Top House Republicans called on the White House to produce all documents and internal communications regarding President Joe Biden’s statement earlier this week in which he appeared to take a swipe at supporters of Donald Trump. White House press officials altered the official transcript of Biden’s statement, drawing objections from the federal workers who document such remarks for posterity, according to two U.S. government officials and an internal email obtained Thursday by The Associated Press. The lawmakers said they question whether the decision to create “a false transcript and manipulate or alter the accurate transcript” produced for the National Archives and Records Administration was a violation of federal law. Rep. James Comer, the Republican chair of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, and House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik demanded the White House produce the records. They’re also calling for the White House to make available for a briefing the top supervisor of the White House Stenography’s Office. “The White House cannot simply rewrite President Biden’s rhetoric,” Comer and Stefanik wrote. “…We are concerned with the latest reporting of the White House’s apparent political decision to protect the Biden-Harris Administration, instead of following longstanding and proper protocols.” Biden created an uproar earlier this week with his remarks to Latino activists responding to racist comments at a Trump rally made by the comedian Tony Hinchcliffe, who referred to the U.S. island territory of Puerto Rico as a “floating island of garbage.” Biden, according to a transcript prepared by the official White House stenographers, told the Latino group on a Tuesday evening video call, “The only garbage I see floating out there is his supporters — his — his demonization of Latinos is unconscionable, and it’s un-American.” The transcript released by the White House press office, however, rendered the quote with an apostrophe, reading “supporter’s” rather than “supporters,” which aides said pointed to Biden criticizing Hinchcliffe, not the millions of Americans who are supporting Trump for president. (AP)
A New York man who turned a rescued squirrel into a social media star called Peanut is pleading with state authorities to return his beloved pet after they seized it during a raid that also yielded a raccoon named Fred. Multiple anonymous complaints about Peanut — also spelled P’Nut or PNUT — brought at least six officers from the state Department of Environmental Conservation to Mark Longo’s home near the Pennsylvania border in rural Pine City on Wednesday, Longo said. “The DEC came to my house and raided my house without a search warrant to find a squirrel!” said Longo, who is 34. “I was treated as if I was a drug dealer and they were going for drugs and guns.” The officers left with Peanut, who amassed hundreds of thousands of followers on Instagram, TikTok and other platforms during his seven years with Longo. They also took Fred, a more recent addition to the family. A spokesperson for the DEC said in a statement that the agency started an investigation after receiving “multiple reports from the public about the potentially unsafe housing of wildlife that could carry rabies and the illegal keeping of wildlife as pets.” Longo, who runs an animal refuge inspired by his squirrel buddy called P’Nuts Freedom Farm Animal Sanctuary, took to Instagram to mourn Peanut’s loss. “Well internet, you WON,” Longo posted. “You took one of the most amazing animals away from me because of your selfishness. To the group of people who called DEC, there’s a special place in hell for you.” Longo fears that Peanut has been euthanized. “I don’t know if Peanut is alive,” he said in a phone interview Thursday. “I don’t know where he is.” The DEC spokesperson did not respond to a question about whether Peanut had been euthanized. Longo said he saw Peanut’s mother get hit by a car in New York City seven years ago, leaving the tiny squirrel an orphan. Longo brought Peanut home and cared for him for eight months before trying to release the squirrel into the great outdoors. “A day and a half later I found him sitting on my porch missing half of his tail with his bone sticking out,” Longo said. Longo determined that Peanut lacked the survival skills to live in the wild and would remain an indoor squirrel. Soon after Longo posted videos of Peanut playing with his cat, internet fame followed. A scroll through Peanut’s Instagram account suggests that this is no ordinary squirrel. Peanut leaps on to Longo’s shoulder, he wears a miniature cowboy hat, he eats a waffle while wearing crocheted bunny ears. Over the years Peanut’s story has been featured on TV and newspapers including USA Today. Longo, who works as a mechanical engineer, was living in Norwalk, Connecticut, until he decided to move to upstate New York last year to start an animal sanctuary. P’Nuts Freedom Farm Animal Sanctuary opened in April 2023 and now houses about 300 animals including horses, goats and alpacas, said Longo, who runs the sanctuary with his wife, Daniela, and other family members. Longo is aware that it’s against New York state law to own a wild animal without a license. He said he was in the process of filing paperwork to get Peanut certified as an educational animal. […]
Third-party presidential candidate Cornel West on Thursday lost a Supreme Court bid to be included on the presidential ballot in the key battleground state of Pennsylvania. Justice Samuel Alito refused his emergency appeal in a brief order. Alito handles appeals originating in Pennsylvania. West, a liberal academic currently serving as professor of philosophy and Christian practice at Union Theological Seminary in New York, would likely draw far more votes away from Democratic nominee Vice President Kamala Harris than from former Republican President Donald Trump. West’s lawyers in the case have deep Republican ties. The refusal comes after a rejection by U.S. District Judge J. Nicholas Ranjan, who expressed sympathy for West’s claim earlier this month but found it was too late to reprint ballots and retest election machines without increasing the risk of error. Ranjan cited federal precedent that courts should not disrupt imminent elections without a powerful reason for doing so. (AP)
Los Angeles County is taking on Pepsi and Coke for their role in plastic pollution. In a lawsuit filed Wednesday, the county alleged PepsiCo and Coca-Cola companies have misled the public about the recyclability of their plastic bottles and downplayed the negative environmental and health impacts of plastic disposal. “Coke and Pepsi need to stop the deception and take responsibility for the plastic pollution problems your products are causing,” LA County supervisor Lindsey Horvath said in a statement. “Los Angeles County will continue to address the serious environmental impacts caused by companies engaging in misleading and unfair business practices.” Coca-Cola owns brands like Dasani, Fanta, Sprite, Vitamin Water, and Smartwater, while PepsiCo owns Gatorade, Aquafina, Mountain Dew, and more. The two companies have been ranked as the world’s top plastic polluters for five consecutive years, and Coca-Cola has taken the number one spot for six years, according to global environmental group Break Free From Plastic. PepsiCo produces approximately 2.5 million metric tons of plastic and Coca-Cola produces approximately 3.224 million metric tons of plastic annually, according to Break Free from Plastic. A European Union consumer protection group and environmental organizations filed a legal complaint against Coca-Cola, Nestle, and Danone last November, accusing them of being misleading when representing packaging as 100% recycled or 100% recyclable. The LA lawsuit said Coca-Cola and PepsiCo have employed “disinformation campaigns” for consumers to purchase single-use plastic, believing them to be recyclable and less harmful to the environment. It alleged that both companies promised to create a “circular economy” for its bottles, in which plastic bottles can be recycled and reused an endless number of times, while in reality plastic bottles can only be recycled once, if at all. The American Beverage Association, which PepsiCo and Coca-Cola are a part of, denied the lawsuit’s accusations about their plastic bottle recycling labels. “The allegation that our packaging is not and will not be recycled is simply not true,” the group’s spokesperson William Dermody said in a statement. Dermody said California had a 71% bottle recycling rate in 2023, one of the highest in the country, and that their bottles are “designed to be recycled and remade and can include up to 100% recycled plastic.” In 2022 alone, an estimated 121,324 to 179,656 tons of plastic waste leaked into the land and ocean in California, and plastics make up seven of the top 10 litter products found on beaches, the lawsuit states. A big part of the problem is microplastics. Plastics that have leaked into the environment eventually disintegrate into tiny pieces of plastic measuring five millimeters or less. They can affect soil and plant growth, marine and fish life, and are nearly impossible to remove from the environment, the lawsuit states. Some Australian researchers, on behalf of the World Wildlife Fund, calculated in 2019 that many people each week consume roughly 5 grams of plastic from common food and beverages, and microplastics have been found in body tissues and organs. Though research is still limited overall, there are growing concerns that microplastics in the body could potentially be linked to heart disease, Alzheimer’s and dementia, and other problems. The lawsuit is seeking a court order to stop the companies’ “unfair and deceptive business practices” as well as restitution for consumers and civil penalties of up to […]
Germany ordered the closure of all three Iranian Consulates in the country on Thursday in response to the execution of Iranian German prisoner Jamshid Sharmahd, who lived in the United States and was kidnapped in Dubai in 2020 by Iranian security forces. Sharmahd, 69, was put to death in Iran on Monday on terrorism charges, the Iranian judiciary said. That followed a 2023 trial that Germany, the U.S. and international rights groups dismissed as a sham. The decision to close the Iranian Consulates in Frankfurt, Hamburg and Munich, announced by Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, leaves the Islamic Republic with only its embassy in Berlin. The German Foreign Ministry had already summoned Iran’s charge d’affaires on Tuesday to protest against Sharmahd’s execution. German Ambassador Markus Potzel also protested to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, before being recalled to Berlin for consultations. Sharmahd was one of several Iranian dissidents abroad in recent years either tricked or kidnapped back to Iran as Tehran began lashing out after the collapse of its 2015 nuclear deal with world powers including Germany. Iran accused Sharmahd, who lived in Glendora, California, of planning a 2008 attack on a mosque that killed 14 people — including five women and a child — and wounded over 200 others, as well as plotting other assaults through the little-known Kingdom Assembly of Iran and its Tondar militant wing. Iran also accused Sharmahd of “disclosing classified information” on missile sites of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard during a television program in 2017. His family disputed the allegations and had worked for years to see him freed. Iran pushed back against Germany’s protests. Araghchi wrote Tuesday on social network X that “a German passport does not provide impunity to anyone, let alone a terrorist criminal.” He accused Baerbock of “gaslighting” and wrote that “your government is accomplice in the ongoing Israeli genocide.” Germany is a staunch ally of Israel and has sharply criticized Iranian attacks on Israel as tensions spiral over the wars in Gaza and Lebanon. The closure of consulates, a diplomatic tool Germany seldom uses, signals a major downgrade to diplomatic relations Baerbock said were “already at more than a low point.” Last year, Berlin told Russia to close four of the five consulates it then had in Germany after Moscow set a limit for the number of staff at the German Embassy and related bodies in Russia. Iran’s government “knows above all the language of blackmail, threat and violence,” Baerbock said Thursday. “The latest comments by the Iranian foreign minister, in which he puts the cold-blooded murder of Jamshid Sharmahd in the context of German support for Israel, also speak for themselves.” “We repeatedly made unmistakably clear to Tehran that the execution of a German citizen would have serious consequences,” said Baerbock, adding that the cases of Germans held in Iran were a “central part” of a meeting she held with Araghchi in New York a month ago. She said Berlin will continue with “tireless work” to get an unspecified number of other Germans released. On Tuesday, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said that “the execution of a European citizen is seriously harming relations between Iran and the European Union.” “In view of this appalling development, the European Union will now consider targeted and significant measures,” he said in a […]
The nation’s deep partisan divisions extend to trust in the vote tallies for this year’s election, as a new poll finds that Republicans are much more skeptical than Democrats that ballots will be counted accurately. Voters generally show more distrust toward nationwide voting results compared to the tallies done by their own local election offices, according to the survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. About half of Republican registered voters have “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of trust that the vote will be accurately counted by their local election officials and around 4 in 10 say the same about the vote count in their state, but only around one-quarter have at least “quite a bit” of trust in the nationwide count. Republicans voters’ overall level of trust in all three, however, is lower than it is among Democratic voters. Roughly three-quarters of Democrats say they have at least “quite a bit” of confidence that votes will be counted accurately nationwide, in their state or by their local election officials. This year’s election marks the first presidential race since former President Donald Trump began a campaign of lies about a stolen 2020 election — a narrative that has undermined public confidence in election results among a wide swath of conservative voters, despite no evidence of widespread fraud. Election experts have warned that Trump may be laying the groundwork to once again challenge the election if he loses. David Farrington, a 78-year-old conservative in Fort Worth, Texas, said he distrusts mail-in ballots and ballot drop boxes, both common targets for claims of voter fraud and election conspiracies attempting to sow distrust in election results. “It’s not the vote count that I’m worried about,” Farrington said. “I have every faith in all the precincts and their ability to count the ballots that are there. But the ballots — we don’t know if they’re legitimate or not.” Conversely, Ruth Edwards, a 28-year-old kindergarten teacher in Tampa, Florida, said she has “never seen evidence that elections are rigged.” “It’s just people who are upset about their candidate losing who are now claiming it’s rigged with no evidence,” said Edwards, a Democrat. “It’s ridiculous.” Voters overall are more likely to believe that votes in the 2024 presidential election will be counted accurately by their local election officials or in their state than nationwide, according to the poll. About 6 in 10 voters have “a great deal” or “quite a bit” of confidence that votes in the 2024 presidential election will be counted accurately by their local election officials or in their state, while about half say this about votes counted nationwide. About one-quarter in each case have “a moderate amount” of confidence. About 3 in 10 say they have “only a little” or no confidence in the nationwide count, while fewer say that about the tally in their state or by local officials. Drew Inman, a 31-year-old Republican working in law enforcement in New Jersey, said he is skeptical that votes will be counted accurately at all levels, but especially in counties outside his own. “I definitely trust my vote to be counted at a local level more than I trust the national vote count,” he said. “… When you go national, there’s a lot more people involved and that […]
Donald Trump is planning to cast his vote on Election Day despite having previously said he would vote early. In a radio interview with Fox News host Brian Kilmeade that aired last week, Trump had said that he intended to early vote — something Kilmeade had suggested might serve as an example for his supporters. Trump and his campaign have been urging voters to cast their ballots early, even as the former president and GOP nominee continues to criticize the option and sow unfounded doubts about potential fraud. “I’ll be voting early. I’ll be voting early,” Trump told the host. But he won’t. Trump instead will be voting Tuesday morning near his estate in Palm Beach, Florida, according to a person familiar with his schedule who spoke on condition of anonymity before a formal announcement. Trump’s declaration that he would vote early had come after Kilmeade had asked — on two separate occasions — whether Trump might do so to “kind of set an example.” Trump has made clear his trepidations. “I’m very mixed on it,” Trump responded the first time. “I say the main thing I say is vote.” Kilmeade then re-asked the question as he ended the interview, telling Trump that he “could vote early and set an example if you wanted to in Florida. That would be an interesting decision.” “Well, you know, it’s interesting. I really feel — I’m very mixed,” Trump said once again, pointing to “the old standard of the Tuesday vote” as well as those who like to vote before Election Day. “You know, people have different feelings about it. But the main thing is you got to get out, you got to vote. And I’ll be voting early,” he said. In the final weeks of the race, Trump has been urging his supporters to bank their votes, with large signs at his rallies spelling out: “VOTE EARLY!” “I am telling everyone to vote early,” Trump said in a podcast interview with Dan Bongino, who has widely spread false information about early voting and the 2020 election. But Trump often sows doubts about the process in the very same breath. “We got to get out and vote. And you can start right away. You know that, right?” he told his supporters at a rally in Indiana, Pennsylvania in September. “Now, we have this stupid stuff where you can vote 45 days early. I wonder what the hell happens during that 45.” He went on to describe a hypothetical situation in which ballots could be tampered with, even though allegations of similar issues in 2020 were widely disproven. “‘See these votes? We’ve got about a million votes in there. Let’s move them. We’re fixing the air conditioner in the room, right?’ No, it’s terrible,” he said urging his supporters to deliver him a victory “too big to rig.” Still, Republicans appear to be heeding the early vote call. Republicans have been flocking to the polls for in-person voting ahead of Election Day, with early turnout breaking records in swing states such as Georgia and North Carolina. Trump is planning a flurry of events as the the election comes to a close, ramping up his schedule during the race’s final stretch. He’ll hold four rallies Monday that will include stops in North Carolina and Pennsylvania, […]
Rev. Mitchell Johnson has resigned from his position as president of the Chicago Board of Education following backlash over past social media posts with antisemitic and conspiratorial content. His resignation was requested by Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson (no relation), according to a report by the Chicago Sun-Times. Mayor Johnson – who had nothing worthwhile to say when a Jewish man was targeted in a shooting this past Shabbos – initially stood by the embattled board president, citing Johnson’s remorse and commitment to making amends. However, pressure escalated after Illinois Governor JB Pritzker and a large majority of Chicago’s council members publicly called for Johnson’s removal. The social media posts in question, reported by Jewish Insider, were made in the wake of Hamas’s October 7 attack and during the subsequent conflict in Gaza. In one post, Johnson wrote, “People have an absolute right to attack their oppressors by any means necessary.” Another post read, “My Jewish colleagues appear drunk with the Israeli power and will live to see their payment.” Johnson had only been sworn in last week, with Mayor Johnson appointing him to lead the Chicago Board of Education. (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)
This election, he has warned, is about the economy. Freedom. Stopping Project 2025 and the MAGA extremes. And, after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, it’s about democracy. And yet, Hakeem Jeffries, in line to make history as the first Black speaker of the House, says he is choosing to stay calm, as Democrats work to wrest control of the chaotic U.S. House from Republicans. “In this unprecedented moment that we’re in, I’ve concluded that calm is an intentional decision,” Jeffries told The Associated Press during an interview at a park-side cafe in between campaign stops in Southern California. “We have to continue to make the decision to remain calm, execute the plan, run through the finish line,” he said. “And then put it into the hands of the American people.” Ever tight, the campaign for control of the House is a toss-up, playing out in unlikely corners of the country far from the presidential race, including in Jeffries’ home state of New York and in California. A single contested seat, among 435, could make the difference if Democrats can flip the majority and dislodge Republican Mike Johnson from the speaker’s office. Never before in the nation’s nearly 250-year history has a Black American been so close to grasping the gavel. Jeffries, 54, is part of a younger generation of leaders, alongside Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris, proposing a new way forward, past the era of the former president, Republican Donald Trump. But Jeffries, a lawyer before coming to Congress, doesn’t want to talk about the milestone of becoming House speaker, and he won’t venture to predict that Democrats will sweep the House majority. He wants to talk about the choices before voters right now. “Everything we care about is on the line. Everything we care about is on the ballot. We can either move this country forward or turn back the clock,” he said on an early Sunday morning in the high desert community of Palmdale, the dusty far reaches of Los Angeles County. “We’re not going back!” chanted the hundreds of volunteers, ready to go knock on doors to get out the vote for Democrat George Whitesides in the race against Republican Rep. Mike Garcia. The Brooklyn-born Jeffries took over as House Democratic leader when Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi stepped aside, making him heir apparent to the speaker’s office. He is poised to win internal party balloting as leader again later this year, regardless of the election results. Yet if Democrats win majority control, he would stand for election as speaker by the whole House, when the new Congress convenes in January. One of the party’s most effective communicators, Jeffries’ free-form speeches on the House floor stand out among modern oratory, popping with cultural references of the times. He is sometimes compared to former President Barack Obama. Now, the congressman’s skills and savvy as he traverses the country and fundraises for the party are being put to the test. He is open and accessible to colleagues, methodical and even meditative, though sometimes slow to act, and keeps his counsel very close. He appears to have told almost no one what he said to President Joe Biden when the two spoke privately during a tumultuous July, before the president announced his decision to withdraw from the race […]
A national campaign is backing ballot measures in six states to end partisan primaries, seeking to turn down the temperature in a polarized country by removing a process that gives the most active members of both major parties an outsize role in picking the country’s leaders. The $70 million effort to replace traditional primaries with either nonpartisan ones or ranked choice voting is run by Unite America, a Denver organization dedicated to de-polarizing the country. “People are losing faith in democracy itself,” said Kent Thiry, the group’s co-chair and the former chief executive officer of the kidney dialysis firm DaVita Inc, during a Denver debate about the initiative on the Colorado ballot. Nick Troiano, Unite America’s executive director, said the goal is to end a system where 85% of congressional seats are effectively filled in partisan primaries because the districts are so overwhelmingly Democratic or Republican that whoever wins the relevant primary is virtually guaranteed victory in November. Troiano said the Republican congressmen who voted to overturn the 2020 election after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol almost all represented noncompetitive districts and have had to answer only to their party’s voters. Supporters are excited at the breadth of the campaign. “It’s eclipsed by the presidential election, but this is the most important year for this sort of structural reform that I can recall,” said Edward Foley, a law professor at Ohio State University. But some skeptics contend that changing the structure of primaries won’t make much of a difference in polarization given how so much of the country lives in either heavily Democratic or heavily Republican communities — and will naturally elect people who occupy those ideological extremes. “It seems like it’s adding political complexity, weakening political parties, and it’s not clear what problem they’re solving,” said Lee Drutman of the New America Foundation in Washington, D.C. The ballot measures include proposals to switch to ranked choice voting in reliably Democratic Colorado, evenly divided Nevada and two reliably Republican states where a sharp swing to the right among GOP primary voters have left traditional Republicans scrambling — Idaho and South Dakota. Swing-state Arizona and conservative Montana both have measures to shift from partisan primaries to nonpartisan ones. In deep blue Oregon, an initiative would allow parties to still run their own primaries but require them to use ranked choice voting in certain statewide and federal races. The ballot initiatives come as an unusual number of measures affecting voting are on state ballots in November. Eight states will consider conservative-led measures to ban voting by noncitizens, which is already illegal under federal law. Connecticut voters will decide whether to allow anyone in their state to vote by mail, and Ohio whether to have a nonpartisan commission draw their state’s legislative lines. The biggest change in U.S. elections could come from increased adoption of ranked voting. It requires every voter to rank candidates in order of preference. If one does not get a majority, the lowest-scoring candidate is eliminated and that politician’s votes are reallocated to whoever their voters picked second. This continues until one candidate wins more than 50% of the vote. Ranked voting is a more complex way of running elections that is touted as producing winners who better represent the whole electorate. The process is […]
The House Education Committee has released a damning report on antisemitism in colleges, following a nearly year-long investigation that led to the resignation of at least two university presidents. The probe collected over 400,000 documents from 11 schools, exposing shocking concessions made by universities to protesters, including partnering with a Palestinian university tied to Hamas and going as far as removing Sabra hummus from campus. This investigation marked the first time in the committee’s history that lawmakers subpoenaed university leadership. The report concluded that universities prioritized protester demands over Jewish students’ safety, administrators withheld support from Jewish students, university leaders failed to discipline students engaging in antisemitic activities, and universities resisted the House’s investigation. Chair Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) condemned university administrators, saying, “While Jewish students displayed incredible courage, university administrators, faculty, and staff were cowards who fully capitulated to the mob and failed the students they were supposed to serve.” Northwestern University considered removing Sabra hummus, while Columbia University offered secret concessions, including reviewing divestment from certain companies and partnering with a Palestinian university. Harvard University refused to condemn a letter blaming Israel for the October 7 attack, leaving Jewish students feeling unsupported. Columbia University let students who occupied Hamilton Hall go unpunished. Critics accuse Republicans of overstepping, with Columbia saying it “strongly condemns antisemitism and all forms of discrimination.” The committee urges the executive branch to enforce laws and ensure colleges provide a safe learning environment, citing potential Title VI violations. Foxx emphasized, “It is time for the executive branch to enforce the laws and ensure colleges and universities restore order and guarantee that all students have a safe learning environment.” (YWN World Headquarters – NYC)
The news rippled through Treasure Island, Florida, almost like a third storm: The mayor planned to move off the barrier island a month after Hurricane Helene flooded tens of thousands of homes along the Gulf Coast and two weeks after Hurricane Milton also ravaged the state. Mayor Tyler Payne’s home had been flooded and damaged beyond repair, he explained in a message to Treasure Island residents, and he and his husband can’t afford to rebuild. He also was stepping down as mayor. “While it pains my heart to make this decision in the midst of our recovery from Hurricanes Helene and Milton, this is the best decision for me and my family,” Payne, who had held the office for more than three years and was a fourth-generation Treasure Island resident, said Monday. Up and down Florida’s storm-battered Gulf Coast, residents are making the same calculations about whether they should stay or go. Can they afford to rebuild? What will insurance cover? People considering moving to Florida are contemplating whether it’s worth the risk to come to a hurricane-prone state. These existential questions about Florida’s appeal are raised regularly after the state experiences a busy hurricane season, such as in 2004, when four hurricanes crossed the Sunshine State. If moves into the state offer any answer, then hurricanes have served little as deterrents. Florida’s population has grown by one-third to 23 million residents in the two decades since Charley, Frances, Jeanne and Ivan ravaged the state. Last year, Florida added more than 365,000 residents, second only to Texas among states. On the other hand, there are signs that Florida’s white-hot real estate market has cooled. Sales of single-family homes were down 12% in September compared with the same time in the previous year. But interest rates, rising home prices and skyrocketing insurance costs likely played bigger roles than the recent hurricanes. “Florida recovers much faster than you think,” said Brad O’Connor, chief economist for Florida Realtors. What happens after a storm? Studies of hurricanes along the Gulf Coast have shown that any outbound migration tends to be short-lived, and if people do leave, it’s usually a short-distance move, such as from a barrier island to the mainland. Older people with more financial resources are more likely to return to devastated communities. When it comes to the housing market, there may be an initial shock to the supply as homeowners wait for reimbursement from insurance companies to fix up their homes or sell them. But in the three years after a hurricane, home prices in areas of Florida that were hit by one are 5% higher on average than elsewhere in the state because of smaller supply, according to a study of the impact of hurricanes on Florida’s housing market from 2000 to 2016. New homeowners tend to be richer than previous ones since wealthier buyers can absorb price increases. Other factors that determine how quickly communities bounce back include whether homes were insured, the speed of insurance reimbursements and whether there are enough construction workers. Because of stricter building codes implemented in the years after Hurricane Andrew devastated South Florida in 1992, newer homes withstand hurricanes better than older ones, O’Connor said. “If a property is damaged and uninsured, and the homeowner says, ‘I don’t want to deal with this,’ there are always people willing to scoop up that property because it’s valuable land,” […]
Boeing overcharged the Air Force nearly $1 million for spare parts on C-17 cargo planes, including an 8,000% markup for simple lavatory soap dispensers, according to the Pentagon’s inspector general. The Defense Department’s auditor reviewed prices paid for 46 spare parts on the C-17 from 2018 to 2022 and found that 12 were overpriced and nine seemed reasonably priced. It couldn’t determine the fairness of prices on the other 25 items. The Office of the Inspector General said it reviewed the soap dispenser prices after getting a hotline tip. Boeing disputed the findings. “We are reviewing the report, which appears to be based on an inapt comparison of the prices paid for parts that meet aircraft and contract specifications and designs versus basic commercial items that would not be qualified or approved for use on the C-17,” Boeing said in a statement. “We will continue to work with the OIG and the U.S. Air Force to provide a detailed written response to the report in the coming days.” The C-17 Globemaster is one of the military’s largest cargo aircraft. It can carry multiple military vehicles, large pallets of humanitarian supplies or, in extreme circumstances, hundreds of people. The Air Force flew C-17s nonstop for two weeks during the hectic August 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, evacuating more than 120,000 civilians fleeing the Taliban. Since 2011, the U.S. government has awarded Boeing more than $30 billion in contracts to purchase needed spare parts for the C-17 and be reimbursed by the Air Force. Boeing is still trying to recover from financial and reputational damage caused by two deadly crashes in 2018 and 2019 of its bestselling airline jet, the 737 Max. This has been a particularly volatile year for the aerospace giant. It came under renewed scrutiny and federal investigations after a door plug flew off a 737 Max during an Alaska Airlines flight in January. Federal regulators limited Boeing production of the plane. In July, Boeing agreed to plead guilty to a felony count of conspiracy to defraud the government for misleading regulators who approved pilot training rules for the Max. That plea deal is pending before a federal judge in Texas. Boeing is on its third chief executive in five years, having hired an outsider who joined the company in August. Last week, Boeing reported a third-quarter loss of more than $6 billion because of charges for several commercial, defense and space programs. A strike by 33,000 union machinists is now seven weeks old and has crippled production of 737s, 777s and 767 freighters, cutting off much-need cash. New CEO Kelly Ortberg has announced roughly 17,000 layoffs, and the company will issue new stock to raise up to $19 billion to shore up its debt-laden balance sheet. (AP)
Never before in a presidential election cycle has there been so much discussion of the child tax credit — a tool many Democrats and Republicans have endorsed as a way to lift children and young families out of poverty. Just three years ago, child poverty rates fell significantly when President Joe Biden’s administration raised the child tax credit and made even the poorest families eligible. But the expansion only lasted a year. Congress declined to renew it. There is hope for another increase in the tax credit, regardless of who wins Tuesday’s presidential election, but tension remains over who should qualify. Democrats seek a massive — and costly — expansion of the social safety net. Vice President Kamala Harris has pitched a major increase to the child tax credit as part of her presidential campaign. Rather than providing the benefit through a tax refund, she wants to send monthly payments to parents, even those who aren’t working and pay no income tax. Republicans have expressed support for increasing the tax credit but also concern that for some parents, it could become an incentive not to work. For all its economic prosperity, childhood poverty remains pervasive in the United States. Children under 5 are the age group most likely to encounter poverty and eviction, and more than one in six young people under 18 live below the federal poverty line. Meanwhile, it’s getting more expensive to raise a child, with the cost of groceries, child care and housing going up. “Expanding the child tax credit is the single most effective option on the table for reducing child poverty in America,” said Christy Gleason of Save the Children, a global humanitarian organization focused on the well-being of children. “Families are demanding it. Voters are demanding it.” Currently, the child tax credit gives families a $2,000 discount on their tax bill for every child under the age of 17 in their care. Families that pay less than $2,000 in income tax get a smaller benefit, and parents who are out of the workforce get none. Harris has made expanding the tax credit central to her campaign’s messaging on the economy. Her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, has a resume that includes passing a state child tax credit. Former President Donald Trump doubled the amount of the child tax credit during his administration. His presidential campaign declined to provide specifics on his plans for the child tax credit except to say he would weigh significantly increasing it. Trump’s running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, raised the possibility of increasing the child tax credit to $5,000 so that more parents can stay home with their children in an interview on CBS’ Face the Nation. But some Republicans have been leery about expanding it to parents who are not working outside the home. After voting down a child tax credit bill in August, Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said for stay-at-home parents the benefit amounts to “cash welfare instead of relief for working taxpayers.” The stakes of that debate are high for parents who are unable to work because of a disability, or because they are caring for children or elderly parents. Many have been excluded from the benefit because they are not earning income. Kandice Beckford, 25, is among those. She was […]
Donald Trump is calling former Rep. Liz Cheney, one of his most prominent Republican critics, a “war hawk” and suggesting she might not be as willing to send troops to fight if she had guns pointed at her. Cheney responded by branding the GOP presidential nominee a “cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.” At an event late Thursday in Arizona, with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, Trump was asked whether it is strange to see Cheney campaign against him. The former Wyoming congressman has vocally opposed Trump since the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and has endorsed Democrat Kamala Harris in the White House race, joining the vice president at recent stops. Trump called Cheney “a deranged person” and added, “But the reason she couldn’t stand me is that she always wanted to go to war with people. If it were up to her we’d be in 50 different countries.” The former president continued: “She’s a radical war hawk. Let’s put her with the rifle standing there with nine barrels shooting at her. OK, let’s see how she feels about it. You know, when the guns are trained on her face. “You know they’re all war hawks when they’re sitting in Washington in a nice building saying, oh gee, well let’s send 10,000 troops right into the mouth of the enemy,” Trump said. Cheney responded Friday in a post on X: “This is how dictators destroy free nations. They threaten those who speak against them with death. We cannot entrust our country and our freedom to a petty, vindictive, cruel, unstable man who wants to be a tyrant.” Earlier, after Harris’ campaign and other Trump critics on social media had pounced on his comment, Trump’s campaign said he “was talking about how Liz Cheney wants to send America’s sons and daughters to fight in wars despite never being in a war herself.” (AP)
A moving company representative and lawyers were expected to be given access to Rudy Giuliani’s Manhattan apartment on Thursday after the former New York City mayor failed to turn over belongings to two former Georgia election workers who won a $148 million defamation judgment against him. The two sides hurled allegations against each other this week as the deadline for Giuliani to surrender the items passed Tuesday without any of the assets changing hands. U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman ordered Giuliani last week to give the election workers, Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, many of his prized possessions. Among them: his $5 million Upper East Side apartment, a 1980 Mercedes once owned by movie star Lauren Bacall, and a variety of other belongings, from his television to a shirt signed by New York Yankees legend Joe DiMaggio to 26 luxury watches. The moving company representative and lawyers for Freeman and Moss were expected to be let into Giuliani’s apartment to see what property was there and estimate the cost of moving items named in Liman’s order, according to a court document filed late Wednesday by Aaron Nathan, an attorney for the election workers. In the document, Nathan said he had talked with Giuliani’s lawyers but that they were not ready to turn over any items and could not “even answer basic questions” about the location of the assets. Giuliani’s attorney, Kenneth Caruso, had said in a court filing late Tuesday that his client was ready to hand over the assets but lawyers for Freeman and Moss had not provided instructions on how to do so. Nathan declined to comment Thursday. The Associated Press left phone and email messages on Thursday with a representative and lawyers for Giuliani. Voting in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Thursday afternoon, Giuliani did not confirm that anyone had been in his New York apartment. He said he didn’t get a chance to defend himself in the Georgia election workers case and said he believes the judgment will be reversed on appeal. “It will probably be one of the most unfair trials in American history, with the exception of the J6 people,” he said, referring to the criminal cases against Trump supporters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. In fact, Giuliani was given a chance to turn over information requested by lawyers for Freeman and Moss last year, but didn’t do so. As punishment, a separate judge found Giuliani liable for defamation before any trial was held. A trial to determine damages was held later. On Thursday, Liman ordered both sides to submit a status report on any property exchanges by Monday. He said he would hold a status conference on Nov. 7 if the assets aren’t turned over. Giuliani’s legal defense fund sent out emails Thursday asking for donations as he fights “Deep State plans to utterly ruin me.” “They want my home, my belongings, even all of the nostalgic keepsakes that I’ve collected throughout my 80 years of life,” the email said. Giuliani’s lawyers had argued that Freeman and Moss should not be allowed to obtain and sell his belongings while his appeal of the $148 million judgment is pending. But Liman ruled against him last week and set the Tuesday deadline. Giuliani’s appeal is currently before a […]
America’s employers added just 12,000 jobs in October, a total that economists say was held down by the effects of strikes and hurricanes that left many workers temporarily off payrolls. The report provided a somewhat blurry view of the job market at the end of a presidential race that has pivoted heavily on voters’ feelings about the economy. Last month’s hiring gain was down significantly from the 223,000 jobs that were added in September. But economists have estimated that Hurricanes Helene and Milton, combined with strikes at Boeing and elsewhere, had the effect of pushing down net job growth by tens of thousands of jobs in October. Friday’s report from the Labor Department also showed that the unemployment rate remained at 4.1% last month. The low jobless rate suggests that the labor market is still fundamentally healthy, if not as robust as it was early this year. Combined with an inflation rate that has tumbled from its 2022 peak to near pre-pandemic levels, the overall economy appears to be on solid footing on the eve of Election Day. Economists have noted, too, that the United States has the strongest of the world’s most advanced economies, one that has proved surprisingly durable despite the pressure of high interest rates. This week, for example, the government estimated that the economy expanded at a healthy 2.8% annual rate last quarter, with consumer spending — the heart of the economy — helping drive growth. Yet as voters choose between former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, large numbers of Americans have said they are unhappy with the state of the economy. Despite the plummeting of inflation, many people are exasperated by high prices, which surged during the recovery from the pandemic recession and remain about 20% higher on average than they were before inflation began accelerating in early 2021. With inflation having significantly cooled, the Federal Reserve is set to cut its benchmark interest rate next week for a second time and likely again in December. The Fed’s 11 rate hikes in 2022 and 2023 managed to help slow inflation without tipping the economy into a recession. A series of Fed rate cuts should lead, over time, to lower borrowing rates for consumers and businesses. In the meantime, there have been signs of a slowdown in the job market. This week, the Labor Department reported that employers posted 7.4 million job openings in September. Though that is still more than employers posted on the eve of the 2020 pandemic, it amounted to the fewest openings since January 2021. And 3.1 million Americans quit their jobs in September, the fewest in more than four years. A drop in quits tends to indicate that more workers are losing confidence in their ability to land a better job elsewhere. (AP)
President Joe Biden tried to explain this week that he doesn’t really think Donald Trump’s supporters are “garbage,” but that doesn’t mean that other people don’t believe the label occasionally fits. “I would say that some of them are garbage,” said Samantha Leister, 32, who went to see Kamala Harris at a rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. As for the rest of them? Leister, whose parents and father-in-law are backing Trump, says they are “misguided.” That same day, at Trump’s rally in Green Bay, Wisconsin, the idea of voting for Harris was impossible to fathom. “I just think they are uneducated, and they believe all the lies,” said Shawn Vanderheyden, 44, who went to see Trump with his wife and two young daughters. “It’s unfortunate.” Vanderheyden still has faith in some people who are supporting the Democratic vice president, saying “hopefully they open their eyes.” The enduring truth of American politics — one that will undoubtedly outlast the controversy over Biden’s comments and this year’s presidential campaign — is that many Trump and Harris voters view one another with disdain and suspicion. At best, they feel confused by people supporting the other party and anxious about the country’s future after the election. The wariness between Americans is not new, but interviews with voters in battleground states reveal that it’s only growing deeper and more insurmountable. It’s divided families and friends, and it’s driven people further into their own political tribes. Some said they believe the country is headed for an even more dramatic splintering. Braxton Wadford, 20, predicted there would be a “mass exodus” of Americans after the election, regardless of who wins. He said people on both sides can’t imagine living under the opposing party’s leadership. “The American dream is turning into leaving America,” said Wadford, who voted early for Trump in North Carolina. Jennifer Phelan, 60, has been volunteering for Harris’ campaign in the same state, pushing undecided voters to cast ballots for the vice president. She’s nervous about the election and can’t see why it’s so close. “It just seems very much like a cartoon of good and evil,” she said at Harris’ rally in Raleigh. The political animosity has been building for a while, helped along by historic upheaval. There was the outbreak of a global pandemic, a violent insurrection at the U.S. Capitol and nationwide protests over racial injustice — and that was just in the span of a single year. The Pew Research Center found that Democrats and Republicans are becoming more likely to view members of the other party as unintelligent, lazy, immoral or dishonest. And nearly everyone has a very or somewhat unfavorable view of the opposing party, according to an AP-NORC Poll from September. Travis Waters, 54, said Trump supporters are “detached from reality.” He has no one close to him who is a Trump supporter — and he’s not looking to add any. “I would think that the people who I choose to associate with are not people who support invading the Capitol, say Haitians are eating pets and tell lies,” Waters said while waiting in line for Harris’ event in Harrisburg. Trump has been a dominant figure in American politics for nearly a decade, contributing to polarization by demonizing his political opponents and fostering a sense of persecution among his […]
As the annual New York City Marathon gears up for Sunday, residents and travelers should prepare for significant road closures along the marathon route. The 26.2 marathon route starts in Fort Wadsworth, Staten Island before traveling across the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge into Brooklyn. The race begins with the professional wheelchair division at 8 a.m., with the final wave of runners taking off at 11:30 a.m. The marathon route then moves into Brooklyn, over the Pulaski Bridge into Queens, the Queensboro Bridge into Manhattan, the Madison Avenue Bridge into the Bronx and the Willis Avenue Bridge into Manhattan. The finish line is located at West 67th Street in Manhattan’s iconic Central Park. Two million spectators are expected to line up along the route to cheer on the 50,000 participants. The five bridges listed above will be closed, along with dozens of roads across the boroughs. Key Road Closures Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge: The upper level will close Saturday night at 11 p.m. and reopen on Sunday at 4 p.m. The lower level will close at 7 a.m. on Sunday, reopening at 2 p.m. Other Road Closures Along the Route: Roads across Staten Island, Brooklyn, Queens, and the Bronx will close between 6:45 and 8:30 a.m. on Sunday and will reopen on a rolling basis after runners pass, starting at 1:15 p.m. in early parts of the route and extending as late as 6:45 p.m. for Central Park South. While roads will reopen as the race progresses, spectators and remaining runners have been told to stay on sidewalks to keep streets clear. The following streets will be closed on Sunday, Nov. 3: Marathon Staten Island Richmond Terrace between Jersey Street and Bay Street Wall Street (aka Richmond County Ballpark Driveway) between Richmond Terrace and Bank Street Jersey Street between Richmond Terrace and Victory Boulevard Victory Boulevard between Jersey Street and Bay Street Bay Street between Richmond Terrace and School Road Fingerboard Road between Bay Street and Tompkins Avenue Tompkins Avenue between Fingerboard Road and School Road School Road between Bay Street and Staten Island Expressway Lily Pond Avenue between Staten Island Expressway and Father Capodanno Boulevard McClean Avenue/Battery Road between Lily Pond Avenue and New York Avenue Hylan Boulevard between Bay Street and Olga Place Steuben Street between Olga Place and West Fingerboard Road West Fingerboard Road between Steuben Street and Hylan Boulevard Sand Lane between Hylan Boulevard and Father Capodanno Boulevard Father Capodanno Boulevard between Sand Lane and Lily Pond Avenue Verrazano Bridge Brooklyn Dahlgren Place between Verrazano Bridge and 92nd Street (Northbound) 92nd Street between Dahlgren Place and 4th Avenue Brooklyn Queens Expressway (Southbound) between Verrazano Bridge and 79th Street Gatling Place/79th Street BQE Entrance Ramp between 83rd Street and 79th Street 7th Avenue (Southbound) between 79th Street and 74th Street 74th Street between 6th Avenue and 7th Avenue 6th Avenue between 74th Street and 75th Street/Bay Ridge Parkway 75th Street/Bay Ridge Parkway between 7th Avenue and 4th Avenue Fort Hamilton Parkway between 92nd Street and 94th Street 94th Street between Fort Hamilton Parkway and 4th Avenue 4th Avenue between 94th Street and Flatbush Avenue Flatbush Avenue between 4th Avenue and Lafayette Avenue Lafayette Avenue between Flatbush Avenue and Bedford Avenue Bedford Avenue between Lafayette Avenue and Nassau Avenue Nassau Avenue between Bedford Avenue/Lorimer Street and Manhattan Avenue Manhattan Avenue between Nassau Avenue […]
Some people who took a new schizophrenia drug for a year improved with only a few side effects, but many dropped out of the research, the company announced Thursday. The results underscore the difficulties in treating schizophrenia, a severe mental illness that can cause people to hear voices, feel paranoid and withdraw from others. High dropout rates are typical in schizophrenia drug studies. Finding a drug that works can be a long ordeal punctuated by crises and hospitalizations. Side effects of existing medications — weight gain, tremors, restlessness — cause some people to stop taking medicine and relapse. There’s been great hope among doctors for Cobenfy, which was approved in September, because it acts in the brain differently than other schizophrenia drugs. Instead of blocking dopamine receptors, Cobenfy’s main ingredient, xanomeline, works on a different receptor that indirectly blocks dopamine release. Cobenfy also contains trospium, which blocks some of the side effects. The most common are nausea, vomiting and indigestion. In contrast to the weight gain seen with other schizophrenia drugs, people lost a few pounds while taking Cobenfy, made by Bristol Myers Squibb. Dr. John Krystal of Yale University has led research on other schizophrenia drugs but was not involved in the new studies. He noted that just 10% to 20% of participants in the new studies dropped out because of side effects. “That is pretty good,” he said, noting that fewer or milder side effects could mean people will stay in treatment longer. That could mean fewer problems associated with untreated mental illness: substance use, homelessness and unemployment. So why did some patients stick with treatment while others dropped out? Krystal said it will be important to understand more about that as doctors start prescribing the drug. The Food and Drug Administration approved Cobenfy on the strength of two encouraging company-sponsored five-week trials and other safety data. The latest results announced Thursday at the Psych Congress meeting in Boston come from two longer studies, providing a fuller picture. In one study, focused on severely ill patients, 78% dropped out, leaving only 35 people for the final analysis. In the other, focused on more stable people, 51% left the study, leaving 283 who took the drug for a year. “It’s not any higher or any lower than what we typically see” in schizophrenia studies, said Dr. Greg Mattingly of Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Mattingly is a consultant for Bristol Myers Squibb and a researcher on one of the studies. In the more severely ill group, 69% of people had a meaningful improvement in their symptoms at the end of the year. In the other group, 30% saw a meaningful benefit. Results of interviews with a sample of study participants conducted by an independent research team and shared by Bristol Myers Squibb showed the likelihood of continuing treatment. After six months, 36 said they would continue taking Cobenfy after the trial if given the option; 10 said they would not. Some participants said the drug reduced the voices while others said it didn’t work for them. The estimated yearly cost for Cobenfy is $22,500 compared to $540 for a generic antipsychotic. Krystal and others worry that insurers will require people to try cheaper drugs first before covering Cobenfy. Most patients’ out-of-pocket costs will be much lower, […]
