based settings and away from institutions.” Fifty years ago, the department served more than 13,000 people with intellectual disabilities in state-operated facilities, but today fewer than 720 receive care in such facilities.\n\nRhode Island\n\nLincoln: Twin River Casino says it is feeling the competitive bite from a new resort casino in neighboring Massachusetts. Twin River said Tuesday that it could be forced to lay off up to 30 table game supervisors to reflect the loss in business. The casino in Lincoln says revenue from table games dipped 34% in July compared to the same month the prior year. July was the first full month of operation for the Wynn Resorts-owned Encore Boston Harbor casino in Everett. Twin River said the impact of the competition was greater than it had expected, and it’s exploring the possibility of voluntarily reducing hours to avoid some layoffs – and also hopes business will pick up enough after Labor Day to allow some workers to be rehired.\n\nSouth Carolina\n\nGreenville: The mayor says affordable housing must be included in a $1billion redevelopment project near the city’s trendy downtown area. Mayor Knox White told a meeting last week that he considers affordable housing to be “non-negotiable.” Greenville’s city center is considered a model for revitalization, and officials are looking at a proposal to spend $1 billion on a redevelopment project within walking distance of the area. As many as 1,500 apartments would be built under the current plan, and White says that must include a mix of housing types. The area that’s being redeveloped doesn’t currently include housing, but it’s beside one of the city’s oldest African American communities. Rising home prices are raising concerns about what will happen to area residents.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nYankton: A county commissioner has been banned from entering Yankton City Hall for a year. Yankton County Commissioner Gary Swensen was sent a letter by Yankton’s city attorney outlining the ban. KYNT-AM obtained a copy of the letter, dated Aug. 12. In the letter, City Attorney Ross Den Herder says Swensen’s recent social media posts are “perceived as threatening to City staff and its elected officials.” The Yankton Daily Press & Dakotan reports Yankton Mayor Nathan Johnson appeared before the commission last week about Swensen’s posting of a cartoon on social media. The cartoon shows a priest telling a woman who confessed to killing a politician that he is “here to listen to your sins, not your community service work.” Swensen has apologized for the cartoon.\n\nTennessee\n\nMemphis: The producers of the Hallmark Channel’s made-in-Memphis “Graceland” movies are selling off three films’ worth of props, wardrobe items, Christmas decorations and Elvis memorabilia. The sale does not signal the end of the Hallmark-Graceland relationship – in fact, more Elvis-connected feature-film romances are planned. In addition to Christmas items, the extraneous inventory includes clothes worn by actors in the three Memphis-based Hallmark Channel movies, “Christmas at Graceland” and “Wedding at Graceland,” with Kellie Pickler and Wes Brown, and the upcoming “Christmas at Graceland 2,” now officially titled “Christmas at Graceland: Home for the Holidays,” with Adrian Grenier and Kaitlin Doubleday, which finished shooting last week. The cash-only sale will take place Aug. 22-23 at 1910 Nonconnah Blvd., Suite 106.\n\nTexas\n\nSan Antonio: An archaeological dig at the Alamo to help preserve the historic Texas mission has unearthed musket balls that experts say could date to the 1800s. The San Antonio Express-News reports the survey of the mission-era west wall of the Long Barrack is meant to help determine how best to protect the oldest component of the Alamo. Crews are digging four pits to help expose the 1700s limestone wall to its foundation in an effort to fight moisture. Archaeologist Kristi Nichols says workers so far have recovered musket balls, a mid-1800s bottle and tin-glazed majolica from the Spanish colonial period. The survey began nearly a month ago. Preservation of the Alamo is part of a wider $450 million development plan for the area.\n\nUtah\n\nSalt Lake City: Wildlife officials say they have found and put to death a bear that bit a 13-year-old boy on his ear and cheek at a campground in eastern Utah. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources said Tuesday in a news release that officials found the black bear Friday night within a mile of the riverside campground where the incident occurred on Aug. 9 east of Moab. Wildlife officials euthanized the bear after determining it matched the size, color and tracks of the bear that attacked the boy. The boy was treated and released from the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The campground was reopened Monday. This is the second bear attack in Utah this summer. A bear was captured and killed in June after it scratched a boy camping in northern Utah.\n\nVermont\n\nMontpelier: The state has launched a website that shows the results of lead testing in water at the state’s schools and child care facilities. The testing is being done at approximately 440 schools and more than 1,200 child care facilities. It’s required under a new law in which schools and child care centers also must make fixes or take outlets, such as drinking fountains, out of service if the results show lead above 4 parts per billion. Officials said Wednesday that the fixes, such as replacing fixtures, are relatively inexpensive. The state is covering the cost of the testing and up to a certain amount of the remediation. Nearly 300 child care facilities and five schools have been tested. The website shows the test results at institutions and if action has been taken.\n\nVirginia\n\nRichmond: Police say more than 50 television sets have been mysteriously placed on front porches in a neighborhood outside the city. Henrico County police Lt. Matt Pecka said residents found older model televisions outside their front doors Sunday morning. He told the Richmond Times-Dispatch that video from one doorbell camera showed a person wearing TV-shaped headgear while dropping off a TV set. Police believe more than one person is responsible. A similar incident occurred in a nearby neighborhood last year. It’s unclear if the incident is a crime. Pecka said that dropping off the televisions on front porches is “at most” illegal dumping. Most of the TVs will be recycled. But a couple of residents indicated they would keep their televisions for now.\n\nWashington\n\nSeattle: The City Council has thwarted a rare veto by Mayor Jenny Durkan by voting for a second time to create a special fund for the city’s soda-tax revenue. The Seattle Times reports the new tax raised about $22 million last year, more than initially predicted, and the mayor and councilmembers disagree on how to spend it. When the council passed the tax in 2017, it indicated the money should be used to boost healthful-food and early-education programs serving low-income communities of color that are targeted by soda marketing. But when the mayor drew up this year’s budget, she used about $6 million from the soda tax to supplant baseline allocations for food banks, a parent-child program and other services that previously had been supported by the city’s general fund. The maneuver freed up $6 million for her other priorities.\n\nWest Virginia\n\nBethany: Bethany College in West Virginia is asking people who like the outdoors to volunteer to help clean up its trail system next month. Projects will include brush cleaning, trail restoration, rubbish removal and outdoor classroom repair. Volunteers should wear work clothes, preferably long pants and sturdy shoes or boots. The school will provide water, bug spray, gloves and tools. The trail system is an asset of Parkinson Forest, which was deeded to the school in 1914. The system includes a waterfall, numerous hiking spots and the outdoor classroom. The cleanup is set for Sept. 15.\n\nWisconsin\n\nMadison: GOP lawmakers in the state found themselves in the unusual position Wednesday of breaking with anti-abortion groups and advocating for a bill that broadens birth control access, an area where Democrats typically lead. Republicans could undermine a key Democratic campaign issue by passing the bill, but they also find themselves in conflict with groups that are typically their allies. Pro-Life Wisconsin and Wisconsin Family Action, a leading anti-abortion group, oppose the measure on moral and ethical grounds, saying increasing access encourages premarital sex and the odds of unintended pregnancies and abortions. Only doctors can prescribe hormonal birth control under current state law. The bill would allow pharmacists to prescribe hormonal contraceptive patches and birth control pills, with some caveats.\n\nWyoming\n\nGillette: Officials say a firework rocket that was launched during a show for the Pyrotechnics Guild International convention landed in a home and sparked a small fire. The Gillette News Record reports the rocket broke through the roof of the Gillette home about 2 miles from the event center where the fireworks display was taking place Sunday. The Campbell County Fire Department says the flames were extinguished before firefighters got to the house. No one was injured. Guild spokesman Tom Sklebar says the organization will pay for the damages. He says a rocket “took an errant trajectory” after it was launched and hit the house. The fireworks convention started last Saturday and runs through Friday. It features fireworks shows on four nights.\n\nFrom USA TODAY Network and wire reports", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2019/08/15"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2020/07/19/johnny-depp-vs-amber-heard-all-nasty-bits-nasty-uk-trial/5444459002/", "title": "Johnny Depp vs. Amber Heard: All the nasty bits of the nasty UK trial", "text": "Train-wreck trials are box-office gold for the media, so the donnybrook going down now in London between movie stars Johnny Depp and Amber Heard – plus a provocative tabloid newspaper – is a can't-look-away legal melee, risible and appalling at the same time.\n\nSo far, the trial has featured testimony about: Violent, shrieking rows. Massive consumption of drugs and drink. Wild punches and flying projectiles. Trashed rooms. A lopped off fingertip. A teacup Yorkie dangled out a car window. Translations of Depp's antique American slang (\"haymaker\" and \"porkie-pies\" ) for the British judge.\n\nAnd ickiest of all, human feces in a bed.\n\nMoreover, this is only Part 1: Sometime later this year or early next year, Depp and Heard are due to put up their dukes again in a Virginia courtroom for a jury trial over Depp's defamation civil suit against his ex-wife. She wrote a newspaper column proclaiming herself a victim of domestic abuse, leaving the strong impression that Depp was the alleged abuser.\n\nIs this judge-only libel trial in the United Kingdom a preview of the American one?\n\n\"The American trial will be very different,\" predicts Adam Waldman, Depp's Washington, D.C. lawyer. \"The procedural rules are quite different between the U.S. and the U.K. The Virginia trial is a jury trial and that is another significant difference.\"\n\nTo recap: In London, it's week two in a three-week trial over a civil suit for libel filed by Depp, 57, against the top editor and the publisher of The Sun tabloid (Rupert Murdoch's company), which labeled him a \"wife beater\" without bothering to precede the term with \"alleged\" or \"accused.\"\n\nHeard, 34, is expected to take the stand this week for The Sun. She has accused Depp of repeatedly beating her in drug-induced rages since before they married in 2015 until they began divorce proceedings in 2016. Their divorce was finalized in 2017 following an uproar in divorce court in Los Angeles.\n\nDepp has strongly denied all of her accusations, saying she was the abuser in their brief, volatile relationship. Their marriage, he told Heard several times, was \"a crime scene waiting to happen,\" he testified.\n\nOn Thursday, Depp's security chief, Sean Bett, said in a written witness statement, released as he appeared in court, that Heard was verbally and physically abusive towards Depp throughout their relationship.\n\n“On many occasions, I witnessed her shout at Mr. Depp. I was also told by Mr. Depp on multiple occasions that Ms. Heard had physically abused him,” he said. “Ms. Heard often behaved in this way when she had been drinking. I learnt quickly to recognize the signs, so that we were able to leave the situation before it escalated further.”\n\nOn cross-examination by The Sun's lawyer, Sasha Wass, she suggested Bett was lying to protect Depp, his employer. “Ma’am you can call me a liar a hundred times. I’m not a liar. I’m telling the truth,\" Bett said.\n\nOn Friday, more damaging testimony for The Sun: A MeToo activist said in written testimony that she was “misquoted and misused” by the tabloid to smear Depp. \"I (did not) accuse Mr. Depp of hurting Amber Heard, about which I have no first-hand knowledge,\" said actress Katherine Kendall. Instead, she said, she heard “several times” that Heard was abusive to Depp. Most of what The Sun published in their April 2018 story quoting her, she said, was a \"lie.\"\n\nAlso on Friday, Isaac Baruch, an artist and longtime friend to Depp and the next-door neighbor at the couple's Los Angeles penthouse, told the court he saw no signs of marks, scratches, swelling or bruises on Heard’s face in the days immediately after she claimed Depp beat her up in May 2016, just before they broke up.\n\nUntil now, none of either Depp's or Heard's accusations has ever been put before a judge or jury in any court anywhere, or even confirmed by police reports. Now a British judge gets first crack at deciding who is telling the truth, who is not and whether anyone was libeled under British law.\n\nSome lowlights from the trial so far:\n\nWho or what left poop in the bed?\n\nIn April 2016, Depp's longtime maid found feces in a bed at their Los Angeles penthouse the morning after Heard’s 30th birthday party when she claims the couple fought and Depp threw a magnum wine bottle at her. He denies that.\n\nHeard blamed one of her two tiny Yorkshire terriers, Pistol and Boo, for the defecation incident. Depp said it was human; so did the maid. \"It was not left by a three- or four-pound dog,\" he told the court. \"I was convinced that it was either Ms Heard herself or one of her (friends).\"\n\nHe said it was one of the final triggering events for the end of their marriage. “I thought that was an oddly fitting end to the relationship,” he said.\n\nHow did Depp's fingertip get chopped off in Australia?\n\nAs part of her list of 14 alleged instances of abuse by Depp, Heard claims Depp subjected her to a “three-day ordeal of assaults” in March 2015 in Australia, where Depp was filming his role as Captain Jack Sparrow in the fifth “Pirates of the Caribbean” film.\n\nDepp rejects this accusation but acknowledged they had a fight which resulted in their rented house being trashed and Depp’s fingertip being severed to the bone.\n\nDepp says that happened when Heard threw a vodka bottle at him. She says she wasn't in the room at the time.\n\nDepp acknowledged he used the blood from severed finger to paint messages on a mirror, and the court was shown pictures of the mirror and of Depp on a hospital gurney.\n\nWho allegedly drank and did drugs the most?\n\nDepp acknowledged heavy use of multiple drugs over his life but he testified he was trying to kick his habits during the period of the marriage, and sometimes lapsed.\n\nHeard was no drug-free saint, Depp claimed. He said she had “many times” chopped out lines of cocaine for him, before rubbing some of the drug into her gums.\n\nDepp's lawyer, David Sherborne, asked him about medical notes from August 2014 that referred to Heard’s “history of substance abuse,” including an addiction to cocaine. The notes said Heard experienced anxiety, insecurity and jealousy and had “severe outbursts of anger and rage.”\n\nDid this tally with Depp's experience of Heard, he was asked. “Yes,” Depp said.\n\nWhen Sasha Wass said Heard often had two or three glasses of wine during an evening, Depp shot back: “Two or three bottles.”\n\n“That is complete nonsense, Mr. Depp,” Wass snapped.\n\nThese two engaged in other sharp exchanges during cross-examination, apparently allowed in British civil trials. When Depp claimed Heard was responsible for most of the damage to the rented house in Australia, Wass protested, \"That is completely untrue.\"\n\n“Thank you, but it’s not,\" Depp retorted.\n\nDid Depp really threaten Heard's little dog, Pistol?\n\nHeard has accused Depp of dangling her teeny-tiny pooch out a car window and making \"howling noises\" as he was driving with Heard and others. Depp said this was an \"absolute utter falsity.\"\n\n\"I don't think hanging an animal, a small defenseless dog that weighs three pounds, out of a window is fun.\" He said his sense of humor is \"rather skewed\" but not that much.\n\nPistol and Boo have come up several times in the trial because they have been star players before in the Depp/Heard saga. In July 2015, Heard was charged with smuggling the two dogs to Australia on a private jet. She pleaded guilty in April 2016 and escaped a conviction after expressing remorse in an awkward hostage-style video she made with Depp.\n\nOn Wednesday, Depp's former estate manager, Kevin Murphy, testified that Heard asked him to lie under oath about illegally sneaking the dogs in. Murphy claimed Heard pressured him to commit perjury or risk losing his job. He said he made a misleading statement in the Australian court case because \"Amber wielded a lot of power and would have made my life miserable.\"\n\nHeard is accused of stealing another woman's rape experience for her own use\n\nIn dramatic testimony on Wednesday, Kate James, Heard's former personal assistant, said she told her former boss that she was raped at machete-point in Brazil decades ago. She said she was shocked to learn that in a witness statement, Heard allegedly misrepresented and exploited her story to court sympathy.\n\n“She referred directly to a violent rape that occurred to me 26 years ago and she twisted it into her own story and she used it for her own use,\" James said by video link from Los Angeles.“I am a sexual violence survivor and that’s very, very serious to take that stance if you are not one.\"\n\nDepp believes Heard was plotting to lodge fake claims against Depp from the start\n\nIn a text message to his doctor after the Australia altercation, Depp called Heard “malicious, evil and vindictive,” said she was desperate for fame, and that he believes she married him with that in mind. He testified he thinks Heard made up fake claims against him as an “insurance policy.”\n\nAs evidence he cited an email she wrote but never sent (it was read in court), in which she compared him to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. “Many times you have hurt me. Physically and emotionally from the things you say and did while (messed) up,” she wrote.\n\n“Hoax is probably the best word one could use because the allegations, all of the allegations, are patently untrue,\" Depp testified. \"It appears to me that Ms. Heard was building a dossier very early on that appears to be an insurance policy for later.”\n\nDepp lost how much money due to alleged business mismanagement?\n\nDepp's eye-popping spending habits (at one point, monthly five-figure bills for wine) and the vast sums he's raked in as a movie star came up again in the trial. He testified that the big fight with Heard on her birthday in Los Angeles came hours after he was told his former business managers had absconded with hundreds of millions of dollars.\n\nAsked how much was allegedly stolen, Depp said, “This is a ludicrous amount to have to state, it’s quite embarrassing — apparently I had made $650 million,” much of it through the ”Pirates of the Caribbean” films. Depp added that in addition to losing the $650 million he was “$100 million in the hole because they had not paid the government my taxes for 17 years.\" Depp and his former business managers settled a legal dispute over the alleged fraud in 2018.\n\nWhat other famous names have come up in testimony?\n\nDepp's former partner, French singer Vanessa Paradis, with whom he has two children, and actress Winona Ryder, his girlfriend in the 1990s, have submitted witness statements supporting him. They were scheduled to testify, but Depp's lawyer said Thursday they were no longer necessary as The Sun does not contest their claim he never hit them.\n\nOther boldfaced names that have come up so far include Marilyn Manson, Keith Richards, James Franco, Billy Bob Thornton, British actor Paul Bettany, and Depp's friend, the late gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, whose book \"Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas\" was adapted for a movie Depp starred in.\n\nDepp testified about trashing a hotel room where he was staying with Kate Moss, recalled the death of his friend River Phoenix from a drug overdose at his nightclub, the Viper Room, in Los Angeles, and claimed Elton John helped him kick his $30,000-a-month wine habit.\n\nContributing: Associated Press", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/07/19"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/50-states/2019/07/23/news-around-states/39798807/", "title": "50 states", "text": "From USA TODAY Network and wire reports\n\nAlabama\n\nMontgomery:A Department of Corrections narcotics dog died last weekend after he had an allergic reaction to a substance inside an Elmore County prison. Department of Corrections officials say K-9 Jake collapsed during a contraband search inside Staton Correctional Facility last Thursday. Jake “alerted” on a substance before falling unconscious. The substance has not yet been identified, though ADOC says an early test by a HazMat team identified it as synthetic marijuana. The nursing staff at Staton performed CPR and inserted an IV before Jake was transported to the Auburn University Veterinary Clinic. But his condition deteriorated after Friday when he developed pneumonia. A funeral with full honors will be held for Jake and Gov. Kay Ivey also commended Jake’s service to the state.\n\nAlaska\n\nFairbanks: An Alaska company is completing plans to acquire and develop a site for mining metals for foreign markets. The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reported that Trilogy Metals plans to develop an ore-extraction site called Artic, where about 43 million tons of reserves were discovered. The company president says the copper deposit is located in the Ambler Mining District about 300 miles north of Fairbanks. By the end of this year, Trilogy hopes to complete its plan to use the site to extract and transport metal ore to Asia. The U.S. Bureau of Land Management says the project includes building a road. Federal officials say draft plans for the road are expected to be released in August followed by a public comment period.\n\nArizona\n\nPhoenix:The state landed $90million in federal grants for a project to widen Interstate 17 north of Phoenix in hopes of easing congestion and cutting down on the number of wrecks, according to Gov. Doug Ducey’s office. It’s part of a $320 million project led by the state Department of Transportation and Federal Highway Administration to add lanes along 23 miles of I-17, from Anthem Way to Sunset Point. The project will also add eight miles of “flex lanes”, which will carry traffic north on Fridays and Saturdays but south on Sundays between Black Canyon City and the Sunset Point Rest Area.\n\nArkansas\n\nLittle Rock: A meat-alternative food company has filed a lawsuit in federal court claiming a state law that bans the use of “meat” in labeling plant-based foods violates free speech rights. Oregon-based Tofurky Co. filed the lawsuit Monday against Arkansas’ Bureau of Standards. Tofurky produces a variety of tofu, quinoa and other plant-based “sausages,” deli slices and burgers. The Arkansas law’s stated goal is to “require truth in labeling.” It also bans companies from labeling other vegetables, such as cauliflower, as “rice.” Arkansas is the nation’s top rice producer. Tofurky filed a lawsuit in 2018 against a Missouri meat-labeling law. This month, Illinois-based Upton’s Naturals Co. challenged a Mississippi law. Arkansas’ law is set to take effect Wednesday. It would fine companies up to $1,000 for each violation.\n\nCalifornia\n\nLos Angeles: Her name was “Lucille,” and in B.B. King’s hands she gave voice to the “King of the Blues.” Julien’s Auctions announced Tuesday that King’s black Gibson ES-345 prototype guitar is among the items from his estate that will go up for bid on Sept. 21. Julien’s says Gibson gave King the instrument for his 80th birthday. The headstock has “B.B. King 80” and a crown inlaid with mother-of-pearl. The guitar is estimated to be worth $80,000 to $100,000. The National Medal of Arts that President George H.W. Bush presented to King in 1990 is also up for auction. So are his touring van, jewelry and clothing. The 15-time Grammy winner was 89 years old when he died in 2015.\n\nColorado\n\nDenver: Public health officials say four homeless people have been diagnosed with hepatitis A this year, so the city is stepping up free vaccinations. KDVR-TV reported Monday that three of the cases were diagnosed within the past three weeks. Public Health executive director Dr. Bill Burman says his agency will set up vaccine clinics almost every day in day shelters, syringe access programs, Civic Center Park and other places where people at risk of contracting the disease are found. Hepatitis A can be spread through the sharing of drugs and equipment, fecal-oral contamination or intimate contact with a person who has the disease. Health officials say the disease can be prevented with a vaccine that has been a part of standard childhood immunizations for more than a decade.\n\nConnecticut\n\nHartford: Heavy rainfall and thunderstorms that raced across the state caused major flooding and a fire in a dorm at a private school. At the Tweed-New Haven Airport, major flooding Monday night caused airport staff to cancel flights for almost 24 hours through Tuesday afternoon. A dorm at Choate Rosemary Hall, a private school in Wallingford, also caught fire after a lightning strike, forcing students to evacuate and take shelter at an athletic center. No injuries were reported. Lorraine Connelly, director of communications for the school, said the lightning struck the building around 6:20 p.m. Firefighters say they had to wait until the lightning passed to complete their work. The state’s major utilities were reporting scattered power outages Tuesday morning.\n\nDelaware\n\nGeorgetown:A Confederate flag and monument honoring those who fought for the South in the Civil War have cost the local historical society more than $14,000 in state funding. The Georgetown Historical Society was set to get $14,443 in grant-in-aid under a bill that gives tens of millions of dollars to more than 100 nonprofits each year, according to budget documents. But Sen. Trey Paradee, D-Dover, who serves on the General Assembly’s Joint Finance Committee, recommended that the group be struck from the list because of the Confederate monument and flag, which are on the grounds of the historical society’s museum on Bedford Street. The bill passed unanimously on the last day of the legislative session. Paradee told The News Journal that he did not discuss the change in funding with the historical society in advance, though he would consider restoring the grant if they got rid of the Confederate symbols. The Georgetown Historical Society did not return calls for comment. Debbie Jones, the group’s vice president, told WBOC 16 that the decision threatens the nonprofit’s financial standing.\n\nDistrict of Columbia\n\nWashington: A D.C. council member who voted for a no-bid sports gambling contract says he wasn’t aware of documentation connecting his cousin to the contract. The Washington Post reports Kenyan R. McDuffie defended his vote Friday, saying his motivating factor was the best interest of the District and residents. Intralot was awarded the sole-source sports gambling contract. The company submitted subcontracting plans with McDuffie’s cousin listed as chief executive of Potomac Supply Company, a commercial paper supplier. McDuffie said he had no knowledge of his cousin being listed as CEO of Potomac before the newspaper contacted him. Potomac’s owner Okera Stewart says Intralot mistakenly identified McDuffie’s cousin as CEO because of an email he sent Intralot on Stewart’s behalf. An Intralot executive hasn’t returned comment requests.\n\nFlorida\n\nCocoa:Trafford Realty, which had been in operation for 102 years, closed July 1. The business was the oldest continuously operating retail office in Florida, says Margot Trafford Hester, former realtor whose father, Al, was chairman. The closure of Trafford Realty followed the death of company President Terry Lolmaugh and Vice President Roy Berry this spring. A.R. Trafford founded the company in 1917. His son, Al, started his career in 1938 and took over the company from his father. Al Trafford, who died in 2014, had continued participating in the business until age 98.\n\nGeorgia\n\nDallas: A K-9 was fatally shot by a deputy during a foot chase of a suspect. News outlets report 8-year-old Verro got out of his patrol car Friday without being assisted by his handler, Cpl. Brandon Kilgore. Paulding County sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Ashley Henson says deputies were pursuing a man fleeing the scene of an alleged domestic dispute. The situation didn’t require the deployment of the dog, but Verro squeezed out of his kennel looking to help Kilgore. The dog then attacked a deputy because he couldn’t differentiate who the suspect was without his handler. Henson says the deputy was unaware the dog was a K-9 and shot him to stop the attack. The suspect was apprehended. Kilgore had worked with Verro for about seven years.\n\nHawaii\n\nHilo: Hawaii County officials have announced reconstruction of a Big Island highway covered in lava is progressing on schedule. The Hawaii Tribune-Herald reported Sunday that the Department of Public Works says construction on parts of Highway 132 is expected to be completed in a few weeks. A spokeswoman says the project that began earlier this month is expected to be completed by Oct. 5 to qualify for 100% federal reimbursement. Work will continue on various sections of the roadway that was inundated with lava during the 2018 Kilauea volcanic eruption. Officials say access to some residents’ land-locked homes and farms will be restored by October on the highway located about 24 miles southeast of Hilo.\n\nIdaho\n\nCaldwell: Federal data shows more women are operating farms in Idaho, but officials say they have always been there. The Idaho Statesman reports the 2017 Census of Agriculture released earlier this year shows about one-third of Idaho farms are run by women. The U.S. Department of Agriculture recorded more than 10,000 women in farm leadership roles. It also says more than 17,000 women are working on farms and ranches in the state, up from the just over 13,000 recorded in 2012. The department attributed the uptick to a change in how the farm leadership positions are recorded. Department statistician Randy Welk says officials determined that woman and youth were probably getting undercounted. He says often the name listed as the operator of a family farm wasn’t updated.\n\nIllinois\n\nFord Heights: A south Chicago suburb without a library is getting a boost from students at an alternative high school inside a state juvenile detention facility. Illinois officials say the youth enrolled at Booker T. Washington Alternative High School at Harrisburg youth center constructed four library boxes to be placed throughout Ford Heights. The boxes will continually be replenished with books through a partnership with a bookstore. Department of Juvenile Justice Director Heidi Mueller says the boxes are symbolic of how collaboration, hard work and a shared goal can help families. Ford Heights had to close its library decades ago over funding issues. There will be a dedication ceremony for the boxes on July 30.\n\nIndiana\n\nIndianapolis: Indiana State Fairgrounds officials say a $50 million project will replace its nearly century-old swine barn with a new building that can hold events around the year. Fairgrounds Executive Director Cynthia Hoye says the open-air building can’t generate year-round revenue because it isn’t climate-controlled. The new building will be called the Fall Creek Pavilion and will still house livestock during the state fair. Most of the building that opened in 1923 will be demolished. Work could start after next year’s state fair. Gov. Eric Holcomb proposes dipping into the state’s $2.3 billion in reserves to pay cash for the project. Democrats have lambasted that plan, saying the money should go to other priorities such as raising teacher pay or improving access to affordable child care.\n\nIowa\n\nIowa City:The Muslim community in the Iowa City area is growing quickly, and along with that growth so is the need for a new Islamic cemetery, mosque leaders say. The Iowa City Mosque spent years establishing the Al-Iman Cemetery in southwest Iowa City and is now in the slow process of beautifying the space and putting in necessary physical infrastructure. The cemetery has long been an important project for the Iowa City Mosque, in part because members found local cemeteries did not allow them to bury loved ones in accordance with certain Muslim traditions, says Ousainou Keita, president of the Executive Committee for the mosque. The new cemetery allows for loved ones to be buried facing Mecca, the birthplace of Islam, and coffins or caskets are not mandated, like they are with other cemeteries. The Al-Iman Cemetery will serve the small slice of residents who identify as Muslim in Iowa City, Coralville and North Liberty.\n\nKansas\n\nWichita: State health and environment officials are recommending alternative ways for municipal water operators to treat toxic blue-green algal blooms that have troubled state lakes for nearly 10 years. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says people and animals that come into contact with cyanobacteria algae might suffer diarrhea, headaches and other symptoms. The state Department of Health and Environment has detected traces of toxins related to the blooms in at least five water treatment plants. KMUW-FM reports that the department has suggested adding activated carbon to the water treatment process. The carbon causes algae to fall to the bottom of ponds, allowing clean water to pass through. Department officials say they also offer a program to subsidize water quality tests searching for toxins caused by cyanobacteria.\n\nKentucky\n\nAshland: Planning is underway for a monument that would list the names of all Boyd County residents who served in World War II. The Independent reports the Ashland Rotary Club is planning a 79-foot wall that would have 6,700 names laser-etched on it. Cheryl Spriggs is spearheading the project and says the organization has raised about $20,000 and hopes to double that. She says Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul has agreed to attend an Aug. 21 fundraiser for the project. She says officials are looking for locations along the riverfront and in Central Park. The wall will replace one built in 1944 and demolished a decade later. Spriggs said she hopes to finish the wall by May 8, 2020, which is the 75th anniversary of Germany’s surrender.\n\nLouisiana\n\nLake Charles:Hurricane Barry brought a 7-foot storm surge in some parts of south Louisiana and dropped more than 20 inches of rain in one parish, according to a preliminary report from the National Weather Service. The storm, which made landfall July 13 as a Category 1 hurricane, also caused flooding and power outages in more than a dozen parishes, according to the report out of the NWS Lake Charles office. The most rainfall was measured in South Ragley in Beauregard Parish. It received 23.5 inches of rain, according to the report. Morgan City in St. Mary Parish, near Barry’s landfall, received nearly 11 inches of rain. Denham Springs in Livingston Parish received nearly 9 inches. In St. Martin Parish, Barry dropped about 7 inches of rain. Scott, in Lafayette Parish, received about 6 inches. The storm, which might have caused as much as $900 million in property damage, also caused more than 7 feet of storm surge in St. Mary and Vermilion parishes. At its peak on July 14, the Vermilion River in Perry reached nearly 11 feet.\n\nMaine\n\nMadawaska: The state will receive $36 million to help pay for the replacement of an aging bridge that connects one of its northernmost communities with the Canadian province of New Brunswick. Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who chairs the Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee, says the money will go toward replacing the Madawaska International Bridge. The bridge connects Madawaska with Edmundston, New Brunswick. The money is through the Infrastructure for Rebuilding America Program, which uses federal grants to help communities fix infrastructure. The program served 26 projects in the country last year. Collins’ office says temporary closures and a weight limit on the bridge forced some residents and businesses to drive as many as 75 miles out of their way. The total cost of replacement is estimated at $73.5 million.\n\nMaryland\n\nBaltimore: The state will receive a $125 million federal grant for long-sought improvements to the Howard Street Tunnel. Gov. Larry Hogan announced the grant Monday from the federal Infrastructure For Rebuilding America Grant Program. Height restrictions prevent the shipment of double-stacked containers by rail to and from the Helen Delich Bentley Port of Baltimore and up and down the East Coast. Double-stack containers provide a more cost-effective way to transport freight by rail than by truck.\n\nMassachusetts\n\nWorcester: The largest furniture and flooring store in New England has been acquired. Vystar Corp. announced Monday that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Worcester-based Rotmans Furniture and Carpet. Rotmans, one of the largest independent furniture retailers in the U.S., with 200,000 square feet and 150 employees, was founded by and has been under the leadership of the Rotman family for 50 years. Vytex is a Worcester-based manufacturer of environmentally safe and biodegradable rubber latex products. Vystar has acquired a controlling interest in Rotmans for more than $2 million, comprised of 25% cash and 75% in notes convertible into shares. Steve Rotman, CEO of Vystar and Rotmans, says the transaction will not impact the Rotmans store name or business practices and is expected to increase Vystar shareholder value and liquidity.\n\nMichigan\n\nDetroit:Fire has claimed the building that once housed the Gold Dollar, the Cass Avenue bar where the White Stripes played their first show and other bands cut their teeth in the late 1990s as Detroit’s garage-rock phenomenon took flight. The Gold Dollar closed in 2001 after a five-year run, and the property was reportedly purchased by the Ilitch organization in 2015 as the company acquired properties in the area around Little Caesars Arena. Deputy fire commissioner David Fornell says the fire was “fully involved” when firefighters arrived on the scene after 8 p.m. Monday. They were still battling the blaze at 10 p.m. Power and gas services at the building were shut off six years ago, Fornell says, adding it was too soon to determine the cause of the fire or speculate about arson.\n\nMinnesota\n\nCollegeville:A St. John’s University monk has been named 2019 Jefferson Lecturer in the Humanities by the National Endowment for the Humanities, marking the first time the honor has been given to a Minnesotan, a member of the clergy or a Benedictine monk. According to a news release issued Monday, Father Columba Stewart, OSB, will give a lecture titled “Cultural Heritage Present and Future: A Benedictine Monk’s Long View” at 7:30 p.m. Oct. 7 at the Warner Theatre in Washington. The lectureship is the highest honor bestowed by the federal government for contributions to the humanities, according to the release. Stewart is a graduate of Harvard, Yale and Oxford universities and a professed Benedictine monk of St. John’s Abbey since 1981. He is a much-awarded expert in the research field of early Christian monasticism, according to the release. Stewart is a professor of theology at St. John’s University School of Theology and Seminary and has been the executive director of the Hill Museum & Manuscript Library at St. John’s since 2003.\n\nMississippi\n\nJackson: The Mississippi Department of Education says a $1,500 raise for teachers will cost $18.5 million more than it originally told lawmakers. The department made the announcement Monday, months after local superintendents discovered a shortfall caused by the department’s ignorance of how teachers were classified in its computer system. Lawmakers allotted $58 million for the raise that began July 1, based on it going to 31,000 teachers. But the department didn’t count 10,000 other teaching positions that officials thought were federally funded. Instead, those positions are state-funded, and Mississippi must absorb the costs. Legislators pledge to pay the remainder of the full $77 million when they convene in January after elections. State Superintendent Carey Wright has said the department will give local school districts enough money to cover costs until then.\n\nMissouri\n\nRocheport: The Missouri Department of Transportation will receive an $81 million federal grant to help pay for the replacement of the Interstate 70 bridge over the Missouri River near Rocheport. Republican members of Missouri’s congressional delegation announced Monday the state will receive the grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Infrastructure for Rebuilding America program. The bridge was built in 1960 and carries about 12.5 million vehicles per year. It is rated in poor condition and repairing it has been a top priority of state officials for years. State transportation officials have said the current bridge will remain open while the new one is built. The agency had applied for about $178 million for the project, which has an estimated cost of $200 million.\n\nMontana\n\nMissoula: Wildlife officials are asking people who are traveling near Glacier National Park to report sightings of animals crossing the road. The Missoulian reported Monday that park officials and the U.S. Geological Survey want to know where animals are crossing U.S. Highway 2. Officials plan to use the data to help find locations for dedicated wildlife crossings and for other efforts to ease animals’ migration between the park and the Flathead National Forest. Park wildlife biologist John Waller says officials are interested in sightings of rare animals like lynx, bears and wolverines, as well as common animals like deer. Research ecologist Tabitha Graves says officials want to collect as much information as possible, including sightings from several years ago.\n\nNebraska\n\nLincoln: A poultry farm that could house up to 380,000 chickens has been proposed for Lancaster County as the county considers new regulations for large livestock operations. The Lincoln Journal Star reports that Sunset Poultry LLC applied earlier this month for a special permit for eight barns housing up to 47,500 chickens each on 80 acres just south of the Saunders County line. The birds would go to the Lincoln Premium Poultry plant in Fremont that’s processing chickens for Costco. An application last year for a poultry farm that would supply Costco spurred officials to examine Lancaster County’s lack of specific zoning laws regarding large livestock operations. A task force has arrived at recommendations for changes. A Lincoln Premium spokeswoman says Sunset Poultry would abide by the pending recommendations.\n\nNevada\n\nLas Vegas:Retired engineer Gary George was a NASA intern in 1976 when he paid $218 at a government auction for three truckloads of film reels that happened to include original video footage of man’s first steps on the moon. On Saturday, three film reels of the moon mission labeled “Apollo 11 EVA” were sold to a private buyer at a Sotheby’s New York auction for $1.82 million. Running 2 hours, 24 minutes, the “unrestored, unenhanced and unremastered tapes” – as described before the auction – including Neil Armstrong’s famous lunar declaration: “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” But that sale perhaps would have never happened if George’s father hadn’t looked a little closer at the peculiar tapes. George had decided to donate any leftover tapes to a Texas church that produced a syndicated television show. That way, he said, he could write them off come tax time. His father, Chet, helped him load the remaining tapes into the family’s 1963 Pontiac station wagon. Scanning the labels on the boxes, Chet noticed something that seemed impossible. On three of the boxes were small labels identifying the metal reels as “Apollo 11 EVA.” George took the three reels out of the pile and put them in a safe place with three other reels that seemed worth keeping: A Bob Hope special recorded at NASA as a benefit for the Apollo 1 astronauts who died in a tragic fire.\n\nNew Hampshire\n\nConcord: Three public school teachers have received fellowships as part of a program aimed at retaining educators in the northern part of the state. The New Hampshire Charitable Foundation says the winners of the Louise Tillotson Teaching Fellowships are Melissa Jellison, STEAM Coordinator at White Mountains Regional High School in Whitefield; Kate Moore, a second-grade teacher at Brown Elementary School in Berlin; and Deborah Sargent, Art Educator at Pittsburg School. Each winner will receive $10,000. Since 2007, the Louise Tillotson Fellowship has awarded $445,100 to North Country public school educators.\n\nNew Jersey\n\nVoorhees: Residents of a southern New Jersey nursing home have returned to their rooms after a malfunctioning air conditioning system forced them to be evacuated for several hours during last weekend’s heatwave. Officials say 183 residents of Voorhees Care and Rehabilitation were evacuated Sunday afternoon while repairs were made. Most were taken across the street to Eastern High School, while some went to other medical facilities. Residents returned to the center around 8 p.m. Sunday. Officials say at least one patient was taken to a hospital, though it wasn’t clear if that case was heat-related. Officials said outside temperatures were reported at 99 degrees when the cooling system failed, with the heat index around 110 degrees. Some patients’ relatives said temperatures inside the facility reached into the 90s.\n\nNew Mexico\n\nAlbuquerque: Five trees planted in New Mexico from seeds taken to the moon during Apollo 14 and given to the state by NASA have died or been forgotten. KOAT-TV reports officials, where the trees were planted decades ago, admit they have lost track of the trees. Other states have kept up with moon tree locations. Moon trees were grown from 500 seeds taken into orbit around the moon by former U.S. Forest Service smokejumper Stuart Roosa during the 1971 mission. NASA says the resulting seedlings were planted throughout the United States and the world. A NASA list of moon trees only cites one New Mexico tree. That one was planted in Albuquerque and city officials say it died.\n\nNew York\n\nBuffalo: After more than 20 years and $50 million, the restoration of an estate designed by architect Frank Lloyd Wright for a patron in Buffalo is complete. Work on the Darwin D. Martin House complex has been ongoing since the early 1990s and involved restoring or rebuilding the main house and several smaller structures, including a carriage house, glass-roofed conservatory and covered walkway. The complex was built between 1903 and 1905. The 1.5-acre estate is a National Historic Landmark and has received $24 million from the state over the years. On Monday, officials announced the completion of the Wright-designed landscape, the final piece of the project. The estate is seen as an example of Wright’s vision of architecture that promotes harmony with the natural world.\n\nNorth Carolina\n\nRaleigh: North Carolina lawmakers are cracking down on robocalls and telephone scammers in a bill that has passed both chambers of the General Assembly. The state Senate voted 45-0 on Monday and sent the bill to Gov. Roy Cooper to be signed. Under the bill, any telephone solicitor who masks their real number on caller ID so that the call appears to come from a local number or a familiar number can be fined up to $5,000. The practice of using fake numbers or names is illegal under federal law, but this bill gives North Carolina more leverage to go after scammers. It requires callers to use their real information or the information of the business they’re representing. The bill also applies to text message solicitations.\n\nNorth Dakota\n\nNorthwood: Sheriff’s officials say an overweight semitrailer loaded with dried beans caused a more-than-century-old bridge to. Grand Forks County sheriff’s officials say the bridge over the Goose River near Northwood collapsed Monday afternoon. Photos show the wooden and iron span buckling under the weight of the vehicle. The bridge is partly submerged in the water. The 56-foot-long bridge was built in 1906 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It has a 14 ton weight restriction. Sheriff’s officials say the semitrailer was 29 tons over that limit. The driver, who was not injured, faces an $11,400 overload fine. Officials say it will cost up to $1 million to replace the bridge. Northwood is about 200 miles northeast of Bismarck.\n\nOhio\n\nColumbus: Gov. Mike DeWine has declared a state of emergency in 63 counties where severe weather caused serious highway damage last month. The 63 counties covered by the emergency declaration have had weather-related damage to roads and/or bridges after mild temperatures and significant rains in June saturated the ground. Some roads still have lane restrictions or are closed completely. The governor said in a statement Monday that the emergency proclamation allows the state Department of Transportation and local governments in the 63 counties to access federal emergency relief funds to help fix the damage.\n\nOklahoma\n\nEdmond: First-degree murder charges have been filed against two people in the shooting death of the manager of a medical marijuana dispensary. Oklahoma County court records indicate charges were filed Monday against 38-year-old George Stewart Watson and 37-year-old Lyndsi Mae Mayabb. The records do not list an attorney for either defendant. Authorities say they are charged in the death of 24-year-old Andrew Sawyer English, the manager of a medical marijuana dispensary in Edmond, whose body was discovered by police in his home on June 27 with three bullet wounds in his back. Investigators tracked the suspects to St. Augustine, Florida, earlier this month, where Mayabb told detectives that Watson allegedly shot English after learning she had a relationship with him. Edmond Police spokeswoman Jennifer Wagnon said Tuesday that the suspects have waived extradition.\n\nOregon\n\nAstoria: Wildlife officials have proposed new regulations to avoid entangling whales in commercial fishing gear used by the state’s Dungeness crab industry. The Daily Astorian reports state fishery officials presented recommendations to avoid unwanted whale interactions to the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission during a June meeting. Officials say there were 12 cases of entangled whales as of July 16, half associated with commercial fishing and a third with commercial crabbing. Fisheries say recommendations include new gear identification tags and equipment cleanup requirements before the season’s end, eliminating a two-week, postseason grace period. Commercial fishermen say they can clean up earlier, but other changes could be contentious. Officials say Oregon has also applied for a federal permit allowing fishermen to take a small number of whales each year while fishing.\n\nPennsylvania\n\nPittsburgh: Scores of police officers, officials and members of the community gathered to pay their respects to an off-duty Pittsburgh police officer shot to death in a street confrontation more than a week ago. Relatives of 35-year-old Officer Calvin Hall were among those speaking during Tuesday’s service at Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall and Museum in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood. Hall’s sister remembered her brother as “the rock of our family.” His father performed a song he wrote and dedicated to his son. Hall died last Wednesday, three days after he was shot three times in the back during a street dispute in the Homewood neighborhood as a party was going on. Charges were announced against a suspect Monday afternoon as a viewing for the slain officer was being held.\n\nRhode Island\n\nNewport: A developer wants to demolish the former Newport Grand slots parlor and build hotels, apartment buildings, offices and retail space. The Carpionato Group says Tuesday it wants to create “Newport North End,” a $100 million mixed-use development project at the site. The project would include two six-story hotels, two six-story apartment buildings, offices and medical, retail and restaurant space. The project needs approvals from the city and state. The slots parlor closed nearly a year ago, when the Twin River Management Group relocated its gambling operations in the area to the new Tiverton Casino Hotel. City officials said then they expected to lose roughly $800,000 in annual property taxes and casino revenues. The Carpionato Group says its project would generate $1.5 million in tax revenue for Newport.\n\nSouth Carolina\n\nColumbia: Highway crews are closing a lane on the main highway north out of downtown Columbia as they prepare to build a bridge. The state Department of Transportation said the lane closure on state Highway 277 north bridge over Interstate 77 will continue until Thursday. Crews are preparing to build a $25 million bridge to carry the freeway from downtown Columbia to I-77 north. DOT engineers say the current bridge is getting old and its intersection with I-77 doesn’t match current safety standards. Crews hope to finish the new bridge by August 2020. They say they will have to temporarily close I-77 next year when they tear down the old bridge.\n\nSouth Dakota\n\nSioux Falls:The leader of Jefferson High School will be hired a full year before the Sioux Falls School District’s newest high school even opens, school officials announced Monday. The searches for the new high school principal and the new Ben Reifel Middle School principal will happen somewhat concurrently, Superintendent Brian Maher said during the district’s annual school board retreat. Both schools are projects tied to a $190 million bond passed in 2018 to help address overcrowding, and both buildings are expected to open by fall 2021. The high school search will begin in January or February and conclude by March or April, he said.\n\nTennessee\n\nJohnson City: East Tennessee State University researchers have developed a device to measure environmental preferences of salamanders that live in southern Appalachia. ETSU says plethodontid salamanders are threatened by climate change, shrinking habitats and fungal infections. ETSU biomedical sciences doctoral student Trevor Chapman calls the salamanders a crucial link in the local ecosystem. He says they’re one of the most abundant vertebrate species, are eaten by most creatures that prey on small organisms and they prey on almost any invertebrate or vertebrate they can fit in their mouths. With the help of faculty, Chapman made a four-chambered device that varies temperatures, moisture levels and other factors to monitor the behavior of salamanders within. Chapman sets the chambers at different levels and sees over 24 hours which chamber the animal will stay in longest.\n\nTexas\n\nCorpus Christi: A south Texas state park has reopened for overnight camping nearly two years after Hurricane Harvey battered the coastal area. The Texas Parks & Wildlife Department on Monday announced Mustang Island State Park has overnight camping available after Harvey delayed a scheduled restroom replacement project. Superintendent Scott Taylor says the staff of Mustang Island State Park is excited to again be able to offer camping to visitors from around the world. Mustang Island is in the area where Harvey made landfall in August 2017. Camp officials say the bathroom renovations included major plumbing and electrical work. Additional Harvey repairs are ongoing to the park’s headquarters and maintenance shop.\n\nUtah\n\nCedar City: Officials are considering whether to preserve a painted image of a Native American and the name “Redmen” on a water tank or allow it to be changed. The Spectrum reports the Cedar City Council reviewed last week two competing resolutions on the Leigh Hill water tank. One measure would designate the tank as a city marker, keeping the image and name of the former Cedar High School mascot. The second measure would allow schools to decide what goes on the tank and a second water tank in town. Under the second measure, representatives from the town’s two high schools would submit proposals for the tanks to the city council. The council is scheduled to vote on the resolutions next week.\n\nVermont\n\nBakersfield: The community has dedicated a memorial pavilion to a U.S. Marine killed overseas. NECN.com reports the community honored Lance Cpl. Lucas Williams at a dedication service Friday. Williams was killed in a Humvee wreck during a training exercise in Kuwait in 1998. He was 19 years old. The late soldier’s mother, Rosalie, has been holding youth programs in her son’s name for nearly two decades and has always wanted a permanent structure for where they can be held. She says the memorial pavilion will now be that place for children and the community to gather. Williams says this pavilion would have been Lucas’s wish and that she was “determined to make his wishes come true.”\n\nVirginia\n\nRichmond: The state Department of Health says the number of people in the state needing medical treatment for heat-related illnesses has nearly doubled compared with last July. Data released Sunday show just over 1,000 people visited emergency departments or urgent-care for heat-related illness since the beginning of the month, up from just below 600 during the same period last year. Parham Jaberi, the state’s chief deputy commissioner for public health and preparedness, told the Richmond Times-Dispatch the numbers describe a serious public health threat. Jaberi said there have been four heat-related deaths in the state within the past week, including an infant left in a car. She said the three others were older than 69 and included a woman doing yard work and a person sitting in a car.\n\nWashington\n\nBainbridge Island: A no-contact advisory for the city’s eastern shoreline north to Indianola has been lifted following a large spill at a Seattle sewage treatment plant. The three-day advisory was posted by the Kitsap Public Health District on Friday following a spill of 3 million gallons of untreated sewage from King County’s West Point Treatment Plant. King County reported the spill was a combination of stormwater and wastewater and said the problem was caused by a power surge early Friday. Workers responded by sending the water into Puget Sound through an emergency outfall pipe for about 30 minutes, in order to prevent flooding in the plant, King County said. The state’s Department of Ecology said backup pumping systems failed during the power disruption and said it is investigating the incident as a violation of the state’s water quality permits for the facility. Following the investigation, the state could levy fines and administrative orders against the county, Ecology spokesman Larry Altose said.\n\nWest Virginia\n\nWheeling: Officials say a suspension bridge will remain closed for another month so crews can make needed repairs and improvements. The Wheeling Suspension Bridge has been closed since a charter bus weighing well over the 2-ton weight limit crossed the span on June 29 and compromised its integrity. The Intelligencer reports state highway officials say along with making structural repairs, the state plans to put a hard barrier at the bridge’s entrances, which would stop vehicles such as dump trucks and tour buses from crossing it. Wheeling Police Department spokesman Philip Stahl has said the driver of the bus was cited for the overweight vehicle and failing to obey a traffic control device.\n\nWisconsin\n\nMadison: The state Department of Natural Resources is asking wastewater treatment plants to test for polyfluoroalkyl pollution. The substances, also known as PFAS, are man-made chemicals that have been used for decades in products such as firefighting foam, nonstick cookware and fast-food wrappers. Research suggests PFAS can decrease female fertility, increase the risk of high blood pressure in pregnant women and lower birth weights. DNR officials said Monday they have started sending letters to 125 municipal wastewater plants asking them to sample and analyze water flowing in and out of the facilities for PFAS compounds. The DNR picked the facilities because they’re more likely to receive wastewater from businesses that use PFAS. The DNR plans to use data from the sampling to build a plan to reduce PFAS entering the facilities.\n\nWyoming\n\nCody: State wildlife officials encourage people who enter the backcountry to carry bear spray, but they declined to make it a requirement. The Cody Enterprise reported Monday that the Wyoming Game and Fish Commission took no action last week on a petition submitted by seven conservation groups earlier this year. The conservation groups had asked the state to consider a bear spray mandate, aiming to reduce the number of grizzly bear deaths from encounters with hunters. Hunters defensively killed 15 grizzlies in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem in 2017. Bonnie Rice of the Sierra Club says bear spray is a proven tool in preventing injury to people and bears. Grand Teton National Park requires elk hunters to carry bear spray when they’re in the park each fall.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2019/07/23"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_24", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:41", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_25", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:41", "search_result": []}
{"question_id": "20230224_26", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:41", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/09/football/morocco-portugal-france-england-world-cup-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "World Cup quarterfinals: Morocco on the verge of history against ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nMorocco already caused the upset of the round of 16 when it beat Spain on penalties to make it to the quarterfinals for the first time in its history, but the North Africans will have to replicate their heroics if they want to get past a reinvigorated Portugal.\n\nLater in the day, the blockbuster final game of the quarterfinals will pit old foes England and France against each other.\n\nMorocco looks to continue dream run\n\n“Before it was just the Moroccans who supported us, now it is the Africans and Arabs,” Morocco manager Walid Regragui said about his team’s journey.\n\nThe Moroccans have become the darlings of the World Cup. At the first “Arab” World Cup, they became the first Arab nation to qualify for the quarterfinals of the World Cup and, as the first African side to qualify for the quarterfinals in over a decade, they represent so much more than just their own nation.\n\nBorn in Madrid, Achraf Hakimi scored the goal to knock Spain out of the World Cup. Ulrik Pedersen/DeFodi Images/Getty Images\n\nBut this has not been the heroic performance of an underdog riding its luck.\n\nThe Moroccans have the meanest defense at the competition, conceding only a single own goal so far. Despite having the most difficult run to the last eight of any of the quarterfinalists – playing fellow quarterfinalist Croatia, Belgium and 2010 World Cup champion Spain along the way – only Argentina has conceded less shots than the Atlas Lions.\n\nWhen teams do get shots off, they have to contend with Yassine “Bono” Bounou. The Sevilla keeper has not conceded a goal to an opposition player in over 300 minutes of football, including a penalty shootout where he saved two penalties.\n\nAfter three or four key players were injured in its previous match against Spain and a grueling fixture list which included matches against nations ranked second, seventh and 12th in the world, Morocco is down to its bare bones. But that will not dampen the team’s spirit or ambition.\n\nWhen asked about making a run deep into the tournament, head coach Regragui said, “At some point in Africa, we have to be ambitious and why not win the World Cup?”\n\nIn Morocco’s way of more history is a Portuguese side that looked, for the first time under Fernando Santos, to be fully unshackled and playing to its attack potential as it thrashed Switzerland 6-1.\n\nBut in order to realize the team’s potential, Santos made the hardest decision of his career, dropping the nation’s greatest ever player, Cristiano Ronaldo. Despite his glittering career and a title as the greatest goalscorer international football has ever seen (118 goals in 194 caps), there are signs that age is finally catching up with the five-time Ballon d’Or winner.\n\nRonaldo is yet to score a goal in a World Cup knockout game. lorencia Tan Jun/PxImages/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images\n\nIn contrast to the 37-year-old’s place as one of the most famous athletes, his replacement Gonçalo Ramos was making his first ever start for the national team, and he took his chance with aplomb.\n\nThe 21-year-old Benfica striker scored three goals to help Portugal dominate the Swiss. The last player to score a hat-trick on his World Cup full debut was Miroslav Klose, who is now the competition’s all-time record scorer.\n\nBut Ramos is not the only player who has been set free by the absence of Ronaldo. His former Manchester United teammate Bruno Fernandes was at his creative best and Atlético Madrid star João Félix looked like the player who has been long considered the man to take up the torch from Ronaldo.\n\nThe last time the two teams met was in the group stage of the 2018 World Cup in a frenetic game which Ronaldo settled with the only goal of the contest.\n\nNo team has scored more than Portugal’s 12 at the World Cup, but will the unstoppable Portugal be able to beat the immovable Morocco?\n\nEngland looks to upset Mbappé and France\n\nThe biggest match of the round is left for last as world champion France, looking to become the first country in 60 years to retain the World Cup, takes on an England team on the verge of reaching only its third semifinal.\n\nDespite both sides featuring some of the world’s best players, eyes inevitably turn to Kylian Mbappé. The PSG forward has been nothing short of sensational this tournament. He has scored five goals in just three starts so far, already surpassing his total from 2018.\n\nMbappé has already surpassed Cristiano Ronalo's World Cup goal scoring record and is level with Lionel Messi on nine. Francois Nel/Getty Images\n\nThe biggest question ahead of the game is whether England can shackle the forward.\n\n“England will have prepared for Kylian, but he is in a position to make the difference,” France coach Didier Deschamps said. “We have other players, but Kylian is Kylian and he can make the difference.”\n\nKyle Walker, who will likely be the defender tasked with stopping Mbappé, was confident when asked about it.\n\n“I do understand what I need to do and that is to stop him,” he said. “It’s probably easier said than done, but I don’t underestimate myself.”\n\nBut Mbappé is not the only French threat going forward. On the opposite flank is Ousmane Dembélé who is not the complete product like Mbappé but is no less dangerous with his blistering pace and dribbling. In between the speedsters is Olivier Giroud, who became France’s all-time record goal scorer earlier in the tournament while operating as a foil for the wide men.\n\nBehind the front three is Atlético man Antoine Griezmann, who after a difficult few seasons, looks back to being the player who took both Euro 2016 and the 2018 World Cup by storm.\n\nDespite the excellent performances of Harry Maguire and John Stones in the heart of the English defense so far, they have not been tested by anything close to this attack at a major tournament.\n\nHarry Kane is England's all-time top scorer at major tournaments with 11 goals. Dan Mullan/Getty Images\n\nHowever, unlike in previous tournaments, England has plenty of tools of its own to hurt a vulnerable French defense.\n\nAlong with Portugal, the Three Lions are the top scorers in Qatar. They won their previous two matches 3-0, and for the first time this century, come into this match with more depth in their team than their opponents who have been hampered by a host of injuries.\n\nLike Giroud, Harry Kane is on the verge of becoming England’s all-time record goal scorer. He is now only one goal behind Wayne Rooney’s record of 53.\n\nBukayo Saka and Marcus Rashford both have three goals a piece despite neither being guaranteed a starting spot and Jordan Henderson has made an unexpected return to the starting lineup with excellent results. The Liverpool captain scored the opener against Senegal and has added much needed balance to the team.\n\nWith two stellar attacks – and two unconvincing defenses – this game has the potential to be the best of the entire tournament.\n\nWhere and when?\n\nMorocco vs Portugal: Saturday, December 10, 10 a.m. ET at the Al Thumama Stadium\n\nEngland vs France: Saturday, December 10, 2 p.m. ET and the Al Bayt Stadium\n\nHow to watch\n\nUS: Fox Sports\n\nUK: BBC or ITV\n\nAustralia: SBS\n\nBrazil: SportTV\n\nGermany: ARD, ZDF, Deutsche Telekom\n\nCanada: Bell Media", "authors": ["Alasdair Howorth"], "publish_date": "2022/12/09"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/16/football/cristiano-ronaldo-manchester-united-interview-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "Cristiano Ronaldo: Has Portuguese star ruined his legacy after TV ...", "text": "CNN —\n\n“You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain,” Harvey Dent says in Batman’s “The Dark Knight,” foreshadowing his descent from a hero to a villain.\n\nCould the same be said about Cristiano Ronaldo?\n\nIt is no secret that the Portuguese superstar has not enjoyed a fairytale reunion with Manchester United ever since he returned to Old Trafford last year.\n\nIn the latest twist in the saga between Ronaldo and United, clips from an explosive interview with Piers Morgan for Talk TV were released this week in which Ronaldo said he had been “betrayed” by the club.\n\nThe full interview will be released over two nights on Wednesday and Thursday.\n\nRonaldo's relationship with Erik ten Hag has been strenuous since the Dutchman took charge at United. Matthew Ashton/AMA/Getty Images\n\nSpecifically, Ronaldo is unhappy with new Manchester United manager Erik ten Hag, who dropped the forward after he left Manchester United’s game against Tottenham Hotspur last month before the end of the match.\n\n“I don’t have respect for him because he doesn’t show respect for me,” Ronaldo said. “If you don’t have respect for me, I’m never gonna have respect for you.”\n\nThe end of an unhappy marriage\n\nRonaldo enjoyed unprecedented success at Manchester United after joining the club in the summer of 2003. Over the next six years, he would transform himself from a tricky winger into the best player in the world – collecting the first of his five Ballon d’Ors in 2008.\n\nIn that time, he won three Premier League titles, the FA Cup, two League Cups and the Champions League – a tournament with which Ronaldo has since become synonymous.\n\nBut since returning to England, he has not enjoyed the same success. Last season was Ronaldo’s first in 17 years in which he did not win any trophies, a stretch going back to his first stint at the club.\n\nSince trying to force a move away from United over the summer, Ronaldo has featured sparingly, only making 16 appearances for the Red Devils.\n\nThat number is unlikely to increase after the Talk TV interview, which may well spell the end of his time in Manchester.\n\nRonaldo now says he feels like he was being forced out of the club by ten Hag, but what he failed to mention was that he was the one pushing for a move in the summer after United failed to qualify for the Champions League.\n\nIn the interview, he also reflected on his personal tragedy. Earlier this year, he and his partner, Georgina Rodríguez, announced their baby son had died.\n\nRonaldo also said his baby daughter ended up in the hospital this year, which he cited as the reason he missed the majority of preseason training with United.\n\nRonaldo also took shots at his former Champions League winning teammates Wayne Rooney and Gary Neville . Franck Fife/AFP/Getty Images\n\nBut after taking aim at his coach, former teammates, the club, and the owners, many have been dismayed by Ronaldo’s swipes at his employer.\n\n“I’m totally baffled and confused as to why he’s done this interview,” former England international turned pundit Jermaine Jenas said on BBC’s Match Of The Day 2.\n\n“We’ve seen nothing but almost petulance throughout the whole year with the walking down the tunnel. Today he was supposedly ill. Now he’s doing interviews with Piers Morgan.\n\n“He’s a frustrated player. Whether he feels lied to or not, today just doesn’t feel right to me. He has to be [done at United].”\n\nBeth Tucker, a presenter for United fan channel The United Stand, appreciated Ronaldo’s criticism of the United ownership, but not of how he treated the club or ten Hag.\n\n“If he wanted to hit the club, he should have come out against the Glazers. He shouldn’t have come out against the manager as well,” Tucker said on The United Stand.\n\n“He thinks he is [bigger than Ten Hag] and in the footballing world he is, but at Manchester United right now he’s not. No player is bigger than the club and the manager.”\n\nSalary and behavior turn clubs away from Ronaldo\n\nThis summer, Ronaldo was linked with a variety of teams, including Atlético Madrid, Chelsea, Napoli, Bayern Munich and even a return to Sporting Lisbon, where he emerged as a talent 20 years ago.\n\nBut despite his tag as an elite striker and his haul of 18 goals last season, Ronaldo seemed incapable of attracting any offers to take him away from United.\n\nOne of the reasons is his immense salary at United, which his current deal believed to be in the region of $560,000 a week.\n\nBut the bigger turn off for clubs may be the behavior of Ronaldo, who has now twice left matches early this season and has done an interview in which he openly disparages his club.\n\nManchester United beat Fulham on Sunday, taking the club to fifth place in the Premier League table. Andrew Boyers/Action Images/Reuters\n\nWhen Bayern was connected to signing Ronaldo this summer, the club’s CEO Oliver Kahn was quick to say that the player “wouldn’t be a fit.”\n\nHe said: “I love Cristiano Ronaldo and everyone knows how fantastic he is. But every club has a certain philosophy and I’m not sure if it would be the right thing for Bayern and the Bundesliga if we signed him now.”\n\nDespite his impressive personal haul last season, Ronaldo was routinely criticized for his behavior at United – both on and off the pitch, where other players seemed to be sacrificing their own talent to service the superstar.\n\nWhere does Ronaldo go now\n\nOn Monday, Ronaldo tweeted that he had “total and absolute focus on the work of the national team” ahead of the World Cup, which gets underway this week.\n\nWhen contacted by CNN, Man United and the Glazer family said they had no further comment following an original statement on the matter.\n\nIn that statement, the club said: “Manchester United notes the media coverage regarding an interview by Cristiano Ronaldo. The club will consider its response after the full facts have been established.\n\n“Our focus remains on preparing for the second half of the season and continuing the momentum, belief and togetherness being built among the players, manager, staff, and fans.”\n\nSome, including former United defender Rio Ferdinand, believe Ronaldo’s association with the club will have to come to an end.\n\n“This has all been manufactured for one thing – and that’s for him to leave the club,” Ferdinand said on his Vibe with Five podcast.\n\n“I don’t feel the club will take him back and I don’t think that he wants to come back. This is all manufactured for that reason.”\n\nThis year's World Cup will likely be Ronaldo's last appearance at the biggest tournament in football. Octavio Passos/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images\n\nRonaldo still holds phenomenal commercial value as a player and is the most followed person on the planet on social media platforms. Even with his incredible salary, most club accountants would say it is worth signing him.\n\nBut Ronaldo has struggled to find his place of late, demanding that a club not only incorporates him in the team, but also builds the team around him. For a 37-year-old arguably past his best, that is not something clubs are looking to do.\n\nAfter this interview, it is also clear Ronaldo is a potential liability for an elite team and most clubs will now look at signing the forward with less wonder and more caution.\n\nOnce a hero of the game, he is in danger of quickly becoming a villain.", "authors": ["Alasdair Howorth"], "publish_date": "2022/11/16"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/15/football/diego-maradona-hand-of-god-ball-auction-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "Diego Maradona: How the 'world's most famous football' became a ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nThe two goals are perhaps as famous as each other – the first fabled for its audacity and guile, the second for its brilliant, breathtaking skill.\n\nJust four minutes separate Diego Maradona’s two memorable contributions at Mexico City’s Estadio Azteca 36 years ago, and together they typify Argentina’s flawed genius and beloved footballing icon.\n\n“The Hand of God” – when Maradona rose above England goalkeeper Peter Shilton and punched the ball into the net – needs little introduction to football fans of any era, while his slaloming run through the heart of England’s defense moments later was voted the Goal of the Century.\n\nIt comes as little surprise, then, that the match ball from that day in Mexico City – now deflated and faded in places – was tipped to fetch up to $3.3 million at auction on Wednesday.\n\n“Without a doubt, it’s the world’s most famous football,” Terry Butcher, who captained England during the 2-1 defeat against Argentina at the 1986 World Cup, tells CNN Sport.\n\nMaradona runs clear of Butcher (left) to score against England. STAFF/AFP/AFP via Getty Images\n\nEven being in the presence of the ball, as he was at Wembley Stadium in London ahead of the auction, brings back uneasy memories for Butcher.\n\nIt’s a reminder of how he remonstrated with Tunisian referee Ali Bin Nasser after Maradona’s first goal, and of how he tried in vain to stop the second with an outstretched leg.\n\n“It’s really weird to be in the same room as the ball, it’s difficult to explain,” Butcher adds. “It’s quite surreal in many respects … That ball – it’s the biggest injustice the world’s ever seen when it comes to football matches.”\n\n‘Hand of God’ controversy\n\nIn the aftermath of his death two years ago, memorabilia from Maradona’s life and career have fetched huge sums at auction.\n\nIn May, the jersey he wore against England sold for $9.3 million, at the time making it the most expensive piece of sports memorabilia in history.\n\nAs for the match ball, it is currently owned by Nasser after FIFA, football’s global governing body, declared that referees would get to keep the ball after each game they officiated at the 1986 World Cup.\n\nThe match ball from the 1986 World Cup quarterfinal is expected to sell for up to $3.3 million. ISABEL INFANTES/AFP/AFP via Getty Images\n\nNasser is 78 now and his refereeing days are long behind him. With the proceeds from the sale, which is being overseen by Graham Budd Auctions in the UK, he will donate some of the money to charity and says the remainder will “raise my standard of life a little.”\n\n“It is a gift from God,” Nasser tells CNN Sport, “because I had a career of 25 years … and I made all the decisions that needed to be made.”\n\nAsked about Maradona’s first goal and Nasser is eager to defend his reasons for letting it stand.\n\nFIFA’s instructions for the tournament, he says, were to rely on other match officials if they had a better view of an incident. Unable to see what had happened in the aerial contest between Maradona and Shilton, Nasser instead turned to his linesman, Bulgarian Bogdan Dochev.\n\n“[Dochev] arrived at the center line, which means the goal is 100% valid,” says Nasser, adding that he “applied the FIFA guidelines regarding the first goal.”\n\nMaradona's controversial hand ball gave Argentina a 1-0 lead against England at the 1986 World Cup. Bob Thomas/Getty Images/file\n\nFor his part, Dochev, who passed away five years ago, said he thought he saw “something irregular” about the goal, but claimed FIFA protocols didn’t allow assistants to discuss decisions with the referee. The fallout from the incident would tarnish his refereeing career.\n\n“Diego Maradona ruined my life,” Dochev later told Bulgarian media in the years before his death. “He is a brilliant footballer but a small man. He is low in height and as a person too.”\n\n‘A genius footballer’\n\nWhile multiple balls would be used over the course of a match in today’s game, back then only one was used for the full 90 minutes.\n\nAccording to Graham Budd, the auction house chairman at Graham Budd Auctions, Nasser’s ball has been cross-checked against match footage and high-res photographs, while an independent body has also verified it as the original.\n\nWith the World Cup beginning in Qatar on Sunday, this week was an optimum time for the ball to go up for auction.\n\nThere were hopes it would become the most expensive sports ball ever sold at auction by eclipsing the $3 million paid for Mark McGwire’s 70th home run baseball in 1999.\n\nHowever, after receiving interest from several potential buyers, Graham Budd Auctions said negotiations between the seller and interested parties are ongoing after the bidding failed to reach the pre-sale reserve.\n\nAli Bin Nasser speaks to the media following Maradona's death two years ago. FETHI BELAID/AFP/AFP via Getty Images\n\nThe ball’s sizable price tag is not only derived from the nature of Maradona’s two interventions.\n\nThe match was the first time England and Argentina had met on a sporting arena since the Falklands or Malvinas War four years earlier, and many of the players had – at least on Argentina’s side – friends or relatives who had been conscripted to fight in the war.\n\nThat backdrop created a sense of drama well before the “Hand of God” took center stage.\n\n“We had an energy, a great desire to win, not just because it was England, but also so that our country could in one way be happy,” Jorge Luis Burruchaga, who would go on to score the winning goal in the final for Argentina against West Germany, told CNN Sport four years ago.\n\n“We were aware that we wouldn’t bring back the dead of the Falklands War, but we were aware that we would bring some happiness.”\n\nFormer England international Peter Reid also acknowledges the political context of the game, which he says contributes to the “unique” status of the match ball.\n\n“There’s a lot of Argentinians there, there was a lot of pressure on both sets of players, and that’s when he [Maradona] handled the pressure really well,” says Reid. “Whatever you say, he was a genius footballer.”\n\nAnd as for the first goal? “Listen, he’s cheated,” adds Reid, “but he’s been very clever as well.”\n\nDespite his decades-long career in football as a player and manager, Reid says he still gets mocked for being outpaced by Maradona for the second goal – even by the man himself when the pair met in Jordan many years later.\n\nAnd while it was Nasser who kept the “Hand of God” match ball from that game and his old teammate Steve Hodge who kept Maradona’s shirt, Reid did end up with a gift from his wily opponent – albeit decades after they had faced each other in Mexico City.\n\n“He came with a signed shirt for me: ‘To my friend. Lots of love, Diego Maradona,’” says Reid. “I’ve got that on my wall, so that’s not a bad one. I’ll hold onto it.”", "authors": ["George Ramsay"], "publish_date": "2022/11/15"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/soccer/2018/12/22/shock-home-epl-defeats-for-man-city-and-chelsea/38784131/", "title": "Solskjaer starts Man U with win; Man City and Chelsea lose", "text": "AP\n\nManchester United was stunning and Manchester City was stunned.\n\nUnited responded to a change in coach by producing a rampant display to thrash lowly Cardiff 5-1 hours after English Premier League leader City slumped to a first defeat at home, to struggling Crystal Palace 3-2 on Saturday.\n\nFormer striker Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, back at United as manager in midweek after Jose Mourinho was sacked, appeared to give the team a new lease of life as it turned on the style in the Welsh capital.\n\nThe last time United scored five goals was in Alex Ferguson's last match in charge in May 2013, a 5-5 draw with West Bromwich Albion.\n\nMeanwhile, City's loss brought to an end its 100 percent home record in the league, and left leader Liverpool four points clear at the top after 18 rounds.\n\nIn another upset, former England striker Jamie Vardy scored to guide Leicester to a 1-0 victory at Stamford Bridge and inflict on fourth-placed Chelsea its first loss at home, also.\n\nArsenal drew level on points with Chelsea after easing past Burnley 3-1.\n\nSouthampton won for the second successive match under new coach Ralph Hasenhuttl when it defeated Huddersfield 3-1, while Watford ended West Ham's run of four consecutive victories by winning at London Stadium 2-0.\n\nBournemouth beat Brighton 2-0, and Newcastle's home game with Fulham ended 0-0.\n\nUNITED BACK ON SONG\n\nManchester United's often ponderous style was one of the reasons Mourinho was fired. Solskjaer promised more attacking intent upon his appointment and the former Norway forward was as good as his word as his new team romped to victory at Cardiff.\n\nFormer captain Wayne Rooney summed up the drastic change of mood at United when he said, \"The players obviously looked a bit restricted (before). The players have ability and today we've seen that. A lot of things were happening around the team and around the manager, which isn't good.\n\n\"Ole's given them that freedom,\" he told BT Sport. \"It's a fantastic day for the club.\"\n\nJesse Lingard struck two goals, one a penalty, while Marcus Rashford, Ander Herrera, and Anthony Martial were also on target for the visitors.\n\nVictor Camarasa replied with a penalty for Cardiff.\n\nUnited was still in sixth place but Chelsea's defeat means the Old Trafford club was only eight points off the Champions League qualifying positions.\n\nTOWNSEND SCORCHER\n\nPalace forward Andros Townsend scored one of the goals of the season as Palace won at Manchester City for the first time in 28 years.\n\nIlkay Gundogan headed the home team in front before Jeffrey Schlupp equalized.\n\nTownsend then turned the match on its head in spectacular fashion when the ball dropped invitingly toward the former England international 30 meters out, and he met it with a ferocious volley that flew into the roof of the net.\n\nLuka Milivojevic made it 3-1 for Palace with a 51st-minute penalty.\n\nKevin De Bruyne pulled one back late on but it proved too little, too late for City.\n\n\"Palace had three shots on target and scored three goals,\" City coach Pep Guardiola said. \"Football is like this.\"\n\nRoy Hodgson's mood was rather different after his Palace side climbed to 14th place.\n\n\"You don't produce that sort of performance by waving a magic wand or having a five-minute team talk, there's a lot of work that goes into that structure and we were excellent,\" Hodgson said.\n\n\"We are playing against a team with enormous skill levels and their focus, their ability to sustain attacks, is an example to us all.\"\n\nBRIDGE OF SIGHS\n\nLeicester won at Chelsea for the first time in 18 years thanks to Vardy's sixth goal of the season.\n\nA run of two victories in 12 games led to media speculation that Claude Puel's job as Leicester manager was in jeopardy.\n\nVardy said on Friday that Puel's patient playing style did not suit him but his goal showed the value of having a top striker in the team. The Stamford Bridge crowd was left stunned in the 51st minute when Ricardo Pereira made a strong run down the right before finding James Maddison and he set up Vardy.\n\nOTHER RESULTS\n\nPierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored twice and Alex Iwobi also struck in Arsenal's win over Burnley.\n\nTroy Deeney's penalty and a goal from Gerard Deulofeu steered Watford past West Ham.\n\nNathan Redmond, Danny Ings, and Michael Obafemi netted in Southampton's win at Huddersfield.\n\nWales international David Brooks scored twice in Bournemouth's win against Brighton, for which captain Lewis Dunk was sent off in the 73rd minute for two yellow cards.\n\n___\n\nMore AP soccer: https://apnews.com/apf-Soccer and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2018/12/22"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/04/football/england-senegal-qatar-world-cup-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "England cruises past Senegal 3-0 to reach World Cup quarterfinals ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nEngland reached the quarterfinals of the World Cup for a second tournament in a row thanks to a comprehensive 3-0 victory over Senegal.\n\nIt was a sluggish start from the Three Lions, but two quickfire goals from Jordan Henderson and Harry Kane at the end of the first half sparked a brilliant performance and put Gareth Southgate’s men in complete control of the match.\n\nKane’s goal was his 11th for England at a major tournament, the most by any Three Lions player in history.\n\nBukayo Saka added gloss to the scoreline in the second half, dinking the ball wonderfully over Senegal keeper Edouard Mendy after being found by Phil Foden’s low cross, as Aliou Cissé’s side never looked like it was getting back into the game.\n\nThe result and performance are as good as England has produced in knockout football under Southgate and will undoubtedly have set off renditions of ‘It’s Coming Home’ up and down the country.\n\nReaching the semifinals of the 2018 World Cup and the final of Euro 2020 has given this side invaluable experience in the latter stages of tournament football and fans will be hopeful this group of players can finally put an end to 56 years of hurt.\n\nJordan Henderson finished off a flowing team move for the opening goal. Alex Pantling/The FA Collection/Getty Images\n\nSlow start, fast finish\n\nThis England team is without a doubt one of the best at this tournament and the players will be confident of improving on their semifinal appearance in Russia four years ago.\n\nEngland fans have grown weary of disappointment and heartbreak in the years since the country’s only major trophy win at the 1966 World Cup, and since taking over as manager in 2016, Gareth Southgate has given supporters renewed hope of finally ending that barren run.\n\nThe lead up to this tournament was far from ideal, however, as England suffered relegation from its Nations League group and was on the receiving end of some surprise defeats: the worst, a 4-0 hammering at home to Hungary.\n\nBut this team is tournament hardened, reaching the semifinal and then the final of its last two major competitions, and the players have turned it on when it’s mattered.\n\nNo team earned more points or scored more goals than England during the group stages and Southgate has the enviable problem of trying to pick from a plethora of attacking talent.\n\nGiven the vast amount of quality options in attack at the manager’s disposal, the former England international has been criticized at times for his conservative team selection and tactics, but it’s an approach that has so far served him well.\n\nSenegal started the game on the front foot and dominated the opening stages. Francisco Seco/AP\n\nSouthgate certainly hadn’t changed that approach here in what was an extremely cagey opening 25 minutes, and it was Senegal that had the first real chance of the game.\n\nHarry Maguire, arguably England’s best player so far in this tournament, gave the ball away in a dangerous area which led to a brilliant chance for Ismaila Sarr, but he skied his effort over the bar under pressure from Jordan Pickford.\n\nDespite the absence of star man Sadio Mané through injury, this Senegal team still boasts quality all over the pitch and England certainly would not have been taking the African champions lightly.\n\nSenegal has grown into the tournament, improving with each passing game. The Lions of Teranga stepped it up once again against England and were undoubtedly the best team of the opening half an hour.\n\nIt was another England error, this time from John Stones while under pressure, that gave Senegal another opening, with Boulaye Dia drawing a smart save from Pickford.\n\nBut just when Senegal was really beginning to dominate, England countered with a sucker punch seven minutes before halftime.\n\nHenderson finished off a sweeping counterattack, steering the ball home from inside the penalty area after being found by Jude Bellingham’s low cross.\n\nThat goal sparked England to life and the Three Lions finished the first half strongly, with Kane – still without a goal in this tournament – and Luke Shaw spurning good opportunities.\n\nEngland will play France in an epic quarterfinal on Saturday. Carl Recine/Reuters\n\nWith the last kick of the half, England doubled its lead and put one foot into the quarterfinals.\n\nIt was only a matter of time before Kane got on the score sheet, with the Tottenham Hotspur forward finishing off another counterattack that was again started by Bellingham.\n\nThe Borussia Dortmund midfielder, still only 19 years old, was having a remarkable first half; it was an individual performance as good as any so far at this World Cup.\n\nThat quickfire double forced Senegal manager Aliou Cissé into making three substitutions at halftime, but his changes had very little effect on the game, if any.\n\nThe result was put beyond any doubt a little over 10 minutes into the second half, as Saka’s cute finish capped off another wonderful England move. Fans of the Three Lions have been used to nerve-racking matches over the years, but those second 45 minutes were likely the most relaxed supporters have been watching this team in a knockout match for years.\n\nThis victory sets up a mouthwatering clash against Kylian Mbappé and defending champion France in the quarterfinals, with the two European powerhouses battling it out for a place in the last four on Saturday.", "authors": ["Matias Grez"], "publish_date": "2022/12/04"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/18/football/kylian-mbappe-best-player-qatar-2022-messi-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "Kylian Mbappé: Why the 'unstoppable' star now wears the crown as ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nAt just 23, Kylian Mbappé has won more in his short career than most players are ever able to achieve.\n\nHe’s already claimed five domestic titles in France, scored 250 career goals and, four years ago, lifted the World Cup trophy.\n\nDespite already proving he belongs among the elite, Mbappé has continued to improve season upon season and this year’s World Cup arguably feels like the moment he steps out alone as the best player in the world.\n\nIt’s a title that doesn’t come without dispute, though.\n\nWhile an aging Cristiano Ronaldo can no longer stake a claim, Mbappé’s Paris Saint-Germain teammate Lionel Messi – who has won seven Ballon d’Or awards – has produced some mesmeric performances for Argentina in Qatar. And let’s not forget players such as Erling Haaland, who failed to qualify for the tournament with Norway, but who promises to challenge Mbappé for accolades.\n\nBut, with this being Messi’s final World Cup, former France international and current Bordeaux coach Rio Mavuba says this tournament has seen the baton of greatness passed onto Mbappé.\n\n“In this World Cup, it’s been the transfer of power from Messi to Mbappé,” he told CNN, ahead of the pair’s showdown in the World Cup final on Sunday.\n\n“Messi is still one of the greatest, maybe the best player of all time, but, at this point, Mbappé can eat at the same table as Messi.\n\n“When he’s focused, he’s probably the best player in the world.”\n\nMessi and Mbappé both play for French club Paris-Saint Germain. GABRIEL BOUYS/AFP/AFP via Getty Images\n\nMavuba made 13 appearances for France and was included in Didier Deschamps’ squad for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.\n\nHe’s watched from afar as a young Mbappé has matured quickly into France’s most important player and says the attacker’s pace and finishing prowess makes him “unstoppable” at times.\n\nMbappé was born and raised in Bondy, a suburb of Paris 11 kilometers from the city center and, aside from a two-year spell playing for Monaco, has lived in the French capital his entire life.\n\nHis spell at Monaco, where he won his first league title, caught the world’s attention and the teenage sensation moved to PSG in 2017, initially on loan for the first year.\n\nThe deal was reported to be worth $214 million but Mbappé seemed to take it all in his stride.\n\nDespite all the trophies he’s won and goals he’s scored, Mavuba says the forward is only now coming into his prime.\n\n“For sure, he’s got a lot of speed but I think the best skill is he can do a lot of things. He can run fast, he can dribble, he can score, this is why it’s very difficult to catch him,” he said.\n\n‘He’s been gifted’\n\nWhile Mbappé’s physical attributes are undeniable, it’s his ability to cope with such intense pressure that separates him from the others, according to former Paris Saint-Germain captain Didier Domi.\n\nDomi, who played over 100 games for PSG and who now works for the club’s academy in Qatar, says Mbappé holds the weight of a nation on his shoulders but it seems his value reaches beyond just his performances on the pitch, and into the political arena.\n\nFrench President Emmanuel Macron intervened earlier this year to implore the young star to stay at PSG amid a transfer saga involving Spanish giant Real Madrid.\n\nBut despite all the pressure that comes both on and off the field, Mbappé continues to produce the goods.\n\n“His game is so unbelievable but the way he lifts the team, this is what has impressed me the most, mentally,” Domi told CNN.\n\n“We know his qualities with his feet but mentally he’s staying in that zone, as a leader, always being crucial for the team. It’s impressive.\n\n“He’s got a talent, of course, but he’s got a talent in his head as well. He controls his nerves and that’s part of the game.\n\n“It’s unbelievable, he doesn’t feel pressure. He’s been gifted.”\n\nMbappé has torn defenses apart with his pace at Qatar 2022. Francois Nel/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images\n\nWhile Mbappé has likely over a decade left to play at the top level, Qatar 2022 also marks the end of arguably the greatest rivalry in football history – with it being the last time we see Ronaldo and Messi play at a World Cup.\n\nBut as that chapter closes, Mbappé has the chance to take center stage.\n\n“He [Mbappé] will be the legacy of Messi and Ronaldo, maybe he’s already the best player in the world,” Domi added.\n\n“He doesn’t have the vision of Messi but, at his best, Mbappé is the best player in the world. He can make a difference at every moment.”\n\nBetter than Zidane?\n\nMbappé has scored five goals in Qatar – level as top goalscorer with Messi – bringing his World Cup total to nine from just two tournaments.\n\nJust Fontaine is the only Frenchman to score more World Cup goals – netting all 13 of his efforts in 1958.\n\nMore importantly, Mbappé is on the verge of winning his second successive World Cup, something that would make him potentially the greatest French player in history, according to Mavuba.\n\n“If he won the second World Cup, he’d probably be the best French player,” Mavuba said.\n\n“I love [Zinedine] Zidane but imagine, 23 years old, two World Cups, he’d be the best.”\n\nLionel Messi holds up the World Cup trophy after Argentina defeated France in the tournament final on Sunday, December 18. Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post/Getty Images Argentina fans celebrate in Buenos Aires. Rodrigo Abd/AP Messi holds the Golden Ball trophy, awarded to the tournament's top player, while kissing the World Cup trophy. Julian Finney/Getty Images Argentina players react after Gonzalo Montiel scored his penalty to clinch the shootout victory. Julian Finney/Getty Images French star Kylian Mbappé sits on the team's bench after the loss. Franck Fife/AFP/Getty Images French players react during the penalty shootout. Julian Finney/Getty Images Montiel becomes emotional after slotting home the winning penalty. Ian MacNicol/Getty Images Argentina goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez celebrates after blocking Kingsley Coman's penalty in the shootout. Natacha Pisarenko/AP Mbappé scored a penalty late in extra time to force the shootout. He scored all of France's three goals. Natacha Pisarenko/AP Messi scored for Argentina in extra time, giving his team a brief 3-2 lead. Hannah Mckay/Reuters Mbappé slams home his team's second goal to tie the match at 2-2 in the second half. It came just moments after he scored on a penalty. Dan Mullan/Getty Images Argentina's Julián Álvarez, left, competes with France's Dayot Upamecano. Jose Breton/Pics Action/NurPhoto/Getty Images Angel Di Maria celebrates after scoring Argentina's second goal in the first half. Argentina led 2-0 at halftime. Catherine Ivill/Getty Images Di Maria slots the ball past France goalkeeper Hugo Lloris, finishing an Argentina counterattack for the 2-0 lead. Dan Mullan/Getty Images Messi opens the scoring with a penalty in the 23rd minute. Matthias Hangst/Getty Images Messi celebrates after converting his penalty. Dan Mullan/Getty Images Players line up for the national anthems before the final at the Lusail Stadium. Christophe Ena/AP Croatia players celebrate after defeating Morocco 2-1 in the World Cup's third-place match on Saturday, December 17. David Ramos/FIFA/Getty Images Croatia captain Luka Modrić celebrates with his daughter after the medal ceremony on Saturday. Francisco Seco/AP Morocco's Achraf Dari scores a header to tie the match against Croatia. Croatia ultimately regained the lead with a goal from Mislav Oršić. Alex Livesey - Danehouse/Getty Images Croatia's Joško Gvardiol, right, celebrates after scoring his side's opening goal against Morocco. Francisco Seco/AP French players celebrate after defeating Morocco 2-0 in the World Cup semifinals on Wednesday, December 14. Ulrik Pedersen/DeFodi Images/Getty Images Morocco's Jawad El Yamiq attempts a bicycle kick during the first half against France. His shot clanged off the post. Fabio Ferrari/LaPresse/Sipa Morocco fans show their support at Wednesday's semifinal. Buda Mendes/Getty Images Theo Hernandez scores France's opening goal early in the match against Morocco. Dan Mullan/Getty Images Argentina star Lionel Messi, left, celebrates with teammate Julián Álvarez after Álvarez scored his first of two goals against Croatia in the World Cup semifinals on Tuesday, December 13. Messi scored the other goal on a first-half penalty. Richard Heathcote/Getty Images Croatian defender Joško Gvardiol reacts in the net after Álvarez scored to put Argentina up 3-0. Martin Meissner/AP Argentina players celebrate their 2-0 lead in the first half. David Ramos/FIFA/Getty Images Argentina goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez reaches out for a save against Croatia. Markus Gilliar/GES Sportfoto/Getty Images England's Mason Mount appears dejected as French players celebrate their 2-1 quarterfinal win at the World Cup on December 10. Robbie Jay Barratt/AMAGetty Images French players try to block a Marcus Rashford free kick late in the match. Michael Regan/FIFA/Getty Images Olivier Giroud celebrates after scoring a goal for France that turned out to be the match-winner. Marc Atkins/Getty Images England's Harry Kane scores a penalty to even up the score against France. But he missed a penalty in the second half with France leading 2-1. Clive Brunskill/Getty Images Aurélien Tchouaméni celebrates after scoring France's opening goal against England. Dylan Martinez/Reuters French star Kylian Mbappé is tackled by England's Declan Rice. Matthias Hangst/Getty Images A memorial for American journalist Grant Wahl sits in the press area of Al Bayt Stadium on December 10. Wahl died after collapsing during the quarterfinal match between Argentina and the Netherlands. His wife, Dr. Celine Gounder, said he died of an aortic aneurysm that ruptured. Hector Vivas/FIFA/Getty Images Morocco players celebrate after defeating Portugal 1-0 on December 10. The \"Atlas Lions\" made history by becoming the first African team to reach a World Cup semifinal. Tom Weller/dpa/Getty Images Morocco fans celebrate in the stands following their team's victory on December 10. Justin Setterfield/Getty Images Sofiane Boufal of Morocco celebrates with a family member. Mike Hewitt/FIFA/Getty Images Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo sinks to the ground beside Moroccan goalkeeper Yassine Bounou. Manan Vatsyayana/AFP/Getty Images Youssef En-Nesyri heads the ball to score Morocco's goal against Portugal. Francois Nel/Getty Images Players from Argentina, top, and the Netherlands react at the end of the penalty shootout that decided their quarterfinal match at the World Cup on December 9. Argentina prevailed on spot kicks after the match ended 2-2. Paul Childs/Reuters Argentina's Lionel Messi, left, and Leandro Paredes celebrate their berth in the semifinals. Ricardo Mazalan/AP Argentina goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez tries to shake Teun Koopmeiners' hand during the shootout. Elsa/Getty Images Martinez saves the penalty of Dutch captain Virgil van Dijk early in the shootout. Martinez made two saves in the shootout, which finished 4-3 for Argentina. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Dutch players celebrate after Wout Weghorst scored late into second-half stoppage time to extend the match. Patrick Smith/FIFA/Getty Images Weghorst overpowers Enzo Fernández on a carefully orchestrated set play to tie the match at 2-2. Patrick Smith/FIFA/Getty Images Van Dijk knocks over Paredes as Dutch players run onto the field in the second half. The skirmish started after a hard Paredes foul on Nathan Aké. Paredes then smashed the ball into the Dutch bench. Matthias Hangst/Getty Images Brazilian star Neymar is comforted by Dani Alves after Brazil were knocked out of the World Cup by Croatia on December 9. Croatia won a penalty shootout after the match ended 1-1. Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images Croatian goalkeeper Dominik Livaković celebrates after Marquinhos hit the post on the last kick of the penalty shootout. It was Croatia's second straight shootout win in this World Cup. Matthew Childs/Reuters Croatian players run around the field and celebrate their victory as Marquinhos, bottom right, falls to his knees. Alessandra Tarantino/AP Croatia's Borna Sosa hits Antony in the face while tussling for position. Frank Augstein/AP Neymar opens the scoring in extra time after the match went scoreless in regulation. With the goal, he tied Pelé as Brazil's all-time goalscorer. But Croatia would tie the match a few minutes later with a goal from Bruno Petković. Manu Fernandez/AP Gonçalo Ramos celebrates his first of three goals in Portugal's 6-1 thrashing of Switzerland on December 6. The win booked Portugal's spot in the quarterfinals. Justin Setterfield/Getty Images Pepe scores Portugal's second goal on December 6. Peter Cziborra/Reuters Portugal manager Fernando Santos speaks with Cristiano Ronaldo before bringing him off the bench against Switzerland. Ronaldo started the first three group-stage games but was replaced by Ramos for the round-of-16 clash. Justin Setterfield/Getty Images Morocco players celebrate after Achraf Hakimi scored to win a penalty shootout against Spain on December 6. The match ended 0-0 before going to the shootout. Wolfgang Rattay/Reuters Morocco's Abdelhamid Sabiri scores during the penalty shootout against Spain. Matthew Childs/Reuters Spain's Aymeric Laporte reacts after the loss to Morocco. Bernadett Szabo/Reuters Morocco goalkeeper Yassine Bounou makes a save near the end of the Spain match. Richard Heathcote/Getty Images Hakimi tries to win the ball from Spain's Dani Olmo, seen in the foreground. Jack Guez/AFP/Getty Images Richarlison, left, scores Brazil's third goal during the World Cup match against South Korea on December 5. Brazil won 4-1 to advance to the quarterfinals. Manu Fernandez/AP From left, Vinicius Junior, Raphinha, Lucas Paqueta and Neymar celebrate after one of Brazil's four first-half goals. Manu Fernandez/AP Mario Pasalic, right, celebrates with goalkeeper Dominik Livaković after Croatia won a penalty shootout over Japan. Livaković made three saves in the shootout after the match ended 1-1. Frank Augstein/AP Livaković saves the first penalty in the shootout against Japan. Marko Djurica/Reuters Croatian midfielder Lovro Majer falls near Japanese midfielder Ao Tanaka. Andrej Isakovic/AFP/Getty Images England players celebrate after Harry Kane scored against Senegal on December 4. England won 3-0 to advance to the quarterfinals. Carl Recine/Reuters A Senegal supporter cheers before the match against England. Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP/Getty Images France's Olivier Giroud celebrates scoring his team's first goal against Poland on December 4. With the goal, Giroud became Les Bleus' all-time top goalscorer. France defeated Poland 3-1 to advance to the quarterfinals. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images France's Dayot Upamecano collides with Poland goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny. Natacha Pisarenko/AP Argentina's Lionel Messi, left, celebrates with teammates after opening the scoring against Australia on December 3. Argentina's 2-1 victory set up a quarterfinal match against the Netherlands. Hector Vivas/FIFA/Getty Images Australian fans in Sydney celebrate their team's goal against Argentina on December 3. Loren Elliott/Reuters US captain Tyler Adams sinks to the ground after the Americans lost 3-1 to the Netherlands on December 3. Dan Mullan/Getty Images The United States' Brenden Aaronson, left, and the Netherlands' Frenkie de Jong battle for the ball on November 3. Elsa/Getty Images Switzerland's Remo Freuler, right, celebrates with Ricardo Rodriguez after scoring the third and decisive goal in the 3-2 victory over Serbia on December 2. With the win, Switzerland advanced to the next stage of the World Cup. Suhaib Salem/Reuters Players argue during the Serbia-Switzerland match. Serbia was eliminated with the loss. Alexander Hassenstein/Getty Images Switzerland's Manuel Akanji heads the ball during the Serbia match. Carl Recine/Reuters Dušan Vlahović scores Serbia's second goal on December 2. Suhaib Salem/Reuters Bremer heads the ball for Brazil during the match against Cameroon on December 2. Cameroon came out on top 1-0, but Brazil still won Group G thanks to two earlier victories. Amanda Perobelli/Reuters Bremer controls the ball against Cameroon. Moises Castillo/AP Cameroon's Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting tries to bring the ball down between Fabinho and Éder Militão. Amanda Perobelli/Reuters South Korea's Hwang Hee-chan celebrates December 2 after his team's 2-1 victory over Portugal clinched a spot in the next round. Hwang scored the game-winning goal in second-half stoppage time. Stuart Franklin/Getty Images South Korea's Son Heung-min slides for a tackle against Portugal's João Mário. Portugal lost the match but still won Group H. Glyn Kirk/AFP/Getty Images Portugal's Ruben Neves, left, heads the ball against South Korea. Patricia de Melo Moreira/AFP/Getty Images Uruguay's Giorgian de Arrascaeta scores his second goal in the 2-0 victory over Ghana on December 2. Uruguay finished Group H with the same amount of points as South Korea, but the South Koreans advanced because they scored more goals in the group. Ashley Landis/AP Uruguay's Luis Suarez, foreground, looks to head the ball against Ghana. Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters Ghana's Inaki Williams leaps for a kick against Uruguay. Serhat Cagdas/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images Japan's Kaoru Mitoma passes the ball near the goal line, leading to a goal that was upheld by a video assistant referee (VAR) review during the match against Spain on December 1. Japan took a 2-1 lead and held on to win by that score. It finished first in Group E while Spain finished second. Petr David Josek/AP Wataru Endo celebrates with teammates after Japan's victory. Kim Hong-Ji/Reuters Spain's Alejandro Balde tries to hold up Japan's Ritsu Doan. Ryan Pierse/Getty Images Germany's Thomas Müller hugs Antonio Rüdiger after their 4-2 win over Costa Rica on December 1. Despite the win, Germany was eliminated from the tournament because Japan defeated Spain. Thaier Al-Sudani/Reuters German goalkeeper Manuel Neuer punches a ball clear against Costa Rica. Ariel Schalit/AP Referee Stephanie Frappart, center, warms up with assistant referees Karen Diaz, left, and Neuza Back before the Germany-Costa Rica match. They made history as the first all-female refereeing crew for a men's World Cup match. Frappert became the first woman to referee a men's World Cup match. Matthew Childs/Reuters Belgium players react after their 0-0 draw against Croatia meant that they would be eliminated on December 1. Belgium finished third at the last World Cup in 2018. Thanassis Stavrakis/AP Belgium's Leandro Trossard, left, and Croatia's Josko Gvardiol compete for a ball. Croatia finished second in Group F to advance to the tournament's knockout stage. Luca Bruno/AP Croatia's Borna Sosa heads the ball near Belgium's Thomas Meunier. Thanassis Stavrakis/AP A Belgium supporter looks dejected after the match against Croatia. Stephane Mahe/Reuters Morocco head coach Walid Regragui is lifted into the air by his team after a 2-1 victory over Canada on December 1. Morocco finished first in Group F. Catherine Ivill/Getty Images Canada's Alistair Johnston tries to head the ball into Morocco's net on December 1. Matthias Hangst/Getty Images Youssef En-Nesyri celebrates after scoring Morocco's second goal against Canada. Carl Recine/Reuters Argentina's Julian Alvarez is put in a headlock by teammate Enzo Fernandez after scoring against Poland on November 30. Argentina won 2-0 to finish first in Group C and advance to the knockout stage. Poland qualified as well despite the loss. Natacha Pisarenko/AP Argentina star Lionel Messi is hit in the face by Poland's Wojciech Szczesny in the first half November 30. A penalty was given after video review, but Szczesny saved Messi's shot. Tim Nwachukwu/Getty Images Messi and Poland's Bartosz Bereszynski compete for the ball. Guiseppe Cacace/AFP/Getty Images Mexico's Orbelín Pineda, left, and Saudi Arabia's Mohamed Kanno go for a header during their match on November 30. Mexico won 2-1. Moises Castillo/AP Mexico's Henry Martín scores the first goal against Saudi Arabia. Matthew Childs/Reuters A fan wears La Catrina-style makeup at the start of the Mexico-Saudi Arabia match. Ricardo Mazalan/AP Australia's Mathew Leckie, left, celebrates after scoring the only goal in the 1-0 win over Denmark on November 30. The win advanced the \"Socceroos\" to the knockout stage. Francisco Seco/AP A Denmark supporter reacts to Australia's goal on November 30. Robbie Jay Barratt/AMA/Getty Images Australia's Riley McGree shields the ball from Denmark's Mikkel Damsgaard. Wolfgang Rattay/Reuters Tunisian players mob teammate Wahbi Khazri after his goal against France on November 30. Tunisia won 1-0, but it was not enough to advance to the knockout stage. France still won Group D. Ian MacNicol/Getty Images Tunisia's Issam Jebali heads the ball next to France's Aurélien Tchouaméni. Christophe Ena/AP American star Christian Pulisic scores the only goal in the match against Iran on November 29. With the victory, the United States advanced to the tournament's knockout stage. Yukihito Taguchi/USA Today Sports/Reuters Iran's Ramin Rezaeian heads the ball during the match against the United States. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Shaq Moore slides in for a tackle against Iran's Abolfazl Jalali. Manu Fernandez/AP England's Phil Foden celebrates after scoring his team's second goal in the 3-0 win over Wales on November 29. England won Group B. Markus Gilliar/GES Sportfoto/Getty Images Marcus Rashford scores England's third goal against Wales. He had two goals in the match. Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images Rashford's free kick whizzes by Wales' Danny Ward for England's first goal. Hannah McKay/Pool/Getty Images Wales' Connor Roberts stretches for a ball during the match against England. Abbie Parr/AP Senegal's Ismaila Sarr celebrates after a 2-1 win over Ecuador secured his team's spot in the knockout round of the World Cup. Dylan Martinez/Reuters Senegal's Ismail Jakobs, left, tries to fend off Ecuador's Enner Valencia on November 29. Stephane Mahe/Reuters The Netherlands' Frenkie de Jong scores his team's second goal in the 2-0 victory over Qatar on November 29. The Dutch won Group A. Qatar, the host nation, lost all three of its games. Julian Finney/Getty Images Qatar's Homam Ahmed leaps near the Netherlands' Denzel Dumfries on November 29. Alberto Lingria/Reuters Portugal's Bruno Fernandes celebrates after scoring his second goal in the 2-0 victory over Uruguay on November 28. The win clinched Portugal's spot in the knockout stage. Jose Breton/Pics Action/NurPhoto via Getty Images A man runs onto the field with a rainbow flag during the match between Portugal and Uruguay. The man, an Italian named Mario Ferri, was also wearing a shirt that said \"save Ukraine\" on the front and \"respect for Iranian women\" on the back. In a series of posts of his Instagram story, Ferri called himself the \"new Robin Hood\" and said, \"Breaking the rules if you do it for a good cause is NEVER A CRIME.\" He was banned from attending future matches. Abbie Parr/AP Portugal forward Cristiano Ronaldo tries to head the ball toward goal in the second half of the Uruguay match. He appeared at first to nod in the first goal, but after review it was determined that he didn't touch it and Bruno was credited with the goal. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images Portugal's Bernardo Silva, left, tries to keep the ball from Uruguay's Mathias Olivera. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images Brazil's Vinícius Júnior performs a rabona during his team's 1-0 victory over Switzerland on November 28. The Brazilians' win ensured that they would be advancing from their group. Clive Brunskill/Getty Images Brazilian midfielder Casemiro, front left, is mobbed by teammates after scoring against Switzerland. Carl Recine/Reuters Ghana midfielder Mohammed Kudus celebrates a goal during the match against South Korea on November 28. It was his second goal of the day, and it was the difference in Ghana's 3-2 victory. Jung Yeon-je/AFP/Getty Images South Korea's Kim Min-jae, left, and Ghana's Andre Ayew, center, jump for a header during their match on November 28. Lee Jin-man/AP Ghana supporters celebrate victory on November 28. Jose Breton/Pics Action/NurPhoto via Getty Images Serbia's Sergej Milinković-Savić celebrates a goal during a 3-3 draw with Cameroon on November 28. Anthony Dibon/Icon Sport/Getty Images Cameroon forward Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting scores his team's third goal against Serbia, tying the match in the second half. Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images Fans of Spain attend the team's match against Germany on November 27. The match ended in a 1-1 draw. Paul Chesterton/Sipa/AP Belgium's Thorgan Hazard, left, and Morocco's Selim Amallah compete for the ball on November 27. Morocco defeated Belgium 2-0. It was Morocco's first World Cup win since 1998 — and its third-ever at the tournament. Mustafa Yalcin/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images Alphonso Davies celebrates after scoring Canada's first-ever World Cup goal on November 27. The goal against Croatia came 68 seconds after kickoff and was the fastest at the 2022 tournament so far. But despite the early lead, Canada lost 4-1. Yukihito Taguchi/USA Today Sports/Reuters Costa Rica's Yeltsin Tejeda and Keysher Fuller celebrate their 1-0 win over Japan on November 27. Fuller scored the winning goal. Issei Kato/Reuters Kylian Mbappé scores his second goal on November 26, leading France to a 2-1 victory over Denmark. The win ensured that France, the tournament's defending champions, would be the first team to qualify for the knockout stage. Mohammad Karamali/DeFodi Images/Getty Images Argentina's Lionel Messi celebrates scoring the opening goal against Mexico on November 26. Argentina went on to win the match 2-0. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images Fans in Doha, Qatar, watch the match between Poland and Saudi Arabia on November 26. Ibraheem Al Omari/Reuters Robert Lewandowski celebrates after scoring Poland's second goal in the 2-0 win against Saudi Arabia on November 26. This was Lewandowski's first-ever World Cup goal. Lars Baron/Getty Images Australia's Jackson Irvine falls on Tunisia's Aissa Laidouni as they battle for the ball on November 26. Australia won 1-0. Jewel Samad/AFP/Getty Images US star Christian Pulisic takes a shot against England in the first half of their World Cup match on November 25. The shot smacked off the crossbar, and the game would eventually end 0-0. Clive Mason/Getty Images England goalkeeper Jordan Pickford dives to make a save in the match against the United States. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images Senegal players celebrate at the corner flag after Bamba Dieng scored the third goal in their 3-1 victory over host nation Qatar. Petr Josek/AP Mohammed Muntari, center, celebrates after scoring Qatar's first-ever World Cup goal. Muntari headed home a cross in the 78th minute to cut Senegal's lead to 2-1. Bernadett Szabo/Reuters Senegal fans attend the match against Qatar. Senegal's football team is nicknamed the Lions of Teranga. Ozan Kose/AFP/Getty Images The Netherlands' Cody Gakpo is challenged by Ecuador's Jhegson Mendez, bottom, during their teams' 1-1 draw on November 25. Gakpo scored in the sixth minute for the Dutch. Darko Vojinovic/AP Iranian players celebrate after Roozbeh Cheshmi scored late into second-half stoppage time to break a 0-0 deadlock against Wales on November 25. Iran added another goal to win 2-0. Fadel Senna/AFP/Getty Images Welsh players are dejected as Iran celebrates on Friday. Manu Fernandez/AP A fan holds a Mahsa Amini jersey as a protest before the Iran-Wales match . Recent protests in Iran were sparked by the death of Amini, a 22-year-old woman who died after being detained by Iran's morality police allegedly for not abiding by the country's conservative dress code. Juan Luis Diaz/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images Richarlison scores a spectacular goal during Brazil's 2-0 win over Serbia on November 24. Richarlison scored both of Brazil's goals. Amanda Perobelli/Reuters Brazilian superstar Neymar celebrates the first goal, which he helped create. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo does his trademark goal celebration after converting a penalty against Ghana to become the first man in history to score in five World Cups . It was the first goal of a match that ended in a 3-2 Portugal win. Hassan Ammar/AP Rafael Leão smiles as his shot goes by Ghana goalkeeper Lawrence Ati-Zigi for Portugal's third goal. Glyn Kirk/AFP/Getty Images Ghana's Andre Ayew, right, celebrates with Mohammed Kudus after tying the match at 1-1 shortly after Ronaldo's penalty. Julian Finney/Getty Images Ronaldo slams his penalty into the upper-left corner of the net. Marko Djurica/Reuters Ronaldo makes a face as he celebrates his goal with teammate João Félix. Clive Brunskill/Getty Images Ghana fans cheer prior to the start of the match against Portugal. Hassan Ammar/AP South Korea's Jung Woo-young competes for a ball with Uruguay's Federico Valverde on November 24. Their match ended 0-0. Bernadett Szabo/Reuters South Korean star Son Heung-min wears a protective eye mask against Uruguay after he suffered a fractured eye socket earlier in the month. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Switzerland's Breel Embolo, second from right, shoots past Cameroon's Andre Onana to score the only goal of their match. Claudio Villa/Getty Images Michy Batshuayi celebrates after giving Belgium a 1-0 lead over Canada in their World Cup opener on November 23. That ended up being the only goal of the match. Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters Belgian players insist there is no foul as Canada's Richie Laryea tumbles over in the box. Molly Darlington/Reuters Canada's Alphonso Davies, left, reacts after missing a penalty early in the first half against Belgium. Ian MacNicol/Getty Images Spain's Ferran Torres, right, shoots past Costa Rican goalkeeper Keylor Navas to give his team a 4-0 lead in their opening match on November 23. Spain went on to win 7-0. Dylan Martinez/Reuters Costa Rica players watch the Spain match from the bench. Patrick Smith/FIFA/Getty Images Media members work at Al Thumama Stadium in Doha for the Spain-Costa Rica match. Peter Cziborra/Reuters Japan midfielder Ritsu Doan, center, is mobbed by teammates after scoring the team's first goal against Germany on November 23. Japan went on to win 2-1. Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP/Getty Images Germany's Antonio Rüdiger, top right, is first to a header during the match against Japan. Matthias Schrader/AP Before kickoff against Japan, Germany's starting 11 posed for their team photo with their right hands in front of their mouths. The team's social media feed confirmed that the gesture was designed to protest FIFA's decision to ban the \"OneLove\" anti-discrimination armband that many European captains had been hoping to wear in Qatar. Visionhaus/Getty Images Morocco's Selim Amallah tries to dribble past Croatia's Marcelo Brozovic, left, and Dejan Lovren during their 0-0 draw on November 23. Croatia was the runner-up in the last World Cup. Darko Vojinovic/AP French players swarm Kylian Mbappé after he scored the team's third goal on November 22. Mbappé was one of the leading stars of the team's World Cup triumph four years ago. Adrian Dennis/AFP/Getty Images French striker Olivier Giroud attempts a shot on goal during a match against Australia on November 22. Giroud scored twice as the defending champions won 4-1. His two goals tied him with Thierry Henry for most international goals by a Frenchman (51). Molly Darlington/Reuters An overhead view of Al Janoub Stadium, in Al Wakrah, Qatar, before the start of the France-Australia match. Pavel Golovkin/AP Poland striker Robert Lewandowski reacts after he missed a second-half penalty in his team's 0-0 draw against Mexico on November 22. Andrej Isakovic/AFP/Getty Images Tunisia's Yassine Meriah stretches to defend a header from Denmark's Andreas Cornelius during their 0-0 draw on November 22. Justin Setterfield/Getty Images Saudi Arabia players celebrate their victory over Argentina on November 22. The 2-1 result was one of the biggest upsets in World Cup history Lionel Hahn/Getty Images Argentina superstar Lionel Messi reacts during the match against Saudi Arabia. Messi opened the scoring with a 10th-minute penalty, but the Saudis rallied with two goals in the second half. Ebrahim Noroozi/AP US forward Timothy Weah celebrates after scoring a first-half goal against Wales on November 21. The match ended 1-1. Matthew Ashton/AMA/Getty Images US fans stand for the national anthem prior to the Wales match. Stu Forster/Getty Images Walker Zimmerman fouls Wales' Gareth Bale in the box, conceding a second-half penalty that Bale would convert to tie the match at 1-1. Pedro Nunes/Reuters Welsh and American players walk onto the field. Elsa/Getty Images The Netherlands' Cody Gakpo celebrates his second-half goal that gave the Dutch a 1-0 lead over Senegal in their World Cup opener on November 21. The Netherlands added a second goal just before the final whistle to win 2-0. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Senegal's Ismaila Sarr eyes the ball during a match against the Netherlands on November 21 Petr David Josek/AP The Senegal-Netherlands match kicks off at Al Thumama Stadium in Doha. Dan Mullan/Getty Images Senegal fans wait for the start of their team's match against the Netherlands. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters England players celebrate after Raheem Sterling scored a goal during their match against Iran on November 21. England won 6-2. Frank Augstein/AP Iranian fans hold up a sign that reads \"Woman Life Freedom\" during the match against England. Anti-government protests have entered a third month back in Iran. Outside the stadium before the game, CNN witnessed a number of Iran supporters wearing protest T-shirts , with slogans such as \"Free Iran\" or \"Rise with the women of Iran.\" Juan Luis Diaz/Quality Sport Images/Getty Images Labour Party leader Keir Starmer, center, celebrates England's second goal with colleagues David Lammy, left, and Lucy Powell, right, in his parliamentary office at the Palace of Westminster in London. Stefan Rousseau/PA Images/Getty Images Jude Bellingham scores England's first goal against Iran. Peter Cziborra/Reuters England players take a knee before the start of the Iran match. England manager Gareth Southgate confirmed Sunday that the team would be making the symbolic gesture. \"We think it's a strong statement that will go around the world for young people in particular to see that inclusivity is very important,\" Southgate said. Hannah Mckay/Reuters Iranian players line up during the national anthems before the match. They did not sing during their anthem. Marko Djurica/Reuters A light show is displayed over the skyline in Doha on November 20. Alex Grimm/Getty Images Enner Valencia, third from left, celebrates after scoring a second goal against host nation Qatar in the tournament's opening match. Ecuador went on to win 2-0. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters Spectators leave Al Bayt Stadium before the end of the Qatar-Ecuador match. No host country had lost a World Cup opener before. Robert Michael/DPA/Picture Alliance/Getty Images Valencia slots a penalty kick past Qatari goalkeeper Saad Al Sheeb to open the scoring in the 16th minute. Robert Michael/DPA/Picture Alliance/Getty Images A fan attends the Qatar-Ecuador match on November 20. Qatar is the first Islamic country to host a World Cup. Ian MacNicol/Getty Images Qatari fans enjoy the pre-match atmosphere at Al Bayt Stadium on November 20. Michael Steele/Getty Images Fans drink beer as they watch the match from a fan zone in Doha. No alcohol is being sold inside the stadiums during the World Cup. Qatar tightly regulates alcohol sales and usage. Francisco Seco/AP A family watches the opening match from their home in Doha. Ibraheem Al Omari/Reuters People watch as fireworks go off before the start of the opening match. Aijaz Rahi/AP People dance in Al Bayt Stadium during the opening ceremony. Pawel Kopczynski/Reuters A girl waves a Qatari flag at a fan zone in Doha. Moises Castillo/AP Actor Morgan Freeman and Qatari YouTuber Ghanim al Muftah take part in the opening ceremony on November 20. Natacha Pisarenko/AP La'eeb, the official mascot of this World Cup , flies during the opening ceremony. La'eeb is an Arabic word meaning super-skilled player. Dylan Martinez/Reuters A performer plays drums during the opening ceremony. Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters People watch the opening ceremony from a cafe in Baghdad, Iraq. Ahmed Saad/Reuters South Korean singer Jung Kook performs at the opening ceremony. Natacha Pisarenko/AP Dancers light up the ground during the opening ceremony. François-Xavier Mart/AFP/Getty Images A view inside Al Bayt Stadium during the opening ceremony. Amr Abdallah Dalsh/Reuters The best photos of the 2022 World Cup Prev Next\n\nZidane was part of the World Cup-winning team in 1998 and the midfield maestro won the Ballon d’Or the same year.\n\nMbappé is still waiting for his first Ballon d’Or, but Mavuba insists achieving glory with the national team matters more than any individual accolade.\n\n“It’s very difficult to win the World Cup, you see Messi, Ronaldo and Neymar [not win one], but Mbappé has a chance to win two World Cups,” he said.\n\n“It’s better to win two World Cups than to win five or seven Ballon d’Or awards.”\n\nWith Messi’s Argentina the only hurdle standing in his way, Mbappé has a huge opportunity to stake a claim to the title of world’s best player.\n\nIn truth, he has a long way to go before he matches the legacies of Ronaldo and Messi but already, at such a young age, he’s done things that those other superstars have so far failed to do.", "authors": ["Ben Church"], "publish_date": "2022/12/18"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/21/football/iran-football-world-cup-protests-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "For Iranians, this World Cup is about more than football | CNN", "text": "CNN —\n\nFor the last few months, soccer in Iran has witnessed small acts of defiance against the country’s regime amid widespread protests in the country; Sardar Azmoun’s refusal to celebrate scoring an equalizer against Senegal and several players changing their social media profile pictures to black.\n\nSoccer, like everything else in Iran, has been affected by the protests, chaos and violence convulsing the country and threatening the very nature of the regime that has been in power for more than 40 years.\n\nIt is amid this turmoil the Iranian national team has traveled across the Persian Gulf to Qatar where it will face two of the country’s fiercest geopolitical rivals, England and the US, in its group – the ‘Old Fox’ and the ‘Great Satan’ as they are referred to colloquially by some in Iran.\n\n“How can this team go and perform when you’re supposed to be a national team, a representative of the people?” Peyvand Mossavat, an Iranian-born Canadian former soccer player and now coach, told CNN Sport.\n\nIn the buildup to the World Cup in Qatar, there were calls for Iran to be thrown out of the tournament. As the team prepares to play England for its opening World Cup match on 21 November, all eyes will be on its players for more than soccer.\n\nThe protests, referred to by experts as the most significant since the establishment of clerical rule following the 1979 Iranian Revolution, were sparked by the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old woman who died after being detained by Iran’s morality police allegedly for not abiding by the country’s conservative dress code.\n\nIranian demonstrators take to the streets of Tehran during a protest for Mahsa Amini in September, days after she died in police custody. AFP/Getty Images\n\nWhat began as a clamor for women’s rights has morphed into a movement, still driven by women, demanding the end of a regime that “people no longer believe…is reformable,” Abbas Milani, director of Iranian studies at Stanford University, told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour earlier this month. “They want a different social contract without the clergy claiming divine right.”\n\nIranian security forces have unleashed a violent response, killing at least 378 people, the Norway-based Iran Human Rights NGO (IHRNGO) group has claimed, while a UN official says as many as 14,000 people have been arrested across the country, including journalists, activists, lawyers and educators.\n\nCNN cannot independently verify these figures as non-state media, the internet, and protest movements in Iran have all been suppressed. Death tolls vary by opposition groups, international rights organizations and journalists tracking the ongoing protests.\n\n‘The number one sport’\n\nFootball is the “number one sport” in Iran, Iranian-born Canadian coach Mossavat says, giving the team a potentially powerful platform from which to voice its support for the protestors.\n\nIn the past, the national team had been seen as more representative of the Iranian people than the regime, Omid Namazi – Iranian national team’s assistant coach from 2011 to 2014 – told CNN Sport.\n\nWhen the FIFA World Cup Twitter account posted images of the Iranian players smiling and goofing around in a pre-tournament photoshoot, it prompted criticism by some on social media.\n\n“I am so disappointed, so heartbroken by these,” Iranian-born football journalist Sina Saemian tweeted. “The lack of common sense, lack of empathy and insensitivity shown in these pictures is genuinely disheartening. The photo op is absolutely FIFA’s requirement, but the poses are not. There is a clear absence of any sense of awareness.”\n\nAlthough its star forward, Azmoun, has shown his support for the protestors, Namazi says that many of the other national team players have remained relatively quiet, “leaving a bad taste.”\n\n“The perception has really changed about the players, the national team itself,” he adds. “People call it the national team of the Islamic Republic and not the national team of the people of Iran.”\n\nIran's Portuguese coach Carlos Queiroz attends a training session at the Al-Rayyan training facility in Doha on November 20, 2022, on the eve of his side's first match. Fadel Senna/AFP/Getty Images\n\nAzmoun, who plays for the German team Bayer Leverkusen, posted multiple times to social media, and changed his profile picture to black in support of the protesters, and indicated that it could have cost him a place in the World Cup squad.\n\n“That is worth sacrificing for one strand of Iranian women’s hair,” he wrote in an Instagram story. “Shame on you who kill people so easily. Long live Iranian women.”\n\nAzmoun was ultimately selected to play in Qatar, but Iranwire, an opposition news outlet, reported that Iranian men’s football team manager Carlos Queiroz had come under pressure from Iran’s Sports Ministry to leave him out the squad.\n\nProtesting at the World Cup, on the biggest stage of all for football, carries potentially huge risks for the current players in the national team.\n\n“The players are under a lot of pressure by the government. It affects their livelihood, their future, their earnings,” Namazi says.\n\nNonetheless, players will be free to protest at the World Cup so long as they do not break FIFA rules, their manager Queiroz has said.\n\n“I don’t know if they’ll do anything,” Iranian football fan Payam, who didn’t give his surname for safety reasons, tells CNN Sport.\n\n“We are all hoping they do something…If they don’t, it’s going to be a big egg on their face, to be honest.”\n\nDefender Ehsan Hajsafi became the first member of the national team to speak out at the World Cup in apparent support of anti-government protests at home. “They should know that we are with them. And we support them. And we sympathize with them regarding the conditions,” he told reporters, per Reuters, on Sunday.\n\nSaeed Piramoon imitates cutting his hair during a match. Telegram/Kanali\n\nCNN has reached out for comment to FIFA regarding its stance on potential player protests but, at the time of publication, had not yet received a response.\n\nFormer player Ali Daei, a soccer great in Iran, has publicly supported the protestors, with Daei refusing to attend the World Cup in solidarity with protestors.\n\nMeanwhile, beach soccer player Saeed Piramoon imitated cutting his hair, signaling his support for the protesters, after he scored the winning goal in the final of the Intercontinental Beach Soccer Cup while his team was seen not singing the Iranian national anthem before the match.\n\nIran’s football authorities vowed that “people who have not followed professional and sports ethics … will be dealt with according to the regulations,” a statement published by Iran’s Football Federation after the beach soccer game said.\n\n“I’ve got goosebumps just telling you the courage that it takes,” Mossavat says. “Their entire team was reported to have been taken away from the airport because they didn’t celebrate.”\n\nA video published on BBC Persian allegedly showed journalists blocked from speaking to the national team when they arrived back at the Imam Khomeini Airport in Tehran. CNN could not verify the video.\n\nThe build-up to the World Cup has been dominated by discussions surrounding human rights, from the death of migrant workers and the conditions many have endured in Qatar, to LGBTQ and women’s rights.\n\nIran faces England in its opening World Cup match. In October the Athletic reported that England didn’t have any plans to “publicly demonstrate its solidarity” with the Iranian protestors. Speaking to CNN, an English Football Association spokesperson said: “We are aware of the protests in Iran, and following the situation. It is obviously worrying, but the best people to comment on it are the Iranian people.”\n\nCNN has also reached out to the Welsh FA and US Soccer, teams also in Iran’s group, but, at the time of publication, had yet to receive a response.\n\n‘Maybe we can show people what’s going on’\n\nIn the wake of the protests and the human rights violations happening in Iran, several groups inside and outside the country have called upon FIFA to ban it from the World Cup.\n\nIn October, a group of prominent Iranian athletes lobbied FIFA via a law firm, urging it to suspend the Iranian Football Federation (FFIRI) and ban it from participating at the World Cup.\n\n“Iran’s brutality and belligerence towards its own people has reached a tipping point, demanding an unequivocal and firm disassociation from the footballing and sports world,” a press release issued alongside the letter reads.\n\nThey were joined in this stance by a human rights group, ‘Open Stadiums,’ which describes itself as “a movement of Iranian women seeking to end discrimination” and allow women to attend football stadiums. “The Iranian FA is not only an accomplice of the crimes of the regime, it is a direct threat to the security of female fans in Iran and wherever our national team plays in the world,” the group wrote in an open letter to FIFA in September.\n\nIranian women were allowed to attend a national football championship match for the first time since the 1979 Islamic Revolution on August 25, 2022. Hossein Zohrevand/Tasnim News/AFP/Getty Images\n\nThe Ukrainian Football Association also called on FIFA to “consider excluding” Iran’s national team, citing the “systematic human rights violations” there, and “the possible involvement of Iran in the military aggression of Russia against Ukraine.”\n\nCNN has reached out to FIFA and the FFIRI for comment about calls for Iran to be banned from the Cup but, at the time of publication, had not received a response.\n\nFIFA President Gianni Infantino defended Iran’s participation in the 2022 Qatar World Cup in his pre-tournament press conference, saying it is “two football teams” going head-to-head in matches rather than “two regimes” or “two ideologies.”\n\nInfantino reminded journalists of FIFA’s role as an organization, saying “we’re not the United Nations. We’re not the world police. We’re not… I don’t know the blue helmets.”\n\nSaman Ghoddos, Iran’s only player to play in the English Premier League, and who has publicly supported the protests, also believes that Iran should compete at the World Cup.\n\n“I’ve heard about it and from my point of view, I don’t know if it’s the right direction,” he told CNN’s Don Riddell in October. “Because I always think that football should be outside politics and should not be involved in that.\n\n“But I don’t think it’s the right move to kick out Iran from the World Cup, but maybe we can put a light and show people what’s going on.”\n\nFor Mossavat, the World Cup seems to be operating in an alternate reality to the protests unfolding in his home country.\n\n“While this is happening, I cannot see people being overly excited [about the World Cup] when they’re out on the street fighting for freedom,” Mossavat says. “I think it’s going to be difficult to galvanize people.”\n\nSaman Ghoddos plays for Brentford. John Patrick Fletcher/Shutterstock\n\nThe national team, Queiroz said on Twitter, are seeking to bring “joy, happiness and pride” to the fans in Iran.\n\n“For him to have the audacity to come and say: ‘Oh, our job is to entertain people and make people happy.’ What people are you making happy?” Mossavat says.\n\n“Can Mahsa Amini’s parents, or [the parents] of Navid Afkari…be happy, be joyful to watch you play football? That’s impossible.”\n\nAfkari was a famous Iranian wrestler who was executed by the government in Iran in 2020 for a crime human rights activists, his family and friends say he did not commit.\n\nFootball seems of diminished importance in the wake of such grief that Iranians have experienced in the last few months.\n\n“When you know what’s going on, it’s very difficult to prioritize football,” Ghoddos added. “It’s very difficult and football comes in the second hand because it’s lives that are being lost by fighting for freedom.”\n\nWhen Iran’s football team takes to the field at the World Cup, complete with national anthems, flags and as a tangible manifestation of the country itself, more than progress to the knockout stages is at stake, for it will find itself inadvertently entangled in the fight for Iran’s future.", "authors": ["Issy Ronald"], "publish_date": "2022/11/21"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/11/football/wayne-rooney-interview-ctw-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "Wayne Rooney: As former Premier League star rolls sushi in Dubai ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nWayne Rooney holds down the bamboo mat with one sinewy hand while the other is busy mixing rice into slices of salmon and avocado.\n\nCarefully, the former Premier League footballer, wearing a bright orange apron, moisturizes the blend with vinegar and water, before wrapping it in one of the toasted seaweed sheets known as nori.\n\nAfter wetting his knife, Rooney slowly cuts the pillar of sushi into bite-sized chunks, standing back to inspect his handiwork.\n\n“I doubt anyone’s going to want to eat this,” he smiles bashfully, turning crimson as he realizes he’s not quite as good with his hands as with his feet.\n\nRolling sushi with CNN in a Dubai restaurant, 230 meters above the iconic man-made island called Palm Jumeirah, is a far cry from the district of Croxteth in Liverpool, where Rooney was born.\n\nRooney is warmly welcomed by resident sushi chef, Moon Kyung Soo, who cannot contain his excitement at meeting a former teammate of one his country’s idols, South Korean Park Ji-Sung. The pair hit it off, and chef Moon proudly names the finished concoction “The Rooney Roll.”\n\nThe Japanese dish is not a common menu item at the Rooney household, admits the former Manchester United player, who says his pallet is more accustomed to spaghetti bolognese or stir-fry.\n\nThe 37-year-old’s diet is emblematic of his character – despite playing top-level football for nearly 20 years, he’s not flashy or conceited, and is almost embarrassed to be on camera.\n\nWearing a black baseball cap, unironed chinos and an unassuming polo shirt, it’s telling that rather than his mercurial dribbling ability, boxer-like power or lightning-quick pace, Rooney believes his work ethic was instead his biggest strength on the pitch.\n\n“That’s an ability … the biggest skill you can have. Every day, that’s probably what I’m most proud of,” Rooney tells CNN’s Becky Anderson, while overlooking a highlight of the city’s skyline, the world’s highest observation wheel, Ain Dubai.\n\nWayne Rooney rolls sushi with CNN's Becky Anderson in Dubai. CNN\n\nA career of records, firsts and superlatives\n\nEngland’s record-goal scorer is in town ahead of the Globe Soccer Awards, an international ceremony which celebrates the best the sport has to offer.\n\nThe nominees for best men’s player include recent Ballon D’Or winner Karim Benzema and the Frenchman’s Real Madrid teammate, Thibaut Courtois. In the women’s category, FC Barcelona star Alexia Putellas and England defender Lucy Bronze are up for contention.\n\nCNN has partnered with the awards, now in its 13th edition, to launch the CNN Off the Pitch category at this year’s ceremony on November 17. The award will recognize the achievements of an individual, club or other soccer organization for their impact on wider society and culture as well as charitable work.\n\nRooney himself is nominated for an award celebrating his playing career – and his two-decade long rollercoaster ride at the top of the sport was undoubtedly something special.\n\n“The outstanding moment … is with my team when you win a trophy and you lift that and the celebrations you have initially after that game. That’s what you work so hard for … That’s why you play,” Rooney reminisces.\n\n“Actually, the best one was the first Premier League trophy we won,” he reveals, referring to Manchester United’s title success in the 2006/2007 season.\n\n“I was actually sat at home… and if Chelsea didn’t win, we won the league. I had my clothes ironed ready to go out, but I didn’t want to jinx anything. Anyway, Chelsea didn’t win so I just remember the phone going off and we had a great night.”\n\nThe mercurial talent made his Premier League debut for his home club Everton in 2002 at the age of 16. His debut goal – a stunning strike that rocketed past then Arsenal goalkeeper David Seaman – has gone down in Premier League folklore\n\nEarmarked as the outstanding talent of his generation, Rooney went on to become the first man to score 50 goals for the England national team, also overtaking Bobby Charlton’s long-held record as Manchester United’s top-scorer. Along the way, he won five league titles and played in three Champions League finals.\n\nYou might think that after such a grueling career, that a much-needed break was on the cards for Rooney. But at the age of 37, he has instead turned his attention to coaching.\n\nHe relocated to Washington in July, to manage D.C. United, a team he spent some time playing with. It won’t be an easy task considering the franchise finished bottom of the MLS Eastern Conference, but that doesn’t seem to bother Rooney.\n\nD.C. United head coach Wayne Rooney before an MLS match in August. Rich von Bibersttein/Icon Sportswire/Getty Images\n\n“I love it. Trying to develop players, young players, but also having that relationship with the more senior players, and trying to develop them.”\n\n“The appealing thing, obviously going back to D.C. and going in as head coach for me was if you look at all the big teams and the culture, it’s so diverse with different nationalities, different religions.”\n\nWhile Rooney is happy stateside for now, it’s clear his long-term ambitions lie closer to home.\n\n“Obviously Everton and Manchester United are the two clubs who are really close to my heart so to manage one of them two would be a dream,” he admits, the latter currently coached by his former England teammate, Frank Lampard.\n\n“I’m still gaining a lot of experience from what I’m doing. You want to learn, and I want to go into Everton or Manchester United, I want to go in there and be able to give the best version of me.\n\n“I’d be naive to say, ‘I’m going to go and manage Manchester United in the next year or so.’ For me it’s about putting the work in and developing myself and if I do that and I do it in the right way, then I feel these jobs, these opportunities will come to me eventually.”\n\nRooney’s tenure at DC United comes after a tumultuous reign at English side Derby County.\n\nThe club went into administration after debts spiraled and it failed to play players their wages. Deducted points for financial mismanagement, Derby was eventually relegated, but Rooney was praised for his efforts to keep them in the Championship, English football’s second tier.\n\nWayne Rooney gives his team instructions during a Derby County game. Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images\n\n“I’m proud of what we achieved there … we were relegated but without the deductions we would’ve stayed in the division.\n\n“There was so many difficulties in what we were facing and obstacles for us to try and get over,” Rooney laments.\n\n“I give them [sic] players so much praise because I think it was 21 debuts from the academy … There are players who maybe didn’t even have a career in football who now have [one].”\n\nLearning from the best\n\nIf he’s looking for advice, Rooney has no shortage of mentors to draw from.\n\nDavid Moyes, now West Ham manager, handed him his debut as a 16-year-old in 2002, La Liga winner Fabio Capello coached him for a spell at England, and Rooney finished his United career under two-time Champions League champion José Mourinho.\n\nBut he says his biggest influence was the Manchester club’s most successful coach, Alex Ferguson, who signed him for the club for a then-record sum for a teenager of nearly $50 million.\n\n“He was great to play for, he’s the reason I signed for Manchester United to play for him. The best advice I got … was from Alex Ferguson, [and it] was [that] the hardest thing to do in life is to work hard every day. And that’s the best. That’s always stuck with me.\n\nThen Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson congratulates Wayne Rooney after his final Premier League title win in 2013. Alex Livesey/Getty Images\n\n“From a football point of view, coaching point of view, of course you’re going to make mistakes, you’re going to get things wrong, but there’s no excuse really to not work.”\n\nManchester United has seen scant success since Ferguson retired in 2013. The 20-time English league winner has seen derby rivals Manchester City outpace them on and off the field since the takeover of the club by the Abu Dhabi United Group in 2008.\n\nErik ten Hag took over the coaching reins in the summer and the Dutchman has notched a few impressive wins which have lifted the mood around Old Trafford. While Rooney was in Dubai, goals from Fred and Bruno Fernandes gave the Manchester club a dominant victory over Tottenham Hotspur.\n\n“It’s the best I’ve seen Manchester United for a long time,” says Rooney. “I think you can see what he’s trying to do. High energy, high press with the team and it was very difficult for Tottenham to play against.”\n\nThe only black mark on that performance was star player Cristiano Ronaldo walking down the tunnel with several minutes left to play because he didn’t get on the pitch. Ten Haag later suspended the player, but Ronaldo’s clear desire to play, is a positive sign for a coach, according to Rooney.\n\n“Football’s emotional and you want players who want to be on the pitch. I don’t mind a player coming off and not being happy. I’ve done it myself,” says Rooney, who played with Ronaldo during his most successful period at United.\n\nIf Rooney has any regrets from his playing career, it’s his performance for England at international tournaments.\n\nAt the age of 18, Rooney became the youngest scorer in European Championship history – a record that only stood for four days after the Englishman’s landmark was taken by Switzerland’s Johan Vonlanthen at Euro 2004.\n\nRooney celebrates scoring a goal at Wembley in 2015, breaking the record for most international goals for England. Shaun Botterill/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images\n\nWhen he set the record, Rooney grabbed two goals in England’s second group game, a 3-0 defeat of Switzerland. He then broke a bone in his foot in the quarterfinal defeat by Portugal when England lost on penalties.\n\nTwo years later Rooney was infamously sent off at against Portugal at the 2006 World Cup for lashing out at then club teammate Ronaldo.\n\nDespite playing as part of a team containing English icons such as Steven Gerrard and Frank Lampard, known as the “Golden Generation,” Rooney never won a trophy with the national side.\n\n“We were unlucky a few times,” Rooney laments. “Obviously in the Euros, 2004, 2006 World Cup, getting knocked out on penalties, both at the quarterfinal stage. And, again, that’s that little bit of luck you need, if you go through there, you potentially go on to win the competition.”", "authors": ["Eoin Mcsweeney Becky Anderson", "Eoin Mcsweeney", "Becky Anderson"], "publish_date": "2022/11/11"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/12/football/croatia-profile-argentina-2022-world-cup-spt-intl/index.html", "title": "From bloody Balkan war to World Cup heavyweight: the making of ...", "text": "CNN —\n\nPanama, Mauritania, Georgia and Eritrea are four countries with roughly the equivalent population sizes of Croatia.\n\nThose four nations share one World Cup appearance between them and that was when Panama played at Russia 2018, finishing the group stage with three defeats and conceding 11 goals.\n\nCroatia’s World Cup pedigree is an altogether different story. In six World Cup appearances, the country has reached the semifinals on three occasions, while four years ago Croatia contested the final, ultimately losing to France.\n\nCroatia only gained independence in 1991, during the bloody Balkan war which lasted until 1995 and its population is just under four million, though you’d never have known given the way it traded blows with soccer superpower Brazil in the quarterfinals, before winning a penalty shootout.\n\nThat success was very much a case of David knocking out Goliath given Brazil’s population is 214 million people.\n\nNext up for Croatia is Lionel Messi and Argentina – population: 45 million.\n\nIgor Štimac, who played in all of Croatia’s 1998 World Cup matches during its run to third place, told CNN that the country’s recent history has helped play a part in forging elite competitors.\n\n“Our people went through many difficulties in its survival, in its independence, fighting for it, in the aggression which we suffered from our neighbors,” Štimac, who coached the Croatia national team between 2012-13, told CNN.\n\n“These things are helping to stay with a great mental strength, great discipline, staying humble and surviving with the pride, whatever difficulties there are in front of us.\n\nŠtimac challenges Clarence Seedorf of the Netherlands during the 1998 World Cup third place playoff match, which Croatia won 2-1. Shaun Botterill/Getty Images Europe/Getty Images\n\n“But we cannot say that only the last war which happened here helped in these things because the wars were going on through this region for many occasions. It’s something also about this region in regards to the climate, in regards to the culture.”\n\nCroatian football journalist Srđan Fabijanac, who has been on the ground in Doha to watch this current iteration of the national team, says the squad’s harmony has proved vital in another extraordinary World Cup for the the Vatreni (the ‘Blazers’)\n\nFabijanac calls the team – constructed with a blend of experience from the likes of Luka Modrić, Ivan Perišić and Dejan Lovren with new faces such as Joško Gvardiol and Borna Sosa – as like a “family.”\n\n“You’ve seen what’s happened in this World Cup; Brazil have excellent players, Portugal have excellent players, Germany have excellent players but in my opinion, they have spirit and they don’t have a team,” Fabijanac told CNN. “That’s the problem. Croatia is too strong as a team.”\n\nCroatia's Bruno Petkovic celebrates with his teammates after scoring his side's goal against Brazil in the quarterfinals of the 2022 World Cup. Croatia eventually won on penalties. Manu Fernandez/AP\n\nFrom the rubble\n\nAfter the collapse of the Soviet Union, democratic movements swept across much of Eastern Europe, including Yugoslavia. With the election of non-communist governments in four of Yugoslavia’s six republics, the Federation began to crumble and ethnic divisions resurfaced.\n\nBy 1991, the prosperous Croatian republic sought to create a loose confederation or to dissolve the union entirely. Less wealthy Serbia opposed this. In June of 1991, Slovenia and Croatia declared independence.\n\nFighting soon began as the Yugoslav army, consisting primarily of Serbs, tried to prevent Slovenia from establishing its own border posts. In July, fighting also broke out between Croatian forces and Serb militiamen.\n\nAmong the other republics, only the smallest – Montenegro – sided with Serbia. The two remaining republics, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia, voted in favor of independence.\n\nIn 1992, the Serbian minority in Bosnia, helped by the federal army, attempted to carve out enclaves for itself, laying siege to Sarajevo.\n\nBy the time the United Nations dismissed Yugoslavia from its General Assembly, some 20,000 people had died and up to two million had become refugees from fighting and “ethnic cleansing.”\n\nBack in 2018, Lovren recounted his memories of his escape as a young child from war-torn Bosnia in 1992.\n\n“I just remember when the sirens went on,” Lovren said. “I was so scared because I was thinking ‘bombs’ or that something will happen now.\n\n“I remember my mum took me and we went to the basement, I don’t know how long we’d been sitting there, I think it was until the sirens went off. Afterwards, I remember mum, my uncle, my uncle’s wife, we took the car and then we were driving to Germany.”\n\nLovren defends against Brazil's Neymar. Robert Michael/picture alliance via Getty Images\n\nLovren’s family settled in Germany, but after seven years they were told to leave and had to start life again in Croatia.\n\nFabijanac admits while some of the squad were not even born during the bloody Balkan war, it is something which still hangs over the country, spurring its players on.\n\n“We want to put the things which happened in the 1990s far from us,” he explained. “There are sports, but we have very strong national emotions and this … is why the Croatian football players always play with the full heart for the national teams.\n\n“Because we are a small country, we have a very, very ugly war which made many traumas for many people in Croatia.\n\n“And sports and players in football and in other sports are national heroes. And that is the reason why they always play for the national teams one level higher than the highest. When we play for the national team in football, in any sport, we play with more than 100%, we play with 110%.\n\n“They put their last atomic force on the field to do something for the country.”\n\nCroatia's Mario Pasalic celebrates with goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic after scoring the winning penalty against Brazil at the 2022 World Cup. Frank Augstein/AP\n\nA new story\n\nThe Croatian Football Association applied and gained admittance to soccer’s world governing body FIFA, in 1992 and Europe’s governing body UEFA in 1993.\n\n“We have football in the blood. Every male child in Croatia wants to be a football player,” Fabijanac said. “First they learn how to walk, after that they take a football or something to play football.”\n\nFabijanac added: “For a small country like us, it’s very important to have this fantastic national team because my granddaughter is three years old and she doesn’t play with dolls, she plays with the ball and says only: ’ Modrić, Modrić, Modrić.’ That’s something which is amazing.”\n\nIt didn’t take long for Croatia to make its mark on the international soccer stage.\n\nFirst, Croatia reached the quarterfinals of the 1996 Euros – beating a star-studded Denmark along the way.\n\nTwo years later, in its first ever World Cup appearance, Croatia got to the semifinals of the 1998 edition in France, eventually finishing third.\n\nThanks to its first golden generation of players – led by Davor Šuker and with Robert Prosinečki and Zvonimir Boban adding a sprinkling off stardust – Croatia qualified with two wins from its group, then beating Romania and Germany in the knockout stages, before losing out to eventual-winners France in the semifinals.\n\nThe Croatia players celebrate a goal against France in the 1998 World Cup semifinals. Alexander Hassenstein/Bongarts/Bongarts/Getty Images\n\nŠuker finished as the 1998 tournament’s top scorer and with its distinctive red and white kit as well as its propensity for shocking football’s traditional heavyweights, Croatia became an immediate favorite for neutrals.\n\nŠtimac said that his former teammates and squad had the responsibility of laying down the foundations for Croatia’s modern soccer heritage.\n\n“Our generation was the one that we had the most difficult path because we were responsible to create a cult of Croatian culture in football and to make the road for the generations to come,” Štimac told CNN.\n\n“And as a newly recognized country, it was obviously very difficult when you are such a small country in the football world and nobody appreciates to consider you at all as important part or subject.\n\n“And from that point of view, we had the most difficult situation and we did well and that’s obviously helped generations which followed.”\n\nThe arrival of Zlatko Dalić as Croatia’s coach in 2017 has also proved pivotal.\n\nHaving been appointed after the team’s qualification for the 2018 World Cup, Dalić came with pressure on his shoulders.\n\nWith many of the team’s star players in their prime – in particular, the midfielder three of Modrić, Ivan Rakitić and Marcelo Brozović – Croatia was expected to perform well.\n\nCroatia did better than just perform well.\n\nThanks to the harmony Dalić was able to engender in the team, Croatia exceeded everyone’s expectations by reaching the final – showing remarkable grit and resilience to win twice on penalties followed by an extra-time victory over England in the semifinals – before being overpowered by France in the final.\n\nModrić reacts after his team conceded a goal against France in the final of the 2018 World Cup. Kirill Kudryavtsev/AFP/Getty Images\n\nReturning to Croatia and a hero’s welcome, with more than 500,000 fans turning Zagreb’s streets into a tapestry of red and white to celebrate the players’ success, the team was feted for surpassing the so-called “bronze” generation of 1998.\n\n“In the past, we also had very good teams. In 1998, we had much better players maybe in the time like Boban, Šuker, Prosinečki, (Robert) Jarni, but maybe they don’t share the chemistry between them to do what this team has done in the past few years,” said Fabijanac.\n\n“We only have one star, it’s Luka Modrić. The other players are not stars, like Kylian Mbappé or Cristiano Ronaldo or Neymar. But the rest of the team is a family and does the most important thing for us.\n\n“When Dalić came to be head coach, when he chose the team … he looked for characters.”\n\nWith Modrić at his magical best and goalkeper Dominik Livaković in imperious form and with the team able to seemingly pluck a goal out of thin air when needed, this Croatia side has continued to surprise, just like it did four years ago.\n\n“When we come to represent the national team, all the egos need to disappear,” said Stimac.\n\nFans in Zagreb celebrate Croatia's victory over Brazil. Antonio Bronic/Reuters\n\n“There is no place in the national team dressing room of Croatia for big egos, and everyone knows that. No one is bigger than the team, no one is bigger than the manager and that’s what is taking us forward.”\n\nBack in 1998, Štimac came off the bench to face Argentina and the likes of Gabriel Batistuta and Juan Sebastián Verón.\n\nOn Tuesday, Croatia will meet Lionel Messi and the next generation of Argentine stars knowing two wins stand between them and a new age of glory.", "authors": ["Ben Morse"], "publish_date": "2022/12/12"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/soccer/2014/08/21/chopra-picked-by-tendulkars-kerala-blasters/14376631/", "title": "Chopra picked by Tendulkar's Kerala Blasters", "text": "AP\n\nMUMBAI, India (AP) — Former Newcastle striker Michael Chopra's Indian origin made him a top pick as he was bought quickly by Kerala Blasters on Thursday in the international player draft of the Indian Super League.\n\nChopra, the only English player among 49 players in the draft, was picked by the south Indian franchise which is part-owned by retired cricket great Sachin Tendulkar.\n\n\"When the drafts came up, the first name that caught our attention was that of Chopra,\" said former England goalkeeper David James, a player and manager with the Kerala Blasters. \"We immediately decided to pick him and are happy to have him in this team.\"\n\nChopra will get $58,185 per season, according to organizers.\n\nOther prominent picks included French defender Bernard Mendy ($80,000) and former Manchester United midfielder Bojan Djordjic of Sweden ($58,185) by the Chennai franchise, while Spanish midfielder Jofre Mateu ($58,185) went to Atletico de Kolkata.\n\nThe players were classified in pay brackets of $39,000 to $80,000 as the league, to be played from Oct. 12-Dec. 20, brought in a mix of some big names by Indian standards as well as upcoming players in a bid to boost the game's following.\n\nThe order of draft picks was decided by draw of lots, with the teams choosing from players in pre-decided sets according to their positions of play.\n\nUnlike the biddings at cricket's Indian Premier League, from which the ISL is inspired, there was no glamour quotient as the cricketers and film stars associated with the tournament did not turn up for the draft.\n\nGiant screens showed the team selection process inside the hall for the draft at a prominent five-star hotel facing the Arabian sea.\n\nAll the teams have the option of selecting three players from outside the draft process, including a marquee player.\n\nLuis Garcia (Kolkata), Joan Capdevila (North East United FC) and David Trezeguet (Pune) are some of the marquee players announced so far, while other teams are still scouting for big names, which are being paid more than those in the draft.\n\nTeams will have squads of 22 with a similar process for Indian players completed last month. Most of the Indian players also figure in the national I-League tournament run by the All India Football Federation, which is likely to play second fiddle to the heavily-promoted ISL in the coming seasons.\n\nThe I-League also features several foreign players but no big names since fees are generally much lower.\n\n\"Frankly speaking, the I-League has not delivered,\" All India Football Federation secretary-general Kushal Das said. \"Indian football needed some adrenalin and we are hoping the ISL will help attract people to the game.\"\n\nThe eight-team ISL is being organized by IMG-Reliance in collaboration with Rupert Murdoch's Star India group.\n\nThe presence of former cricketers and Indian film stars as co-owners in the league is expected to arouse interest in the cricket-crazy country of 1.2 billion where a number of franchise leagues in other sports have mushroomed over the past few years.\n\nFormer India cricket captain Sourav Ganguly has a stake in Atletico de Kolkata, while Bollywood actors Salman Khan, Ranbir Kapoor and John Abraham are among the other co-owners of teams in Pune, Mumbai and Shillong, respectively.\n\nMeanwhile, organizers announced that Bangalore owner Sun Group has dropped out and will be replaced with one from Chennai that will be run in collaboration with Italian club Inter Milan. The name of the team will be announced later.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2014/08/21"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_27", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:41", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2023/03/05/roald-dahl-books-censored-who-next/11381921002/", "title": "Roald Dahl, James Bond are censorship's latest victims. Who's next?", "text": "Perhaps nothing better illustrates the silliness of our times than the disturbing trend to “rework” classic books to make them palatable for a modern audience.\n\nApplying current mores to the past – and forcing the past to conform to our “enlightened” ways – is patently unwise and smacks of something from George Orwell’s “1984” or tactics of the Soviet Union.\n\nIt’s an attempt to control thought.\n\nBritish children’s author Roald Dahl and James Bond-creator Ian Fleming are the latest targets of the woke publishing world, and “sensitivity readers” have been busy.\n\nWhat do these popular authors think about this makeover of their works? We can’t know as both men died decades ago.\n\nDahl wrote the beloved classics “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” “Matilda,” “James and the Giant Peach” and “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” among others. His works are known for being somewhat dark, and his eccentric characters are what have drawn generations of children to them.\n\n'Fat' and 'ugly' are taboo words\n\nThe troubling words that may offend today’s sensitive children – and that new editions of these books have erased – include “fat,” “ugly” and “black” (not used as a racial connotation). New lines have been added. Women are given more exciting jobs.\n\nAre these 'bad' words?:Stanford's political correctness czars deem 'American' and 'guys' harmful words (no joke)\n\n\"Female\" has been changed to “woman.” Gender-neutral words are also preferred to offensive ones like “men,” “mother,” “father,” “girls” and “boys.”\n\nA paragraph in “The Witches” talks about how the witches are bald under their wigs. Apparently, that needed an addition of this line: “There are plenty of other reasons why women might wear wigs and there is certainly nothing wrong with that.”\n\nYou get the idea.\n\nDahl purists and free expression advocates have pushed back hard against this meddling. And Penguin Random House, which publishes Dahl’s books, has agreed to keep “classic” (i.e. original) copies of his works, in addition to the freshly scrubbed ones. But who knows how long it will keep doing that.\n\n“I think once you start going down that road of applying the modern sensibilities to any art of the past or even art today that might deviate somewhat from orthodox thought or common opinions and perspectives, you really limit the range of creative expression that's available in our society,” says Aaron Terr, director of public advocacy at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression,\n\n“And I think a society that believes in creative and artistic expression certainly doesn't rewrite books to avoid any possibility of offending potential readers.”\n\nProgressives want to ban Amy Coney Barrett's book:How can they think that's OK?\n\nFirst Dr. Seuss, now James Bond\n\nSimilarly, some of Flemings’ wording is apparently too racist for today's readers. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the Bond Girls get new personas as well. (Pussy Galore, Kissy Suzuki and Honey Ryder aren’t likely to sit well with modern women).\n\nSuch rewrites undermine what literature is all about. Books are not only engaging stories – they are windows into the past, and past ways of thinking. They reflect the time in which they were written.\n\nIt was only two years ago that Dr. Seuss – one of the most popular children’s authors of all time – was in cancel culture’s crosshairs, and six books including \"McElligot's Pool,\" \"On Beyond Zebra!,\" \"Scrambled Eggs Super!,\" and \"The Cat's Quizzer\" were deemed “racist and insensitive” and thus inappropriate for publishing.\n\nMuch like Dahl and Fleming, Dr. Seuss creator Theodor Geisel lived in a very different time. These authors shouldn’t be punished or censored for living when they did.\n\nAuthor Salman Rushdie, who has faced attacks and years of threats for his books, called the rewrites of Dahl’s work “absurd censorship.”\n\nA 'dangerous new weapon'\n\nRushdie is joined by other high-profile critics.\n\n“Amidst fierce battles against book bans and strictures on what can be taught and read, selective editing to make works of literature conform to particular sensibilities could represent a dangerous new weapon,\" tweeted Suzanne Nossel, CEO of PEN America, which advocates for free expression in publishing.\n\n“Those who might cheer specific edits to Dahl’s work should consider how the power to rewrite books might be used in the hands of those who do not share their values and sensibilities.\"\n\nThe left likes to blame “book banning” on Republicans and parents, many of whom have valid concerns about what young children in school should learning about race and gender.\n\nYet those debates aren’t about “banning” books in a literal sense – rather they are about limiting where children access them. The books still exist and are easily accessible in our online world.\n\nFundamentally changing words or context in existing books – or trying to prevent them from being published in the first place – is more insidious.\n\nIf Roald Dahl and Ian Fleming are fair game for the thought police now, what’s to stop the censors from “fixing” a book you love next?\n\nIngrid Jacques is a columnist at USA TODAY. Contact her at ijacques@usatoday.com or on Twitter: @Ingrid_Jacques", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/03/05"}, {"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/04/opinions/nyu-chemistry-professor-student-complaint-filipovic/index.html", "title": "Opinion: This fired chemistry professor's example shows what's ..."}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/arts/2015/06/09/ty-cobb-myth-legend-popular-culture/28765125/", "title": "How Ty Cobb the truth got lost inside Ty Cobb the myth", "text": "Anna Clark\n\nSpecial to the Detroit Free Press\n\nIt wasn't just baseball that was new. There was also the widespread use of electricity. The typewriter. The airplane. Moving pictures. And in those early years of the 20th Century, for the first time in history, people had enough leisure time and resources to seek out mass entertainment.\n\nWhat did they choose to do? They watched baseball. And Detroit Tigers center fielder Ty Cobb was its first star.\n\nBut more than 50 years after his death, Cobb is remembered less for his astonishing ability on the field than as a monster fans love to hate. Books, plays, radio shows and newspapers have told and retold stories about Cobb as a mean-spirited egoist who sharpened his spikes to cut infielders on a slide, made racist taunts and beat up fans who looked at him funny. In the 1994 film \"Cobb,\" starring Tommy Lee Jones, the ballplayer is introduced as unshaven, surrounded by bottles of pills and booze and recklessly shooting his gun at a guest who knocks on his door. Woozy with painkillers, the Cobb character spins himself into a fury when he can't get his biographer to describe him as \"a prince among men.\" The Free Press itself described its hometown hero as \"dangerous to the point of dementia.\" \"No one came to his funeral,\" is an erroneous but oft-quoted belief.\n\nAt the same time, a small contingent of fans has argued that Cobb is misunderstood: that his bad behavior should be understood as a product of his time, and in context of the trauma of his mother killing his father in Georgia just days before he shipped north to play ball in Detroit. And, revisionists say, his good deeds — like using money he made via savvy investing to finance a hospital in Georgia and a college scholarship fund — have been unjustly unheralded.\n\nCobb's complexity has made it possible for fans to see in him whatever it is they want to see — and for writers, historians and filmmakers to emphasize the sides of Cobb they most want to present. It is not all that different from how the city of Detroit has experienced the public eye in the years since Cobb's death in 1961. Just as Detroit's best and worst characteristics have made it an object of fascination, Cobb's story is one we just can't drop. His talent alone would be enough to make him a legend — from the time he stole second, third and home on three consecutive pitches to the time he went on a 40-game hitting streak. But vile portrayals of the first player to be inaugurated into the Hall of Fame have lingered in our cultural memory for far more than his unmatched batting records.\n\n'1st big celebrity'\n\nCharles Leerhsen, a former executive editor of Sports Illustrated, aims to square the outsized image of Cobb with the real-life man in the new biography, \"Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty\" (Simon & Schuster, $27.50). It's the difference between \"Ty Cobb\" — who was portrayed in the 2004 book \"American Monsters\" alongside Charles Manson and John Wilkes Booth — and plain old Ty Cobb.\n\nAs Leerhsen tells it, Cobb's baseball career began at the same moment that America was ready to embrace a popular culture for the first time. Before baseball, entertainment was segregated by class: theater and horse-racing for the wealthy and bare-knuckle boxing matches and dogfights for the lower class. In 1905, Cobb's first year on the Tigers roster, cinema was still primitive, so it was left to baseball to be one of the first arenas to bring together different kinds of people — men, women and children of varied means — for a leisure activity. And given his clever and consistent play, Cobb was a draw at every game.\n\n\"You could argue that he was the first big celebrity in America,\" Leerhsen told the Free Press.\n\nBaseball wasn't the same game back then. The major league was young, with the first World Series played in 1903. Players weren't well paid, and given that they made their living from a game and spent their life on the road, a whiff of disreputability hung over their heads.\n\nBut over Cobb's career, baseball evolved. Players began to sign endorsement deals for everything from vitamin tonics to cigarettes. By 1915, it had become a polished business. Numerous concrete-and-steel ballparks were built all across America, including Navin Field in 1912.\n\nCobb can be partly credited for that growth, according to Leerhsen. Besides his fast-moving steals, he brought an aristocratic air to the ballplayer image. He was more educated, and he carried himself accordingly. While many of his hard-drinking counterparts played day games hung over after a rough night out, Cobb kept his distance. That made him more palatable to the public, but less palatable to his fellow ballplayers. \"It was a source of tension,\" Leershen said. \"In Washington, he'd go to the Library of Congress in his off hours to read, and that annoyed the hell out of them.\"\n\nFor the man credited with playing an unusually intelligent ball game — he once found a way to steal home against the Yankees while the entire opposing team was crowded around the plate to protest an umpire's call — this makes sense. But that's not the kind of story about Cobb that gets repeated. Many vicious tales can be traced to sportswriter Al Stump, who collaborated with Cobb on his autobiography. After Cobb's death, Stump wrote a lurid article for True magazine and later republished the biography. These versions, he said, were true to Cobb's cruelty. The Tommy Lee Jones film was based on the second book; it was the Stump character that Cobb greeted by firing his gun.\n\nBut as Leerhsen states bluntly in his biography, Stump's renditions \"contained too many inaccuracies to be useful.\" Stump went so far as to accuse Cobb killing a man in Detroit in 1912, just hours before a game — a claim debunked in 1996 in National Pastime journal by former prosecutor Doug Roberts. And five years ago, an epic story by William R. Cobb (no relation) in the same publication detailed Stump's memorabilia fraud: For years, he sold items that he fraudulently claimed were Cobb's, including a shotgun he claimed was the one that killed his father. Stump even forged Cobb's letters and diaries.\n\n\"Practically all of Stump's sensationalized story of the last 10 months of Ty Cobb's life is outrageously false,\" Cobb wrote. \"Stump would have us believe that these months were the alcohol-and-drug-crazed nightmare of a raging lunatic with whom Stump lived in a state of constant fear. Actually, Stump spent only a few days on and off with Ty Cobb.\"\n\nCobb enthusiasts in his hometown of Royston, Ga., were so frustrated with the way he was portrayed that they founded the Ty Cobb Museum just a few years later. Director Julie Ridgway said that there's a banner that hangs inside that describes Cobb as \"fierce, calculating, feared, revered, famous, infamous, benefactor and a gentleman.\"\n\n\"And that's who he was,\" Ridgway told the Free Press. \"He was all of those things.\" She said that the museum has been accused of being biased by portraying Cobb's story in a manner that doesn't rise to Stump-style negativity. But in truth, the museum has \"been doing our best to present a complete and real picture of him\" – and that meant countering some of the \"legends that people just want to hang on to.\"\n\n\"It's unique that all the really bad stuff about Cobb started in 1961,\" echoed Leerhsen. \"That's when he died. And it was all based on 'new evidence.' One sportswriter started an avalanche of lies.\" With precious little film of Cobb, and living memory dying out, Stump's take had little to counter it.\n\nA real human being\n\nSo what's the real story? In the case of the sharpened spikes, Leerhsen punctures the myth by describing how sportswriters contributed to it. At the time, there was intense fascination at the novel shoes worn by ballplayers. Describing a game that neither the sportswriters nor their readers had played in their youth in any organized fashion, the shoes looked \"at once medieval and futuristic,\" Leerhsen said, and so, they were prone to exaggerate their danger. But Cobb never sharpened his spikes. In fact, weary of his dirty reputation, Cobb tried to get the major league to require players to dull their spikes and have umpires inspect them before each game.\n\nLeerhsen's biography also describes plenty of contemporary players and umpires who vouch that Cobb didn't use his spikes to cut opponents. And it wasn't as if his opponents, struggling to beat Cobb on one of his nine different slides, were wilting flowers. In 1958, Cobb rolled up the cuffs of his pants to show a New York Times reporter the scar tissue from infielders who pounded on him with their own cleats. \"It was all part of the game,\" Leerhsen said.\n\nBut for all that it counters the conventional wisdom about the ballplayer, \"Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty\" isn't a revisionist take that paints Cobb in wholly complimentary terms. \"I wonder if people think I just spent 400 pages bringing up myths and debunking them,\" Leerhsen said. \"My allegiance is really not to Cobb, but to the truth, like it would be for any journalist.\"\n\nWhat emerges is a clear-eyed portrayal of Cobb not as a tyrant and not as a saint. It showcases Cobb as a flawed and vulnerable human being who, after suffering a nervous breakdown his second season, came back to fearlessly embrace his talent in an era that was just discovering what it meant to love baseball.\n\nBut is it enough to change the tide on the story we tell ourselves? \"Ty Cobb created more than the normal amount of controversy during his lifetime, and he lived to suffer the negative effects of his actions on his reputation,\" wrote William Cobb in \"National Pastime.\" \"Until his death in 1961, Ty was genuinely concerned with his baseball legacy, often expressing concern about being remembered for spikings, fighting, and aggressive play.\"\n\nConsidering that books like Stump's \"Cobb: A Biography\" and the Tommy Lee Jones film were on the way, his concern was well-placed. \"People really resist parting with (their preconceived notions about Cobb),\" Leerhsen said. \"They love the myth because it gives them someone to feel superior to.\" That's a conundrum that the whole city of Detroit can relate to.\n\nContact freelance writer Anna Clark at annaclark.net.\n\nTY COBB IN MOVIES, BOOKS, MORE\n\nWhat frames our perception of Ty Cobb? Here are some examples of the Detroit Tigers great in popular culture:\n\n\"Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty,\" by Charles Leerhsen (2015): Leerhsen's new biography draws on primary sources — including Free Press archives and the Ernie Harwell Sports Collection at the Detroit Public Library — to unravel the myths that popular culture has cultivated about the first superstar of baseball. As the former Sports Illustrated executive editor, Leerhsen brings a journalistic eye to Cobb's story. Winner of the 2015 SABR Baseball Research Award.\n\n\"Cobb\" (1994): Starring Tommy Lee Jones as a mean-spirited and drunken Cobb who wants his biographer to write only about the good stuff, this Robert Shelton film has been widely panned. \"Hogwash!\" wrote film critic Roger Ebert in his review for the Chicago Sun-Times.\n\n\"My Life in Baseball: The True Record,\" by Ty Cobb (1961): Sportswriter Al Stump ghostwrote Cobb's biography, drawing from interviews Cobb gave in the last year of his life. But Stump later decried the story as a coverup and, 30 years later, he wrote a new version. \"Cobb: A Biography\" described the ballplayer as a narcissistic and violent monster.\n\n\"Cobb\" by Lee Blessing (1998): Debuting off-Broadway in 2000, this play showcases Cobb at three points of his life: at age 19, just beginning his Tigers career; in his early forties, struggling with middle age, and in his last years. It, too, spins a tale of Cobb's nastiness. \"With Cobb, to know him is to hate him,\" wrote a Los Angeles Times review of the play in 2012.\n\nThe Ty Cobb Museum: It's not in Detroit; it's in Royston, Georgia. And it's not a stand-alone institution; it's inside the Ty Cobb Healthcare System, a hospital financed by Cobb in memory of his parents. Dedicated to preserving a wealth of media about \"the greatness of Ty Cobb,\" the Cobb Museum also hosts annual vintage ball games against a team from the Shoeless Joe Jackson Museum.\n\n'Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty' events\n\nTalks, Q&As and signings with author Charles Leerhsen\n\n■ Presented by Detroit Historical Society\n\n11 a.m.-1 p.m. Sat.\n\nDetroit Historical Museum\n\n5401 Woodward, Detroit\n\n313-833-1805\n\n■ Presented by the Detroit chapter of the Society for American Baseball Research\n\n1:30-4:30 p.m. Sun.\n\nDetroit Yacht Club\n\n1 Riverbank Drive, Detroit\n\n313-824-1200", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2015/06/09"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/local/michigan/detroit/2013/09/15/how-detroit-went-broke-the-answers-may-surprise-you-and/77152028/", "title": "How Detroit went broke: The answers may surprise you — and don't ...", "text": "Nathan Bomey and John Gallagher\n\nDetroit Free Press\n\nOriginally published Sept. 15, 2013\n\nDetroit is broke, but it didn’t have to be. An in-depth Free Press analysis of the city’s financial history back to the 1950s shows that its elected officials and others charged with managing its finances repeatedly failed — or refused — to make the tough economic and political decisions that might have saved the city from financial ruin.\n\nInstead, amid a huge exodus of residents, plummeting tax revenues and skyrocketing home abandonment, Detroit’s leaders engaged in a billion-dollar borrowing binge, created new taxes and failed to cut expenses when they needed to. Simultaneously, they gifted workers and retirees with generous bonuses. And under pressure from unions and, sometimes, arbitrators, they failed to cut health care benefits — saddling the city with staggering costs that today threaten the safety and quality of life of people who live here.\n\nThe numbers, most from records deeply buried in the public library, lay waste to misconceptions about the roots of Detroit’s economic crisis. For critics who want to blame Mayor Coleman Young for starting this mess, think again. The mayor’s sometimes fiery rhetoric may have contributed to metro Detroit’s racial divide, but he was an astute money manager who recognized, early on, the challenges the city faced and began slashing staff and spending to address them.\n\nAnd Wall Street types who applauded Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s financial acumen following his 2005 deal to restructure city pension debt should consider this: The numbers prove that his plan devastated the city’s finances and was a key factor that drove Detroit to file for Chapter 9 bankruptcy in July.\n\nThe State of Michigan also bears some blame. Lansing politicians reduced Detroit’s state-shared revenue by 48% from 1998 to 2012, withholding $172 million from the city, according to state records.\n\nDecades of mismanagement added to Detroit’s fiscal woes. The city notoriously bungled multiple federal aid programs and overpaid outrageously to incentivize projects such as the Chrysler Jefferson North plant. Bureaucracy bogged down even the simplest deals and contracts. In a city that needed urgency, major city functions often seemed rudderless.\n\nWhen all the numbers are crunched, one fact is crystal clear: Yes, a disaster was looming for Detroit. But there were ample opportunities when decisive action by city leaders might have fended off bankruptcy.\n\nIf Mayors Jerome Cavanagh and Roman Gribbs had cut the workforce in the 1960s and early 1970s as the population and property values dropped. If Mayor Dennis Archer hadn’t added more than 1,100 employees in the 1990s when the city was flush but still losing population. If Kilpatrick had shown more fiscal discipline and not launched a borrowing spree to cover operating expenses that continued into Mayor Dave Bing’s tenure. Over five decades, there were many ‘if only’ moments.\n\n“Detroit got into a trap of doing a lot of borrowing for cash flow purposes and then trying to figure out how to push costs (out) as much as possible,” said Bettie Buss, a former city budget staffer who spent years analyzing city finances for the nonpartisan Citizens Research Council of Michigan. “That was the whole culture — how do we get what we want and not pay for it until tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow?”\n\nUltimately, Detroit ended up with $18 billion to $20 billion in debt and unfunded pension and health care liabilities. Gov. Rick Snyder appointed bankruptcy attorney Kevyn Orr as the city’s emergency manager, and Orr filed for Chapter 9 on July 18.\n\nFor this report, the Free Press examined about 10,000 pages of documents gathering dust in the public library’s archives. Since most of those documents have never been digitized, the Free Press created its own database of 50 years of Detroit’s financial history. Reporters also conducted dozens of interviews with participants from the last six mayoral administrations as well as city bureaucrats and outside experts. Among the highlights from the review:\n\n■ Taxing higher and higher: City leaders tried repeatedly to reverse sliding revenue through new taxes. Despite a new income tax in 1962, a new utility tax in 1971 and a new casino revenue tax in 1999 — not to mention several tax increases along the way — revenue in today’s dollars fell 40% from 1962 to 2012. Higher taxes helped drive residents to the suburbs and drove away business. Today, Detroit still doesn’t take in as much tax revenue as it did just from property taxes in 1963.\n\n■ Reconsidering Coleman Young: Serving from 1974-1994, Young was the most austere Detroit mayor since World War II, reducing the workforce, department budgets and debt during a particularly nasty national recession in the early 1980s. Young was the only Detroit mayor since 1950 to preside over a city with more income than debt, although he relied heavily on tax increases to pay for services.\n\n■ Downsizing — too little, too late: The total assessed value of Detroit property — a good gauge of the city’s tax base and its ability to pay bills — fell a staggering 77% over the past 50 years in today’s dollars. But through 2004, the city cut only 28% of its workers, even though the money to pay them was drying up. Not until the last decade did Detroit, in desperation, cut half its workforce. The city also failed to take advantage of efficiencies, such as new technology, that enabled enormous productivity gains in the broader economy.\n\n■ Skyrocketing employee benefits: City leaders allowed legacy costs — the tab for retiree pensions and health care — to spiral out of control even as the State of Michigan and private industry were pushing workers into less costly plans. That placed major stress on the budget and diverted money from services such as streetlights and public safety. Detroit’s spending on retiree health care soared 46% from 2000 to 2012, even as its general fund revenue fell 20%.\n\n■ Gifting a billion in bonuses: Pension officials handed out about $1 billion in bonuses from the city’s two pension funds to retirees and active city workers from 1985 to 2008. That money — mostly in the form of so-called 13th checks — could have shored up the funds and possibly prevented the city from filing for bankruptcy. If that money had been saved, it would have been worth more than $1.9 billion today to the city and pension funds, by one expert’s estimate.\n\n■ Missing chance after chance: Contrary to myth, the city has not been in free fall since the 1960s. There have been periods of economic growth and hope, such as in the 1990s when the population decline slowed, income-tax revenue increased and city leaders balanced the budget. But leaders failed to take advantage of those moments of calm to reform city government, reduce expenses and protect the city and its residents from another downturn.\n\n■ Borrowing more and more: Detroit went on a binge starting around 2000 to close budget holes and to build infrastructure, more than doubling debt to $8 billion by 2012. Under Archer, Detroit sold water and sewer bonds. Kilpatrick, who took office in 2002, used borrowing as his stock answer to budget issues, and Bing borrowed more than $250 million.\n\n■ Adding the last straw — Kilpatrick’s gamble: He’s best known around the globe for a sex and perjury scandal that sent him to jail and massive corruption that threatens to send him to prison next month for more than 20 years. The corruption cases further eroded Detroit’s image and distracted the city from its fiscal storm. But perhaps the greatest damage Kilpatrick did to the city’s long-term stability was with Wall Street’s help when he borrowed $1.44 billion in a flashy high-finance deal to restructure pension fund debt. That deal, which could cost $2.8 billion over the next 22 years, now represents nearly one-fifth of the city’s debt.\n\nWith all the lost opportunities over decades, with Detroit’s debt mounting, with the housing crash and Great Recession just over the horizon, 2005 turned out to be the watershed year.\n\nAlthough no one could see it at the time, Detroit’s insolvency was guaranteed.\n\nPostwar boom, then ugly first signs of urban decline\n\nComing out of World War II, American industry was triumphant, and few centers of industry were riding higher than Detroit. The Arsenal of Democracy had built the planes and tanks that carried the war effort and was ready to return to producing cars and trucks for peacetime.\n\nThe fruits of victory were everywhere. Detroit’s population was growing toward 2 million. The cityscape was crowded — 14,000 people per square mile. With almost one-third of Michigan’s population living within its borders, Detroit exercised an outsized influence on the state’s politics and economy.\n\nBut the 1950s brought the first sobering inklings of crisis, and Detroit mayors for two decades made halting attempts to get ahead of it. Albert Cobo (1950-1957) formed the Dodge Committee to recommend diversifying the city’s tax base as wartime contracts dried up. Jerome Cavanagh (1962-1970) responded to falling revenue by instituting Detroit’s first income tax. Roman Gribbs (1970-1974) spearheaded an effort to revitalize downtown and Detroit’s tax base.\n\nBut two trends were undermining Detroit and the nation’s industrial centers like no foreign enemy had been able to do.\n\nSuburbanization: All cities spread out postwar into the farmland at their perimeters. Automakers and road builders eager to sell cars, home builders eager to sell new houses, village mayors eager for new taxes — all promoted suburban growth. So did the federal government with its subsidies and tax incentives. Eager for elbow room, families in crowded cities like Detroit and Cleveland and St. Louis began moving to the new communities. The process of spreading out hasn’t stopped yet.\n\nDiscriminatory practices, such as redlining — denying minority buyers mortgages and access to homes in white neighborhoods — made the process in Detroit and many other cities an ugly one. Unscrupulous real estate agents encouraged white flight by stoking some whites’ fears of black people moving in next door. Rancor ran deep. Experts warned of two Americas: one privileged, suburban and white; the other poor, urban and black.\n\nDeindustrialization: Cities like Detroit and Flint that rose to power in the first half of the 20th Century were shocked to find in the second half how many factory jobs would be lost to foreign competition. Detroit auto executive Lee Iacocca once boasted that U.S. carmakers would kick their Japanese competitors back into the Pacific Ocean. He was wrong. American steelmakers learned the same hard lessons.\n\nEven by the late 1950s, the signs of strain were showing in industrial cities. Population and housing values peaked in Detroit in the 1950s and began their long and seemingly unstoppable decline. The urban riots of the 1960s, including Detroit’s, accelerated the process.\n\nBy the 1960s, in Detroit as in city after city, the process was well under way. And mayors and civic leaders, here and elsewhere, began their long, anguished battle against decline.\n\nToday, the revivals of downtown and Midtown are drawing young professionals of diverse race and ethnicity back to the city. But the overall population is still dropping as people leave, looking for safer neighborhoods, better schools, lower taxes and reliable city services. Detroit’s population now is about 700,000.\n\nOther cities also have profound problems today — Chicago, Providence, R.I., Baltimore. But only Detroit is in bankruptcy court.\n\nCause and effect: People leave, taxes go up, more people leave\n\nAs the post-World War II manufacturing expansion leveled off and Detroit started to lose population and revenue, the city turned for the first time in 1962 to an income tax: 1% for residents, nonresidents and corporations. Only six years later, the rate for residents would double.\n\nIn the early 1980s, a nasty national recession pummeled the auto industry, and Detroit’s finances spiraled downward. Mayor Young convened a blue-ribbon panel to recommend action. They said the city would be bankrupt by summer if it did not raise taxes and reduce costs again.\n\nWithin months of a heated primary election, Young achieved the politically unthinkable: He persuaded Detroit voters to increase their own income taxes from 2% to 3%. He got Republican Gov. William Milliken to sign off, too. And he coupled it with deals to freeze wages for thousands of workers and lay off several hundred police officers.\n\n“He could pull a lot of this off because he had such political capital in the community that a lot of folks would say, ‘If Coleman Young said it, it must be OK,’” said Tim Kiska, a professor at the University of Michigan-Dearborn.\n\nTo continue paying for city services and to pay for union benefits awarded by outside arbitrators, the city also instituted a new utility tax in 1971 and a wagering tax when casinos began operating here in 1999. As population declined, the city instituted new taxes or raised existing ones to try and keep up with falling revenues.\n\nThe total property tax burden for city homeowners, including county and school taxes, rose from 44.79 mills per thousand dollars of value in the mid-’60s to 88.178 per thousand by 1991.\n\n“It’s almost like every decade we got a new source of income to keep our ass on the ground,” said Ed Rago, Young’s budget director.\n\nBut the problem with using taxes to raise revenue was that it made the city a more expensive — and less attractive — place to live and do business. People and corporations kept leaving.\n\n“So, very quickly, you had a situation where the city residents were taxed far higher than anywhere else,” Buss said.\n\nColeman Young’s legacy: Divisive — but fiscally sound\n\nWhen Coleman Young was elected mayor in 1973, Detroit had lived through one of the worst race riots in U.S. history and had lost about half a million people from its peak population years. Young has been alternately blamed for fanning the flames of racial tension, dealing out sweetheart deals to unions, expanding the city’s budget and setting Detroit on a path toward financial destruction.\n\nIndeed, he did raise taxes, but he also recognized fiscal realities by cutting costs aggressively to shore up the budget. Contrary to the typical portrait of him, Young may have been Detroit’s most conservative modern mayor, attacking fiscal problems by shrinking government and forging new relationships with corporate America to build new Detroit auto factories during his tenure.\n\n“Coleman Young was a fiscal conservative,” said Buss. “Not many people appreciate that about him. He knew politics, and he was also desperately afraid that his community would lose control.”\n\nHe even reduced its recreation infrastructure. For example, when Young took office in 1974, the city had 117 skating rinks, 18 city pools and five “swim-mobiles,” portable metal tanks that were filled with water and traveled to neighborhoods so kids could take a dip.\n\nWhen Young left office, the city had four skating rinks and 12 city pools. The swim-mobiles were still around.\n\nUnder Young, Detroit cut about 6,000 workers from 1978 to 1984, according to financial records reviewed by the Free Press. During his two decades as mayor, he also cut about 2,000 Police Department employees and about 500 Fire Department employees.\n\n“He did a number of things to bring costs down,” said Bob Berg, Young’s former press secretary. “He kept a pretty tight rein ... in some very difficult economic times.”\n\nOne reason Young cut public safety officers: The city lost an arbitration ruling during a bitter dispute early in his tenure in favor of hefty union compensation.\n\nRoger Short, a budget analyst who later became one of the city’s top fiscal officials in the Archer and Kilpatrick administrations, recalled that Young also slashed the Police Department’s equipment.\n\n“We got rid of the planes and the helicopters,” Short said. “We couldn’t afford them.”\n\nStill, Young cannot be altogether exonerated in his role in Detroit’s financial demise. In fact, when he was serving in the state Legislature, Young wrote Public Act 312, which required binding arbitration in union compensation fights, the very same law that came back to haunt the city years later when the city lost arbitrations.\n\n“He always said it was the worst mistake he ever made in public life,” Berg said.\n\nYoung embraced taxes, too. Raising taxes helped him keep the budget balanced. The city’s income tax revenue for residents doubled from 1981 to 1986, according to the Free Press analysis.\n\nWith the public safety cuts, Young stabilized the budget. In 1985, the city’s debt-to-revenue ratio in today’s dollars hit an all-time low of 0.66, according to the Free Press analysis. Today, the ratio is 7.1 — more than 10 times greater.\n\nKiska, who covered Young’s administration for the Free Press in the early 1980s and wrote a book about the city’s power brokers, said Young was responding to a “sense of terror” as the auto industry languished.\n\n“If you look at what he’s done, he was behaving — and this is just my opinion — totally responsibly,” Kiska said.\n\nWall Street apparently agreed. In June 1986, Standard & Poor’s increased Detroit’s bond rating to investment-grade, ending a six-year stretch in which Detroit’s ability to borrow was limited.\n\nThat kicked off a spree that continued through the end of Young’s administration. From 1987 to 1994, the city’s debt load soared 72% in inflation-adjusted dollars, according to a Free Press analysis.\n\nIn 1990, for example, the city sold $130 million in limited-tax general obligation bonds, which voters had not approved, to help finance Chrysler’s Jefferson North Assembly Plant. At the time, analysts projected the deal would cost the city a total of $245 million in principal and interest over 20 years.\n\nStill, Detroit’s debt was relatively under control under the Young administration and through the Dennis Archer years. It wasn’t until the early 2000s that it started to become unmanageable.\n\nMissed chances to rightsize staff as population falls\n\nOne running theme in the Free Press’ review is that city leaders failed, again and again, to come to grips with the looming crisis. Young downsized the bureaucracy, but not as much as he should have in view of the city’s declining population and revenue.\n\nAnd in 1994, when the Clinton-era financial boom took hold and the city’s finances appeared to be stabilizing, the city started hiring again.\n\nFlush with new tax revenue, Archer increased the city workforce from 1994 to 2001, even as the population contracted. Those new employees added to the city’s legacy costs. By the end of the 2001 fiscal year, the city had 18,132 employees, about one worker for every 51 residents.\n\nArcher told the Free Press that cuts were not politically palatable then, in part because the U.S. economy was booming. He defended adding employees, saying the city could afford it and budgets were balanced during his tenure.\n\n“We wouldn’t buy things unless we could afford to,” he said. “That’s how we were able to, frankly, balance our budget and have a modest surplus, because we watched what we were doing.”\n\nBut as Detroit’s economic problems intensified, Kilpatrick, mayor from 2002 until he resigned amid a sex and perjury scandal in 2008, presided over one of the largest purges of municipal workers in the city’s history — cutting more than 4,000 employees.\n\nWhen Bing, the current mayor, inherited a red-ink budget in 2009, he resorted to more cuts in an attempt to keep the city solvent, slashing another 4,000 employees in four years. In just a few years, Bing laid off nearly one of every three city workers.\n\nToday, the city has about one employee for every 73 residents.\n\nCosts for health care, retiree benefits soar — city fails to act\n\nIt has been obvious for at least a quarter-century that governments and industry were going to face massive legacy costs as more workers aged and retired. In fact, Detroit had about 18,000 retirees in the late 1980s, only about 3,000 fewer than today.\n\nBut Archer said the red flags weren’t obvious in the 1980s and 1990s. “During the eight years I was in office, there was some discussion that was starting to be held, quietly,” he said. It eventually became clear that “cities needed to watch out; states needed to watch out.”\n\nEd Hannan, one of his budget directors, agreed: “If you go way, way back, health care was not an expensive add-on,” he said. “As years went on, health care became very big.... We did go to council. We showed projections and what would happen and difficult times ahead. We were met with skepticism.”\n\nEven in recent years, when no one questioned that the health care tab had been ballooning, city leaders failed to cut costs because of intense pressure from unions. Adverse court and arbitration rulings also stymied the city’s best efforts to cut. The city’s spending on retiree health care soared 46% from 2000 to 2012, even as general fund revenue fell by 20%.\n\nMeanwhile, the city’s total unfunded retiree health care liabilities rose 19% from 2007 to 2011. Those numbers are critical because they show how costs have increased even though the number of employees was decreasing.\n\nToday, the city’s retiree health care obligations continue to drain the budget and are central to its insolvency.\n\nThe city also missed opportunities to rightsize retirement benefits. For instance, when the State of Michigan switched from pensions to 401(k)-style plans in 1997, Detroit failed to follow suit.\n\nArcher negotiated with the pensions funds to create a new plan for city workers, but it was never implemented.\n\nIn 2000, the city spent about $99 million on retiree health care benefits. That rose by almost half to about $145 million in 2012.\n\nBonuses to workers, retirees add up to more budget trouble\n\nIn 1994, Archer convened a meeting of his top officials the first week he took office to inspect the city’s books. Rago, Young’s budget director who stayed on during Archer’s first year, told the new mayor how the city’s pension system distributed excess earnings each year to retirees and active employees, instead of reinvesting it. The practice of distributing 13th checks and annuity bonuses dated to at least the mid-1980s.\n\nAlarmed, Archer vowed to kill the practice. But the city doesn’t control its pension funds, which have been largely administered by union officials serving on two independent pension boards.\n\nSo Archer backed an effort to block the payments through a proposed new city charter, which actually passed in August 1996. Enraged, several city unions and a retiree group sued and won. Archer tried again to block payments through a ballot initiative, called Proposal T, but it failed.\n\n“That’s a whole lot of money that, if it was in the pension fund, may have made a difference,” Archer told the Free Press.\n\nMilliman, an accounting firm conducting an analysis for Detroit emergency manager Kevyn Orr, this year pegged the unfunded pension liabilities at $3.5 billion. Pension fund trustees dispute that figure, saying the funds are healthy despite the 13th check practice and a string of poor investments over the last decade.\n\nOne of the city’s two pension funds, the General Retirement System board, which represents nonuniform employees, doled out $951 million in excess earnings, mostly to retirees and active employees, from 1985 to 2008, according to a report conducted for City Council in 2011 by independent actuary Joseph Esuchanko.\n\nHe estimated that the total accumulated cost to the city from the distributions, including lost interest, was $1.9 billion as of June 30, 2008.\n\nIt’s unclear exactly how much extra money was distributed from the city’s other pension fund, which covers police and fire department employees. Officials have told the Free Press, however, it was a much less frequent practice and that it happened in earnest for only a few years. With the stock market booming under Archer’s tenure, the city agreed in negotiations with its police and firefighter unions in October 2000 to hand out $190.4 million in bonus pension payments to current and future retirees.\n\nThere were clear signs of strain in Detroit’s two pension funds going back to the 1970s. The level of benefits paid each year was rising dramatically, in actual dollar amounts and as a percentage of the city’s active payrolls.\n\nThe funds also raised benefits year after year for decades through a cost-of-living allowance and through higher benefits negotiated by unions.\n\nDon Fuerst, a senior pension fellow at the American Academy of Actuaries, calls those rising costs “a serious red flag” for a pension fund.\n\n“When you see costs increasing as a percentage of payroll, as a percentage of revenues, as a percentage of assets, and you see a clear trend of increasing costs, that should be a red flag of concern, no question,” he said.\n\nShirley Lightsey, president of the Detroit Retired City Employees Association, said many retirees have accepted that times have changed.\n\n“We’ve told our people there’s no more 13th check, so don’t even talk about it anymore,” she said.\n\nThe pension board claims of safety and solvency were exaggerated over time in part because of a common but controversial accounting practice called “smoothing,” according to a Free Press analysis of pension reports.\n\nThat concept was used by Detroit trustees to assign a predicted annual return on assets over a seven-year period to “smooth” out the up-and-down market gyrations. But in Detroit’s case, the predicted return was too high and the reality of poor investments and falling contributions sapped the funds too quickly for the “smoothed” out numbers to remain accurate.\n\nDetroit’s pension boards also had another problem, experts say: Seven years is too long a period for smoothing. Three to five years is a more responsible time frame for predicting market returns.\n\nAs a result, the actual value of assets for Detroit’s two pension funds is really about $5.4 billion — not the $6.77 billion claimed by the pension boards. That’s 20% off — and “really substantial,” Fuerst said.\n\nKilpatrick’s award-winning deal turns into a financial disaster\n\nOn Dec. 6, 2005, Kwame Kilpatrick strode to the stage of a New York City ballroom to applause. Decked out in a black tuxedo, Kilpatrick accepted a gleaming trophy for engineering a complex $1.44-billion pension deal designed to eliminate the city’s unfunded pension liabilities.\n\nHe cracked a joke on stage, and Wall Street chuckled. Photographs from the event show laughing faces, a high-priced evening, a night to envy.\n\nThe transaction — which earned Detroit the Midwest Regional Deal of the Year honors from the Bond Buyer, Wall Street’s bible for municipal investments — was hailed for its intricate legal framework and creativity. City officials openly bragged that they had to construct a byzantine legal structure to justify the deal.\n\nThe deal hailed by Wall Street was a disaster. The borrowing scheme now represents close to one-fifth of the city’s debt and stands as a key reason the city filed for Chapter 9 bankruptcy on July 18.\n\nMany said it seemed like a good idea at the time, but the financial machination now stands as a prime example of the city’s willingness to borrow huge sums — and how Kilpatrick took borrowing to new heights.\n\nFor a year, Kilpatrick had lobbied the City Council to approve the idea of borrowing to fund pensions. The mayor said the city’s pension obligation, left unaddressed, would force him to lay off 2,000 employees.\n\nBut his new deal was designed to fix all that. He estimated the city would shave $277 million a year from its pension contribution obligation and prevent layoffs. It worked like this: Detroit sold pension obligation certificates of participation and shoved the money into its pension funds, making them nearly 100% funded. Separately, the city also bought so-called swaps, or derivatives, a complex Wall Street financial deal to permanently lock in steady interest rates in the range of 6%, a comparatively good rate at the time.\n\nCouncil members at the time — Maryann Mahaffey, Barbara-Rose Collins, Sharon McPhail and JoAnn Watson — blocked the original pension certificates deal for months. They warned it was too risky because of the stock market’s volatility and accused Kilpatrick of political gamesmanship.\n\nThe Free Press editorial page in February 2005 also applied pressure, calling the reluctant council members “heads-in-the-sand” politicians who “have become a threat to the stability of the community.” The editorial described the transaction as a “sound deal” that was “akin to refinancing a mortgage.”\n\nEventually, the council members capitulated under pressure from Kilpatrick and criticism from unions, including the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represented city workers. The deal eventually passed council unanimously.\n\n“Kilpatrick had to know or to believe he wasn’t going to be around at the time those payments were going to be due,” said Joseph Harris, Detroit’s auditor general from 1995 to 2005.\n\nThree years later, interest rates tanked and the stock market collapsed. Detroit’s credit rating was downgraded. In desperation, the city pledged its casino tax revenue as collateral to creditors to avoid a payment of up to $400 million that, back then, would have pushed Detroit into a bankruptcy filing.\n\nThe city now owes $2.8 billion for principal, interest and insurance payments over the next 22 years, according to a Free Press review of the city’s records. The bill soared in part because the city made only interest payments for about five years.\n\n“Things really got ugly as a result of that,” said Rago, the former budget director. “In the end, as you look back on it, it was the worst thing they could have done.”\n\nBankruptcy avoidable — until decadelong borrowing binge\n\nDespite the city’s huge tax burden, big spending and large bureaucracy, the Free Press analysis suggests that when Archer left office in 2001, the city still could have avoided disaster. Bankruptcy was not inevitable.\n\nBut under the Kilpatrick and Bing administrations, the city started borrowing aggressively to cover its operating expenses, enabled by Wall Street’s irresponsible lending of the 2000s.\n\n“It just makes me ill. Almost cry,” said former Mayor Gribbs, now 87, who served from 1970 to 1974. “You can’t continually borrow money and use it for operating expenses and expect never to have the trouble of paying it back. That’s where you end up going bankrupt.”\n\nShortly after Kilpatrick took office, his administration issued $61.07 million in “fiscal stabilization bonds.” It was the first of several bond issues championed by Kilpatrick to keep the city budget afloat.\n\nKilpatrick was full of ideas — like turning the crumbling Michigan Central Station into police headquarters — but was never able to build realistic budgets. He added city workers, then had to cut them. His stock answer to budget issues was to borrow. And chronic annual deficit spending started under him.\n\nIn 2009, at Bing’s urging, the city issued $250 million in fiscal stabilization bonds. He told the Free Press last week that the city was almost out of cash and that he couldn’t avoid borrowing.\n\n“I think too many of us looked at Detroit through rose-colored glasses and thought the revenue was going to increase and therefore we didn’t have to do anything on the expenditure side,” he said. “But I knew early on that my revenue wasn’t going to increase and my only option was to cut.… I had to make sure that there was enough money in our system to carry us through the next fiscal year and maybe the next.”\n\nThe borrowing also was aided by Wall Street. As recently as the middle of the last decade, bond rating agencies, including Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s, were rating Detroit debt as investment grade.\n\nBut even after eventual downgrades, investors continued to scoop up each new city bond issue. That’s because the lower the credit rating, the higher the interest paid to investors.\n\nThe demand was also fueled by Wall Street’s mistaken impression that the State of Michigan would never allow the city to file for bankruptcy.\n\nIn 2009, Harris — who became chief financial officer for Mayor Kenneth Cockrel Jr. during his single year in office 2008-09 — met with Wall Street firms and rating agencies to help the water department issue revenue bonds. At one stop with a credit agency, he discussed the city’s tenuous financial circumstances with an analyst.\n\n“She says, ‘Well, what happens if Detroit goes bankrupt?’” Harris recalled in a Free Press interview. “I said, ‘We don’t. The state will step in and ensure that they right the ship and that the bonds are paid.’”\n\nFinally: What would Frank do?\n\nAn echo of Detroit’s current distress can be found in memories of the Great Depression of the 1930s. Then, too, Detroit suffered overwhelming unemployment, chronic budget deficits, rampant crime.\n\nBut the city government managed to avoid a financial collapse, led by charismatic Mayor Frank Murphy, later Michigan’s governor, U.S. attorney general and associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.\n\nIn a report to citizens, Murphy bemoaned the “unsatisfactory governmental administration in the near past,” the “racketeers” who were plaguing the community and the “acute” joblessness that undercut the city.\n\nDespite an imploding economy, he called for a “stubborn stand against the allowance of deficits.” He pledged to cut the city’s budget “to the bone” and he declared war on “financial acrobatics” in a letter attached to the city’s 1930 annual report, which the Free Press uncovered in the Detroit Public Library.\n\nHis efforts helped the city survive the nation’s worst economic times.\n\nAlong the way, he made a vow.\n\n“This is a great, rich city,” he proclaimed in the letter. “It never has repudiated an obligation nor defaulted upon a debt — and it never will.”\n\nContact Nathan Bomey: nbomey@usatoday.com. Follow him on Twitter @NathanBomey. Contact John Gallagher: 313-222-5173 or gallagher@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @jgallagherfreep. Staff writer Kristi Tanner contributed to this report.\n\nHow this report was done\n\n\n\nDigital information about Detroit’s financial history is sorely lacking. In pursuit of historical context on the city’s finances, the Free Press spent weeks conducting research at the Detroit Public Library’s Burton Historical Collection and Department of Sociology and Economics.\n\n\n\nThe Free Press created its own database of 50 years of Detroit’s financial history by reviewing the city’s annual financial audits for 1960-2012, reading a half century of pension fund reports and combing through many other city records.\n\n\n\nCity financial audits before 2002 were available in print only. Reports from 1964 and 1971 were not available.\n\n\n\nThe Free Press also conducted dozens of interviews with outside experts and leaders from the last six mayoral administrations to provide context and additional information.\n\n\n\nThe Free Press uses general fund revenue figures, which are the best reflection of the city’s financial health. For some years, the city’s audited figures were later slightly adjusted because of new accounting principles, delinquent receipts or additional spending.\n\n\n\nMany news reports have relied on Detroit emergency manager Kevyn Orr’s assertion that the city has about $18 billion in debt. However, those figures include disputed estimates of the city’s long-term liabilities, including pension funds and retiree health care. In all references to the city’s debt, the Free Press is referring to the value of general obligation bonds, pension obligation certificates of participation and secured bonds, such as water and sewer debt.\n\n\n\nIn references to inflation-adjusted figures, the Free Press uses the recommended conversion method from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/09/15"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_28", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:41", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/politics/959780/humza-yousaf-new-frontrunner-in-race-to-become-first-minister", "title": "Humza Yousaf: 'Irn-Bru-swigging' SNP frontrunner | The Week UK", "text": "Humza Yousaf has emerged as the leading candidate to replace Nicola Sturgeon as leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) after the spectacular collapse of the campaign of former frontrunner and finance minister Kate Forbes, following comments that she would not have voted to legalise same-sex marriage.\n\nPolitico said Scotland’s health secretary “must now be considered a hot favourite to beat the other declared candidate, outsider Ash Regan” but after accident and emergency delays in Scotland worsened for the second week in a row, with more than three out of ten patients waiting longer than four hours, Yousaf has come under criticism for taking his eye off the ball.\n\nJackie Baillie, the deputy leader of Scottish Labour, told The Times Scotland it would be “disastrous for Scotland if Humza Yousaf’s failure was rewarded with a promotion to the top job”.\n\nWho is Humza Yousaf?\n\nBorn in 1985 in Glasgow, Yousaf, whose grandfather emigrated from Pakistan in the 1960s, was privately educated at Hutchesons’ Grammar School before attending Glasgow University, where he studied politics and was elected President of the Glasgow University Muslim Students Association.\n\nOn his own website, Yousaf claims he never dreamed of becoming a politician. “Although I studied Politics at Glasgow University, I always thought I would do political research or some other work that involved being in the background – where I was always most comfortable,” he wrote. But in an interview with The Times last year, Yousaf said: “As an angry 16-year-old Muslim growing up in the West in the aftermath of 9/11, with all of the Islamophobia that ensued after that, I wanted to change the world, and change attitudes. Politics has given me a platform and a voice to do that.”\n\nInvolved in nationalist politics from a young age, after leaving university he worked as parliamentary assistant for several prominent MSPs, including then first minister Alex Salmond and then deputy first minister Nicola Sturgeon.\n\nIn 2011 he was elected to the Scottish Parliament for the Glasgow region, taking his oath in both English and Urdu. Appointed minister for External Affairs and International Development just a year later, he was elevated to justice secretary in 2018, the first non-white cabinet minister in the Scottish government, and finally becoming health secretary in 2021.\n\nWhat kind of politician is he?\n\nAt just 37 years old he may be from a younger generation than Sturgeon, but politically Yousaf “is evidently the SNP establishment’s candidate” said Alex Massie in The Times.", "authors": ["The Week Staff"], "publish_date": "2023/02/21"}, {"url": "https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/959988/ten-things-you-need-to-know-today-10-march-2023", "title": "Ten Things You Need to Know Today: 10 March 2023 | The Week UK", "text": "Could WhatsApp be banned?\n\nWhatsApp could be banned in the UK, warned the head of its parent company, Meta. The UK’s upcoming Online Safety Bill could force the messaging app to weaken the end-to-end encryption that secures messages on the service, said Will Cathcart. However, he added, his company would refuse, opening the prospect of the app being banned entirely within the country. Although end-to-end encryption secures messages by ensuring that only those sending and receiving them can read them, some officials have argued that it should be weakened so that messages can be scanned for illegal content, said The Independent.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2023/03/10"}]}
{"question_id": "20230224_29", "search_time": "2023/03/15/01:41", "search_result": [{"url": "https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/17/world/sponge-bacteria-pores-chambers-scn/index.html", "title": "A kitchen sponge may be the best place for bacteria diversity | CNN", "text": "CNN —\n\nAn everyday item in your kitchen is a better home for many diverse types of bacteria than a petri dish in a laboratory, new research revealed.\n\nA common sponge’s spatial partitioning – the way it’s divided into different sectors of various sizes – caters to bacteria that prefer isolated environments and those that prefer to be around other organisms, making it the best of both worlds for microbial communities, according to a study published recently in the journal Nature Chemical Biology. Bacteria that thrive in secluded spaces, like the smaller pores of a sponge, won’t “bully” other organisms for room, while the sponge’s bigger wells allow for microbes that depend on the presence of others to survive.\n\n“It’s just like we are going to parties and there are individuals who will really enjoy having huge room interactions with a lot of people, and it will draw energy from that,” said the study’s senior author Lingchong You, professor of biomedical engineering at Duke University in North Carolina. “But there are also individuals who feel like they want to be in a smaller environment.”\n\nResearchers tracked bacteria growth by marking them different colors. Courtesy Andrea Weiss, Zach Holmes and Yuanchi Ha\n\nWhile the results may help you better understand why your kitchen sponge is habitat central for germs, the aim of this research is to find a means to engineer diverse microbial communities that produce chemicals of medicinal or biotechnological value, You said.\n\nHome sweet home\n\nTo arrive at these results, researchers tested E. coli density and presence in two different ways. They used plates with varying degrees of spatial partitioning, ranging from six to 1,536 isolated wells. The plates showed that the amount of division in spaces has an impact on what type of bacteria tend to thrive the most.\n\nResearchers then performed another experiment with a kitchen sponge and a tube. The results revealed that in a sponge, there are “60% more diverse members than in a well-mixed environment,” You said, referencing the compacted habitat bacteria are in when placed inside a tube.\n\n“The degree of this spatial partitioning plays a critical role in maintaining the microbial community diversity,” You said. “And it could be that the optimal degree of partitioning also depends on the nature of interactions in a particular community (of bacteria).”\n\nOverall, what they found was that environments that can provide a mix of large chambers and small wells allow for the most diverse microbial communities.\n\nBecause sponges are a “perfect growth environment for microbes,” You recommended that consumers be “mindful” and replace their sponges on a periodic basis or find a way to disinfect them. It is recommended sponges be replaced on a weekly basis, according to a 2017 study published in the journal Scientific Reports. To sterilize bacteria on sponges, the United States Department of Agriculture suggests consumers use microwave heating and dishwashing with a drying cycle.\n\nThe results provide an understanding of the microbial point of view where “distances and spaces are dramatically different” from a human’s point of view, said Slava Epstein, a professor of microbiology at Northeastern University, who was not involved with the study. By studying the distance between cells, which is measured in microns, researchers are better able to understand how the importance of scale impacts microbial interactions, Epstein said.\n\nMicrobial communities in nature\n\nEpstein added that a “natural extension” of this research would be to examine the role of spatial partitioning in nature, such as how bacteria work in soil, since the bacteria used in the study were grown artificially and controlled by researchers.\n\nBacteria are able to find both isolated and shared enviornments in sponges. Courtesy Andrea Weiss, Zach Holmes and Yuanchi Ha\n\n“Working with well plates clearly indicates a very significant role in the size of compartments they can grow and whether or not there is a separation between such compartments,” Epstein said. “Once we know this, it gives you ammunition and drive to go after actual natural communities.”\n\nAlthough the study cannot prove quite yet how spatial partitioning affects microbial communities in nature, You said he is optimistic overall that the results should remain consistent. Researchers are interested in experimenting with natural microbial communities, but You said these bacteria need to learn how to live with each other first.\n\n“One member will control one step of the pathway, another member will control another step of the pathway,” You said. “But in order for this to work, they will need to co-exist, so we need to maintain their diversity, and then we’re using this partitioned environment, precisely to help maintain different members.”", "authors": ["Angie Orellana Hernandez"], "publish_date": "2022/03/17"}, {"url": "https://www.theweek.co.uk/news/world-news/959733/the-surprisingly-germiest-place-in-your-kitchen", "title": "Spice rack 'germiest' place in your kitchen | The Week UK", "text": "A new study had found that the spice rack is one of the “germiest” places in the kitchen, said The Telegraph. Having analysed spice jars, the team found that 48% showed evidence of cross-contamination. They were more intensely contaminated than bin lids, knives, and sinks. “Consumers may not necessarily think to wipe down or decontaminate spice containers after cooking because they are not typically targeted as high risk for cross-contamination in consumer messaging,” said the report, by the US Agriculture Department Food Safety and Inspection Service.\n\nAncient Roman dildo discovered\n\nArchaeologists believe they discovered a life-size Roman dildo in Northumberland. “If it was not used as a sexual implement” then the 2,000-year-old object “may have been an erect penis-shaped pestle”, said The Guardian, a feature from a statue that people touched for good luck. The item was initially documented as a darning tool but Newcastle University archaeology senior lecturer Rob Collins, “part of me thinks it’s kind of self-evident that it is a penis”.\n\nMan strikes gold in Birmingham\n\nA former squaddie, who once guarded the Queen, has struck gold in Birmingham. Andy Brooke, 37, discovered specks of the precious metal while checking a stream in the city. He is keeping the location of the discovery “under wraps” for fear of “sparking a stampede to the West Midlands”, said the Daily Star. However, he advocates his detectorist hobby, telling the tabloid: “I would say if anyone wants to get outdoors and have a bit of fun, I’d recommend anyone goes and does it.”\n\nFor more odd news stories, sign up to the weekly Tall Tales newsletter.", "authors": ["Chas Newkey-Burden"], "publish_date": "2023/02/20"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2013/09/27/germiest-places-kitchen/2882321/", "title": "The germiest, grimiest place in your kitchen", "text": "USATODAY\n\nYou may never look at your kitchen the same way again. A new study that looked at household germs examined 14 common household items. So which areas were the germiest? The list may surprise you. Watch as Darla Carter, health and fitness reporter for the (Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal, breaks down the top 6 places.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/09/27"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/09/26/health-kitchen-germs/2880125/", "title": "Harmful germs lurking in your kitchen can make you sick", "text": "Darla Carter\n\n(Louisville, Ky.) Courier-Journal\n\nCDC%3A Foodborne illnesses sicken 48 millions Americans every year\n\nGermiest areas%3A refrigerator compartments%2C food containers%2C rubber spatulas\n\nWhen was the last time you washed your blender gasket%3F\n\nWhen was the last time you cleaned your refrigerator crisper or meat drawer or washed your can opener?\n\nIf it's been a while, you might want to clean up your act — or at least your kitchen.\n\nA public health and safety organization called NSF International found potentially harmful microorganisms such as E. coli, salmonella and listeria on kitchen items that are often used for food preparation or storage.\n\nSalmonella, listeria and some types of E. coli are among the many causes of foodborne illnesses, which sicken about 48 million Americans a year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The infections can range from mild to life-threatening but often are written off by people as brief stomach bugs.\n\n\"For a normal, healthy person, these things might not affect them that much,\" said Lisa Yakas, a senior project manager for NSF International, which does product testing and certification.\n\nBut certain kinds of people, such as the elderly, pregnant women, children, and individuals with compromised immune systems, may be more seriously impacted.\n\n\"Those types of people could all be in our homes, and they are the most susceptible to these organisms, so we just want to bring this to light, make these areas known, so that people can start cleaning these areas.\"\n\nNSF International conducted a household germ study, using 20 Michigan families that volunteered to swab items in their kitchen and submit samples to be analyzed for NSF's 2013 Household Germ Study.\n\nSome of the germiest areas, in terms of having microorganisms that could make you sick, included the vegetable and meat compartments of the refrigerator, rubber spatula, blender gasket, can opener and food storage container with rubber seal, according to NSF.\n\nSome of the \"bugs\" that were found are less concerning than others. For example, yeasts and molds don't tend to \"make people sick like normal pathogens, but if you are allergic ... then sometimes these yeasts and molds can affect you,\" Yakas said.\n\nCommon symptoms of foodborne illnesses caused by pathogens, such as salmonella and listeria, include nausea, vomiting, abdominal cramps and diarrhea. Serious cases can lead to hospitalization and major complications, such as kidney failure and miscarriages, depending on the culprit.\n\nAnnually, about one in six Americans gets sick, 128,000 are hospitalized and 3,000 die of foodborne diseases, according to the CDC.\n\nUniversity of Kentucky meat scientist Gregg Rentfrow said people should take practical steps to keep themselves safe, such as thoroughly washing fruits and vegetables before eating them, thoroughly cooking meats and cleaning up drippings from chicken and other meats.\n\n\"Just use common sense,\" said Rentfrow, an associate extension professor and extension meat specialist in the College of Agriculture, Food and Environment. \"If you handle everything like you know it's contaminated, you'll be OK.\"\n\nRentfrow said the NSF's findings weren't surprising, though \"it is kind of concerning when folks don't realize that (you) need to clean out your vegetable container and your meat container and stuff like that, especially if you're thawing out meat inside that meat container and the purge gets onto the actual refrigerator itself.\"\n\nTwenty-one percent of U.S. outbreaks of foodborne illness with a known single setting resulted from food consumed in a private home, compared with 48 percent that stemmed from food eaten in a restaurant or deli, according to CDC stats for 2009-10.\n\nAt home, it's important to pay attention to manufacturers' instructions for cleaning products that come in contact with food and to get on a regular cleaning schedule, Yakas said.\n\nTools, such as blenders, can openers, rubber spatulas and food-storage containers, should be cleaned \"after every use, whereas the vegetable bins and things like that ... can be more on a monthly routine,\" Yakas said.\n\nHer group recommends doing some extra work that you might not normally think about, such as disassembling the blender to clean its various parts, separating two-piece spatulas for cleaning and paying special attention to the area around the seals of containers that have rubber seals when cleaning.\n\nAlso, \"if you see a spill or drippage, clean that stuff up right away,\" Yakas said. And \"make sure that your hands are clean and make sure that your food surfaces are clean.\"\n\nIn kitchens, germs can be transferred from one food to another by using the same cutting board or utensils to prepare things without washing them in between, according to the CDC.\n\nFor example, Rentfrow said some people put their hamburgers and bratwursts on a cutting board to carry them out to the grill, then start cutting vegetables on that same board without cleaning it thoroughly with hot, soapy water.\n\nAnother problem is failing to keep hot foods hot and cold foods cold, he said. By letting them sit out at room temperature for long periods, you provide an opportunity for germs to grow. \"Now you're going to get yourself sick,\" Rentfrow said.\n\nTop six cleaning tips to get rid of kitchen germs\n\nRefrigerator vegetable compartment: Remove the drawer from the refrigerator if possible. Use a clean sponge or soft cloth and wash the bin with a mild detergent mixed with warm water. Rinse with tap water and wipe dry with a clean towel. To help control odors, use warm water mixed with a baking soda solution (about 1-2 tablespoons of baking soda to 1 quart of water). Rinse and wipe dry. Clean monthly.\n\nRefrigerator meat compartment: Remove the compartment/drawer from the refrigerator if possible. Use a clean sponge or soft cloth and wash the bin with a mild detergent mixed with warm water. Rinse with tap water and wipe dry with a clean towel. To help control odors, use warm water mixed with a baking soda solution (about 1-2 tablespoons of baking soda to 1 quart of water). Rinse and wipe dry. Clean monthly and whenever you see any spilled meat juices.\n\nBlender gaskets: Unplug the blender and remove the blender jar from the base. Completely disassemble the jar, removing the blade and gasket at the bottom. If dishwasher safe, place all pieces in the dishwasher after each use. If hand washing, wash the gasket, blade assembly, jar and lid thoroughly in hot soapy water, rinse and dry before re-assembling. Perform this cleaning procedure after each use.\n\nCan opener: Place the can opener in the dishwasher after each use (if dishwasher safe). If hand washing, wash the can opener in hot soapy water, rinsing thoroughly with clean tap water before air drying after each use. If hand washing, pay special attention to the area around the cutting blades to be sure all food residue is removed.\n\nRubber spatula: For two-piece spatulas, it's important to separate the handle from the spatula portion and, if dishwasher safe, place both sections in the dishwasher after each use. If hand washing, wash in hot soapy water, rinsing thoroughly with clean water. For one-piece spatulas, if dishwasher safe, place in the dishwasher after each use. Otherwise, hand wash thoroughly in hot soapy water, paying special attention to the area where the handle joins the spatula. Rinse thoroughly and dry.\n\nFood storage container with rubber seal: If dishwasher safe, place both the container and the lid in the dishwasher and wash after each use. If hand washing, wash both the container and lid in hot soapy water, paying special attention to the area around the seal as well as any grooves where the cover attaches to the container. Rinse thoroughly and allow to air dry.\n\nSource: NSF International", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2013/09/26"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/01/16/keurig-nespresso-mr-coffee-how-properly-clean-your-coffee-maker/4465580002/", "title": "Keurig, Nespresso, Mr. Coffee: How to properly clean your coffee ...", "text": "If you're an avid coffee drinker, you’re probably making multiple trips to the kitchen to get your fix. But have you ever thought about how dirty your home or office coffee maker can get after all those uses?\n\nWhether it’s the single-serve Keurig, espresso Nespresso machine or a traditional coffee maker, it’s important to keep these appliances clean to prevent the growth of bacteria, yeast or even mold.\n\nLisa Yakas, senior product manager of Consumer Products at NSF International, formerly known as the National Sanitation Foundation, says that these appliances are relatively harmless as long as clients follow the manufacturer’s cleaning directions.\n\nHowever, without routine cleaning, they can get pretty grimy.\n\nMold and yeast like to grow in your coffee maker\n\nYakas points to the water reservoir – the part of the coffee maker that stores water – as one of the dirtiest parts of the kitchen if not cleaned on a regular basis.\n\nA NSF International study of kitchen products in 2011 found that 50% of the sampled reservoirs in coffee makers had mold or yeast.\n\n“It wasn’t on their radar,” Yakas said of the families involved in the study.\n\nAccording to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, food borne yeast and mold can be a source of sensitivity for people with allergies and may even cause infections.\n\nYakas recommends to always empty out the unused water in the reservoir and leave the lid off to let it dry out.\n\n“Some of these organisms like these moist and damp places, that’s where they like to grow,” Yakas said. “If you eliminate that moisture altogether… then you eliminate their conditions to grow.”\n\nHer motto is “keep it dry and keep it clean.”\n\nOther places germs appear in and around your coffee maker\n\nChuck Gerba, professor of microbiology at the University of Arizona, said coffee break rooms have more bacteria than restrooms in most office buildings.\n\nIf the office has a coffee pot, Gerba says the first thing that gets germiest is the coffee pot handle. However, on a single-use machine, he says the top of the machine where the people place the plastic pod has the most germs.\n\n“When you use the machine, it could get in your coffee,” he said.\n\nGerba also said that another big source of germs are coffee cups, especially if they’re shared amongst co-workers. A 1997 study he co-authored examining office coffee cups found that E. coli and even fecal matter were found in some of the cups.\n\nAre beards dirtier than dogs?:'Significantly' more germs hide in men's beards, study finds\n\nLeave your shoes at the door:Science says they're covered in poop and could make you sick\n\nAccording to Gerba, the sponges that people were using to clean out their cups were actually contaminating them. If the office has a dishwasher, he recommends using it.\n\n“Dishwashers work great because you have a high temperature and it dries out,” he said.\n\nHowever, if the sponge can’t be avoided, Gerba says it’s important to wipe the coffee cup dry with a paper towel instead of using a cloth or letting it dry out on a rack.\n\nYuck:Sponges left in sinks become fecal germ bombs\n\nHow to clean your coffee maker: Keurig, Nespresso, Black & Decker, Mr. Coffee\n\nBoth Gerba and Yakas say that the heat from the coffee maker can kill most germs, but it shouldn't replace ritual cleaning or descaling, which should happen every one to six months depending on the manufacturer's recommendations.\n\n“While it’s possible the heat of coffee brewing might kill some microbes, why take a chance?\" Yakas said. \"We think it’s best to go to the source and keep the coffee maker clean.\"\n\nSo, here's how to properly clean your coffee maker according to the product's manufacturer:\n\nKeurig: Turn off the Keurig and empty out the water reservoir, removing the filter. Pour Keurig descaling solution into the reservoir. After pouring the entire solution in, fill the empty bottle with water and add that into the reservoir. Power the Keurig back on, place a mug, perform a cleansing brew using 10 oz. brew size and then pour out the contents of the mug. Repeat until the \"add water\" light comes on. Let the Keurig sit for about 30 minutes (with the power still on) and then rinse out the reservoir thoroughly. Fill the reservoir with fresh water and perform at least 12 cleansing brews.\n\nNespresso: Rinse and clean the water tank before filling it with fresh water and then put the water tank in place. Rinse the cup support and place a container of at least 0.5 liters under under the coffee outlet. Then open the machine head, let the used capsule be ejected, and empty and rinse the capsule container. Close the head and turn lever until in the \"locked\" position. Push the button three times within two seconds, the button should start blinking quickly. It will take less than two minutes for a flow to come out, then the cleaning procedure will run automatically for five minutes for three cycles. The company urges that consumers to not use any cleaning agents or vinegar in the process. The company offers their own descaling products to use instead.\n\nWiping fungi on your face?:Your makeup bag is a cesspool of germs, study says\n\nBefore you swipe:Credit and debit cards have more germs than cash and train station urinals, study says\n\nBlack & Decker: The coffee maker will indicate when it's time for a cleaning cycle. Fill the reservoir with equal parts white vinegar and cold water, then place a paper filter into the filter basket and close the cover. Press the auto clean button on the control panel. About half of the liquid will pour into the pot right away, but the second half will take about 30 minutes. When the process is done, the pot should be full and the coffee maker will automatically shut off. Before brewing coffee again, run another cycle with just cold water.\n\nMr. Coffee: Some traditional coffee makers aren't programmable with a cleaning cycle, in which it's recommended to clean your coffee maker with the vinegar solution every 40 to 80 uses. Instead of using the auto clean button, turn on the coffee maker until the carafe is three cups full. Turn if off and wait 30 minutes, then turn it back on and brew the rest.\n\nGerba said that vinegar will clear out most of the mold and yeast, but it’s not considered to be a disinfectant by the U.S. Environmental and Protection Agency and doesn’t get rid of all the bacteria that can make a person sick.\n\nThat’s why Yakas recommends taking out each removable piece of the coffee maker and cleaning it by hand. Some coffee maker parts are dishwasher safe.\n\nFollow Adrianna Rodriguez on Twitter: @AdriannaUSAT.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/01/16"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/hotels/2020/03/18/coronavirus-road-see-how-sanitize-your-hotel-room/5041000002/", "title": "Coronavirus: On the road? See how to sanitize your hotel room", "text": "Caroline Costello\n\nSmarterTravel.com\n\nYour hotel room is your home away from home, with a few exceptions: the hundreds or even thousands of strangers from every corner of the world who have slept there. And the hotel staff may not have the same standards of cleanliness that you do at home.\n\nHaving a sanitary hotel room is important under normal circumstances but with coronavirus cases mounting in the United States, it's a crucial way of helping protect travelers from picking up the COVID-19 virus, which a new study authored by scientists from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institiutes of Health, Princeton and UCLA says can live on surfaces for anywhere from a few hours to days.\n\nIf you can't avoid traveling – or are trying to make your way home – during the coronavirus pandemic, try the following steps to achieving a clean hotel room to help improve your odds of staying healthy – and lower your anxiety level.\n\nNo penalty? Hotel chains differ on cancellation fee policies around the coronavirus\n\n'A disaster': Airbnb hosts blast decision to refund guests amid coronavirus\n\nRead the reviews\n\nThere are no international standards for hotel cleanliness. Price, location, or a brand name will not guarantee completely sanitary digs. So until some international “clean commission” starts sending out fastidious officials to size up squalid toilets in hotels around the world, your best bet is to find out what your fellow travelers are saying. Most travel and hotel review sites have cleanliness as a category for evaluation. The largest hotel-review site is TripAdvisor (SmarterTravel’s parent company) with user ratings of thousands of hotels, restaurants, and businesses around the world; you can also find hotel reviews on major booking engines such as Booking.com, Hotels.com, and Expedia.\n\nGrab some supplies from a nearby store\n\nFirst, you'll need cleaning supplies, such as Lysol Disinfectant Spray or Clorox wipes. Not all travel wipes and cleaners kill norovirus, so if that's your goal, read labels and pick a product that does the job. (Note that if you buy something strong or hospital-grade, containing bleach, you might also need to bring gloves and a mask to keep yourself safe.) Also, grab a box of large zip-top bags; disposable gloves and dish soap are optional.\n\nCan't find these items at the local supermarket or drugstore? Try home improvement or office supply stores. And if you or a traveling companion are a veteran and there's a military base in town, try the PX.\n\nWash your hands\n\nFrequent hand washing has been proven to reduce the transfer of colds and viruses, and will prevent bacteria getting from whatever it is you’re touching (why is this remote control sticky?) to your mouth, eyes, or nose. So even if your hotel room is poorly sanitized, washing your hands will help keep the icky germs at bay. Oh, and once you're done cleaning all the items on this list, wash your hands again.\n\nYour coronavirus questions, answered: Everything readers want to know\n\nDitch the bedspread and decorative pillows\n\nYou’ve probably heard this one before: Most hotels do not wash heavy bedspreads after each unique guest. The frequency of laundering varies from hotel to hotel, so if the idea of an anonymous stranger cuddling up with the blanket that now lies across your queen bed creeps you out, call your hotel and ask how often the staff washes the bedspreads. Or bring your own travel-friendly blanket and remove the hotel’s altogether.\n\nCarry wipes\n\nIf you’re feeling a little icky in your dumpy budget hotel room or you just want to be extra cautious, simply hitting frequently touched surfaces with some antibacterial wipes could make your life a whole lot cleaner. Key places to spray for germs include the phone, door knobs, toilet handle, ice bucket, remote control, and bathroom faucet handles. Another option is to wave a UV wand over places prone to germs.\n\nClean all hard surfaces\n\nWipe down hard surfaces, such as the night table, coffee table, desk and shelves. You don't need to do them all, but prioritize surfaces where you will set down things that will go near your face or in your mouth. (Think shelves that house glassware, or nightstands where you put your glasses.)\n\nWipe down bathroom surfaces\n\nBathrooms can be germ central, so spray or wipe down all hard surfaces, including the toilet seat and lid.\n\nWipe down all door handles and light switches\n\nThese high-touch areas are used by everyone in your room, as well as housekeeping and anyone else visiting your room. Give them a good wipe down on day one; you might want to revisit the task later in the cruise, as well.\n\nAvoid the glassware\n\nThere’s no guarantee that your room glasses and mugs aren’t simply rinsed off under the tap by the cleaning staff, or even wiped down with the same sponge that’s used to clean other parts of the bathroom. The quick way to deal with this is to run your cup under hot water for a minute or two before using it; this will kill most bacteria. Or you can pack a travel mug from home.\n\nBag the remote\n\nIt's common knowledge that one of the germiest items in a hotel room is the remote control – touched by many and with lots of crevices that can't be effectively wiped down. Pick it up with a tissue or gloves, put it in a plastic bag and zip it shut. You can still operate the remote, but never have to actually touch its surface.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2020/03/18"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/problemsolved/2022/08/25/how-clean-computer-laptop-keyboard/7469015001/", "title": "How to clean a keyboard: 8 tips for washing gunk from computer ...", "text": "Think back to the last time you washed your hands. How many things have you touched since then? A breakfast sandwich, your face, your dog, the refrigerator handle, a chair, the desk, scratched itch on your foot, your hair and, lastly, your keyboard.\n\nNow, think about where your computer sits. Do you eat your lunch over the keyboard? Are you in the office with people walking past? Or in a home where someone is coughing or sneezing?\n\nAdd all of these factors together and you’re left with a lot of germs living on your keyboard. So many that WebMD ranks keyboards the fourth germiest place in the office.\n\nHow can I safely clean my keyboard?\n\nThere are a few easy ways to clean your keyboard:\n\nBlow the keyboard with compressed air\n\nWipe it down with distilled water\n\nMake your own cleaner that is safe for keyboards and screens\n\nUse a cotton swab to get into the smaller places, like in-between keys\n\nDisinfectant wipes, but do not use these on your screen\n\nDo not spray liquids directly on to the keyboard\n\nAvoid products with bleach\n\nDo not put your keyboard in water\n\nHow can I keep it clean?\n\nA 2018 study from the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found disinfecting your keyboard just once can significantly reduce germs and bacteria.\n\nRegular disinfecting in addition to frequent hand washing and avoiding activities like eating over the keyboard won’t keep the germs away, but it will cut down on all of the germs and bacteria living in the keyboard capital of QWERTY.\n\nMore problems, solved", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2022/08/25"}, {"url": "https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/reviewed/2021/07/23/shop-our-favorite-samsung-appliances-kitchen-laundry-room-and-home/8069926002/", "title": "Shop our favorite Samsung appliances for the kitchen, laundry room ...", "text": "— Recommendations are independently chosen by Reviewed’s editors. Purchases you make through our links may earn us a commission.\n\nYou’d be hard pressed to find a consumer who hasn’t heard the name Samsung. From laptops, mobile phones, and televisions to refrigerators, ranges, and robot vacuums, this megabrand has its hand in many aspects of your life.\n\nAs an appliance manufacturer, Samsung makes some of our favorites (yes, ones we’ve tested and love), dressed in both sleek design and above-average functionality. And, since Samsung is also a frontrunner in phone and computer technology, its appliances are well equipped with cutting-edge, app-based tech intended to make preparing dinner or vacuuming floors a lot easier.\n\nIf you’re in the market for a new appliance, Samsung is offering some killer deals on its website right now. Not to mention that it’s pretty easy to get these appliances delivered and installed at your home.\n\nHere are our favorites—the best-performing Samsung appliances that we’ve tested out already.\n\nSamsung RF263BEAESG French-door refrigerator\n\nIf you’re looking for a refrigerator built for a family, this is for you. We like the Samsung RF263BEAESG for its fingerprint resistant stainless steel, ability to store large items, and its smart shelving and drawers. The in-door shelving is able to fit two gallons of milk at once, so it’s built for buying in bulk. Another perk is the crisper drawers, which maintain optimal humidity levels to keep produce fresh. Additionally you only need to open one of the fridge doors to access the crisper drawer, meaning that you’re keeping the air in your fridge at more level temps.\n\nGet the Samsung RF263BEAESG for $1,349\n\nSamsung RS27T5200SR side-by-side, counter-depth refrigerator\n\nFor remarkably steady temperatures, the Samsung RS27T5200SR is a go-to. This model lacks Samsung’s smart home feature, Family Hub, but it makes up for it in reliability and spaciousness. While reviewing this model, we found that it has a remarkably larger capacity than the average standard side-by-side.\n\nGet the Samsung RS27T5200SR for $1,439\n\nSamsung Bespoke 4-door Flex refrigerator\n\nSamsung’s Bespoke fridge has had our attention since the beginning of 2021 when Samsung announced it for American consumers. You can customize its stunning design with interchangeable panels in a variety of colors and finishes, and you can also customize the temperatures of its individual freezer and refrigerated compartments.\n\nNo need to worry if there’s enough room in the fridge for a filtered water pitcher because this fridge has one built in, and it refills automatically. This model additionally features UV technology that deodorizes the fridge.\n\nWe currently have the Bespoke 4-door Flex in our labs for testing, but we’re intrigued by the promise of this model and impressed with our first peek.\n\nSamsung DW80R9950UT dishwasher\n\nAfter going through our lab testing, the Samsung DW80R9950UT comes out the other side as an Editor’s Choice winner. It has over a 99% efficacy in removing stains at both the normal and heavy cycles, while also offering a stunning fingerprint-resistant stainless steel outer. Like other high-end dishwashers on the market, this model features a third rack that is adjustable to accommodate oversized utensils, and it runs quietly while not sacrificing on efficiency.\n\nGet the Samsung DW80R9950UT dishwasher for $1,084\n\nSamsung NX58K9500WG slide-in gas range with True Convection\n\nThe Samsung NX58K9500WG earned an Editor’s Choice badge when we tested it. With its five burners and True Convection single oven, this range has everything you could want. It offers a great cooktop that includes a griddle that fits into the middle burner. This oven is a baker’s delight with its ability to quickly pre-heat, in addition to offering a great convection oven that evenly bakes anything from sugar cookies to a dense cake. If you’ve kept up your quarantine bread hobby alive or you’re getting ready to host loads of dinner parties, there’s a warming drawer ready to proof bread or keep dishes warm.\n\nGet the Samsung NX58K9500WG slide-in gas range with True Convection for $2,599\n\nSamsung NY63T8751SS Flex Duo slide-in dual fuel range\n\nThe Samsung NY63T8751SS is one of the best gas ranges we’ve tested, and the full review is coming soon. This smart range offers many tech-forward features, including a smart dial, Wi-Fi, and an air fry setting. It can learn your cooking habits and simplify oven settings so it “knows” just what you need. You can even use your smartphone to change the temperature and check on cooking time without being nearby. Even better, it features an air fry mode, which negates the need for a separate countertop air fryer and saves you the space and expense of another kitchen device.\n\nGet the Samsung NY63T8751SS Flex Duo slide-in dual fuel range for $3,329\n\nSamsung ME21F707MJT over-the-range microwave\n\nThe Samsung ME21F707MJT microwave offers a sleek design, including a horizontal control panel that sits at eye level, making it user-friendly while perched above your range. Its heat sensor technology does a good job of heating items and offers plenty of one-touch presets.\n\nGet the Samsung ME21F707MJT over-the-range microwave for $469\n\nSamsung WF45R6300AV smart, front-load washing machine\n\nIf you’re looking for a front-loading washing machine that can work quickly, the Samsung WF45R6300AV is an exceptional machine. It effectively removes 75% of stains that we tested, and for the germiest of loads, the machine’s Sanitize cycle effectively kills bacteria. This front-loader features smart technology so that rather than listening for the machine to signal that it’s done, you can receive a notification on your smartphone. It’s a great value with customizable cycle options that get done quickly with the SuperSpeed option.\n\nGet the Samsung WF45R6300AV smart, front-load washing machine for $1,034\n\nSamsung DVE45R6100C dryer\n\nAvailable in both electric or gas models, the Samsung DVE45R6100C works to near perfection with great capacity and settings to dry any load. It offers specialized settings for bedding that allow your sheets and comforters to come out fully dry. If you have allergies, this machine has a Sanitize option that can rid your laundry of allergens. A design-forward look means it will also look nice in your home. In a fun twist, this dryer has a light that flashes before the next cycle if you’ve forgotten to empty the lint trap after the last load.\n\nIf an error comes up for the machine, you can use your smartphone to scan the code provided and the Samsung app will tell you what’s wrong.\n\nGet the Samsung DVE45R6100C dryer starting at $944\n\nSamsung Jetbot AI+ robot vacuum\n\nSamsung’s brand new Jetbot AI+ has just arrived at our lab for testing, but first impressions look great. It has promising features including object recognition that helps it identify the surface it’s cleaning and adjusting its suction level accordingly. Maybe the best part of this machine is its hygienic. With the accompanying clean station, this machine automatically empties itself.\n\nGet the Samsung Jetbot AI+ for $1,299\n\nGet expert shopping advice delivered to your phone. Sign up for text message alerts from the deal-hunting nerds at Reviewed.\n\nThe product experts at Reviewed have all your shopping needs covered. Follow Reviewed on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for the latest deals, product reviews, and more.\n\nPrices were accurate at the time this article was published but may change over time.", "authors": [], "publish_date": "2021/07/23"}]}