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Putin’s war is forcing Russians to ditch a favorite holiday destination | CNN

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For more than nine years, Russian tourists vacationing in Crimea didn’t need to give much thought to the fact that their country was waging war on Ukraine – or that their sun lounger was parked on occupied territory.

But with Kyiv’s counteroffensive underway, the southern Ukrainian peninsula is no longer the safe haven such holidaymakers had become accustomed to since Moscow annexed it in 2014.

Crimea has experienced a spate of attacks in recent weeks, including a seaborne raid by Ukrainian special forces on Thursday and a series of drone attacks on Friday. The bridges that connect Crimea to Russia and to southern Ukrainian areas under Russian control have been struck repeatedly in recent months.

Ukraine has claimed responsibility for some of these strikes and Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov has warned its assaults will continue.

The attacks are forcing Russian tourists to reconsider their plans. Svitlana, a Russian woman who used to work as a manager at a tourist agency in Crimea, told CNN the security situation has caused her work to dry up.

Svitlana asked for her last name to remain private, as she was scared about the consequences of speaking to Western media. She left Crimea earlier this summer and moved to St. Petersburg in Russia.

“I recently went there again in the hope that everything will end soon and they will agree on something to end the conflict. But I stayed for four months and realized that nothing will end anytime soon,” she told CNN.

“Tourism is all gone. There was less tourism last year and this year it has completely disappeared. Last year, tourists canceled reservations when it all started and this year they didn’t even book,” she said.

Crimea is economically dependent on the tourism industry, which is why the Russian-installed local authorities keep encouraging visitors to come despite the attacks. The Crimean Ministry of Resorts and Tourism has set up a new helpline for Russian tourists this summer and said it was working with hotels to make sure those who arrive or leave late because of security issues do not face additional charges or cancellations.

Tour operators and hotels are also offering heavily discounted trips and free perks to lure in more tourists. The Russian Union of Travel Industry said that hotel prices in Crimea have dropped by 30% this summer season compared to 2022 because of falling demand.

But the discounts are not working. The Russia-appointed administration said the average booking rate for August stood at 40%, meaning the majority of hotel rooms remained empty this summer.

Svitlana said that most people who are still vacationing in Crimea are booking low budget holidays, either camping or staying in the cheapest hotels or private accommodation. People who could afford to stay in the more upscale resorts are going to other, safer destinations.

She told CNN she did not enjoy her time in Crimea. “I’m so tired of the constant warplanes overhead, of the constant military in the city, of the wounded, of these poor people running away with frightened eyes, of the military equipment that almost crushed me a couple of times,” she said, recalling an incident when an armored personnel carrier nearly collided with her car.

Crimea has always been popular with Russian tourists, many of whom remember vacationing there during Soviet times. But the number visiting the peninsula ballooned following Moscow’s annexation in 2014.

While 5 million came in 2015, the first full year under Russian control, that number had risen to 9.4 million by 2021, according to the Russia-installed Crimean tourism ministry.

Svitlana still remembers the bumper season. “Profits brought that year were more than in the last 10 years. During the pandemic, people stayed at home and then rushed into (Crimea) when everything opened,” she said.

Ukraine says the influx of Russian citizens hasn’t been limited to tourism. Ukraine’s Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk said in March that 800,000 Russians had moved to Crimea permanently since it was annexed.

The peninsula has seen a flow of cash from tourism and the Russian government, which has poured money into Crimean infrastructure.

Chief among these investments was the $3.7 billion Kerch Strait Bridge, Europe’s longest bridge and a pet project of Putin. Its 2018 opening was hailed as the physical “reunification” of Crimea with the Russian mainland.

The 19-kilometer (nearly 12-mile) bridge made it even easier for Russian tourists to travel to Crimea at a time when the rest of the world had become a lot more expensive. Many Western countries imposed economic sanctions on Russia following the annexation, and the value of the ruble nosedived.

After Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February last year, a number of countries closed their doors to Russian tourists. The European Union suspended its visa facilitation agreement with Russia, making it harder for Russians to apply for an EU visa. According to the Association of Russian Tour Operators (ATOR), trips by Russians to European countries were down by 88% in the first half of this year compared to the first half of 2019, the last year unaffected by travel bans or pandemic restrictions. There are no direct flights between Russia and the EU.

Crimea suddenly became one of the few sunny beach destinations Russian tourists could still visit without having to spend a lot of money.

“People come to Crimea because Europe is closed and prices are very expensive in Turkey now. Where else can we rest? Sochi (a resort city in Russia) is crowded, (and has) crazy prices. We have nowhere else (to go) so people go to the Crimea,” Svitlana told CNN.

But the Kerch bridge’s strategic and symbolic importance has made it an attractive target for the Ukrainians.

The first strike came last October, when a huge explosion severely curtailed road and rail traffic on the bridge. While Kyiv did not comment on the incident at the time, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) acknowledged in June that it was behind the attack.

Another major assault came last month, when a Ukrainian experimental sea drone caused serious damage to the road lanes of the bridge, and, according to Russian officials, killed two civilians.

The attack was frightening enough to scare away many of the Russian tourists who had still been planning to come. The Russia-appointed head of the State Council of the Republic of Crimea, Vladimir Konstantinov, said that 10% of holiday bookings in Crimea were canceled in the following days.

ATOR said hotel bookings dropped 45% in the second half of July compared to the first half.

Security on the bridge has increased following the attacks and ATOR said last month that on some occasions, traffic jams stretching for eight miles formed on it.

The authorities told tourists to avoid the bridge and travel instead through occupied Ukraine, a route that is about 800 kilometers (500 miles) long and cuts through numerous areas heavily impacted by the war, including Mariupol, which was nearly leveled by Russian bombardment last spring.

“There are military and police checkpoints along the route,” the guidance tells tourists wanting to travel to Crimea through the occupied areas, adding that clearing each checkpoint shouldn’t take “more than 10 minutes per vehicle.” The guidance suggests bringing cash and downloading all maps in advance so that they can be accessed without internet.

The security situation is unlikely to improve any time soon.

Kyiv’s forces have stepped up attacks in the past two months, striking both the peninsula and ships navigating Ukrainian territorial waters around it several times. The Crimean port city of Sevastopol is a major naval base for Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.

The Ukrainian military said that its latest operation against the peninsula on Thursday morning had left at least 30 Russians dead.

Ukraine has been using aerial and sea drones to target ammunition depots, oil storage facilities and other structures. “All these targets are official targets because it will reduce their capacity to fight against us (and) will help to save the lives of Ukrainians,” Reznikov, the defense minister, said last month in an interview with CNN.

Asked if Ukraine’s goal was to permanently disable the bridge, Reznikov responded that it was “normal tactics to ruin the logistic lines of your enemy, to stop the options to get more ammunition, to get more fuel, to get more food.”

According to the Ukrainian government, more than 50,000 people fled Crimea to other parts of Ukraine after the annexation. However, Crimean NGOs estimate the number of refugees might be twice as high, as not everyone has officially registered with the government.

Roughly 2.5 million people lived in Crimea before the annexation.

Many of those who left had their properties confiscated and auctioned off by the Russian authorities, with the proceeds going to Russia’s armed forces, according to the authorities. Holiday homes owned by Ukrainians living elsewhere – including a Yalta apartment belonging to President Volodymyr Zelensky himself – were nationalized by Russia, according to the Russia-appointed chairman of the State Council of the Republic of Crimea, Vladimir Konstantinov.

Svitlana told CNN that some of the properties confiscated by the Russian authorities were passed onto Russian citizens and people coming to Crimea from Russian-occupied areas in southern Ukraine.

Those loyal to Kyiv who have stayed have been subjected to a brutal regime. Human rights groups have documented cases of activists, politicians, public figures and residents being kidnapped and held by pro-Russian authorities.

Remaining Ukrainian citizens have been forced to apply for Russian citizenship. Those who have refused have been persecuted, according to the Crimean Human Rights Group.

CNN has spoke to one Ukrainian resident of Crimea who confirmed the atmosphere of terror. The person was so scared for their safety that they asked for their identity to be concealed and no quotes to be published.

Ukrainian officials, including Zelensky, have repeatedly said the war will not end until Crimea is back under Ukrainian control.

Before its annexation, Crimea was home to about 5% of the Ukrainian population and accounted for almost 4% of its GDP. “We cannot imagine Ukraine without Crimea. And while Crimea is under the Russian occupation, it means only one thing: The war is not over yet,” Zelensky told CNN in an interview last month.

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August 27, 2023
3 people dead in ‘racially motivated’ shooting at Dollar General in Jacksonville, Florida, officials say | CNN

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CNN
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[Breaking news update, published at 6:50 p.m. ET]

Three people were shot and killed Saturday at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida, in what law enforcement described as a racially motivated incident.

“This shooting was racially motivated and he hated Black people,” Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters said at a news conference. He said the shooter, who is White and shot himself after the attack, left behind evidence that outlined his “disgusting ideology of hate” and his motive in the attack.

All three victims were Black.

The shooting happened blocks away from Edward Waters University, a historically Black school where students living on campus were told to stay in their residence halls.

[Original story, published at 6:35 p.m. ET]

The person suspected of opening fire and killing multiple people in a “racially motivated” attack at a Dollar General store in Jacksonville, Florida, on Saturday afternoon is dead, officials said.

The suspected shooter was barricaded in the store after opening fire and leaving “multiple fatalities,” Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan said. State Sen. Tracie Davis told CNN the suspect is now dead.

The circumstances surrounding the shooter’s death are unclear. It was not immediately clear if victims were shot inside or outside the store.

Jacksonville Fire and Rescue Department spokesperson Eric Prosswimmer told CNN the department was “on standby” to treat victims but could not share any information about how many people were hurt.

Jacksonville is located in northeast Florida, about 35 miles south of the Georgia border.

The area near the Dollar General store features several churches and an apartment building across the street.

Edward Waters University, a historically Black private Christian school that is located less than a mile southeast of the store, issued campus-wide stay-in-place order. The warning said students, faculty and staff don’t appear to be involved, according to preliminary reports.

“Our campus police have secured all campus facilities. Students are being kept in their residence halls through the afternoon until the scene is cleared,” the alert said.

Davis, whose district includes Jacksonville, called the shooting a “tragic day” for the city in a post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.

“I’m offering prayers to the families of the victims and am on my way to meet with (Jacksonville Sheriff T.K. Waters) for answers,” Davis posted Saturday.

“This type of violence is unacceptable in our communities,” Davis added.

There have been at least 470 mass shootings in the United States so far in 2023, according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting in which four or more people are injured and or killed, not including the shooter. The nation surpassed the 400 mark in July, – the earliest month such a high number has been recorded since 2013, the group said.

The gun violence in Jacksonville marked one of several reported shooting incidents in the US over two days, including in Massachusetts and Oklahoma. Shots rang out across several cities, bringing a startling halt to normal summertime activities like high school football games and weekend shopping.

In Boston, at least seven people were injured Saturday morning in a shooting that interrupted a popular parade, police said. A high school football game in Choctaw, Oklahoma, took a deadly turn Friday night after a possible argument led to three people being shot, authorities say. One of them – a 16-year-old boy – died. And Four people, including a 17-year-old, were killed at an apartment in Joppatowne, Maryland, Saturday morning, officials said.

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August 26, 2023
As hundreds remain missing in Maui, electric company admits evidence to determine how wildfires started may have been compromised | CNN

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Hundreds of people are still listed as unaccounted for after this month’s devastating wildfires on Maui – a number that’s expected to change as the FBI continues vetting names.

The “validated list” curated by the FBI currently includes 388 names, Maui County said Thursday, as cell phone data is now being used to try to pinpoint where victims may have been when the deadliest US wildfire disaster in more than 100 years tore through the Hawaiian island. At least 115 people are confirmed dead, though authorities say that number is likely to change.

The FBI on Friday acknowledged the list of names was “a subset of a larger list” of people who are believed to be missing. Steven Merrill, the bureau’s special agent in charge in Hawaii, said those currently on the list are people who authorities had more complete information about. Since the list was released, they’ve gotten “at least 100 people that have notified us that a certain person shouldn’t be on the list,” Merrill said – so the number of those still unaccounted for is expected to change.

As the race to identify the lost continues, the state’s main electrical utility stands accused of compromising evidence in the fire investigation, and Maui County officials have followed others in suing the company over responsibility for the fire. First responders also are pressing for answers about why they weren’t better prepared after a similar ruinous fire five years ago.

The updated list of the missing was released with hopes of confirming anyone who’s not truly still lost, officials said.

“We’re releasing this list of names today because we know that it will help with the investigation,” Police Chief John Pelletier said in the release. “We also know that once those names come out, it can and will cause pain for folks whose loved ones are listed. This is not an easy thing to do, but we want to make sure that we are doing everything we can to make this investigation as complete and thorough as possible.”

Pelletier said Friday that since the names were released, authorities have received hundreds of calls. Authorities would like to do a weekly update on the list of missing people to help notify the public, he said.

The FBI has worked with agencies “to unduplicate people that have been reported missing,” Hawaii Gov. Josh Green said earlier Thursday in a social media post. Some 800 to 1,200 people have been listed as unaccounted for since the fires, he said.

The grim search for those believed missing began shortly after wind-whipped flames tore through the island on August 8. Much of the western Maui community of Lahaina – once a lively economic and cultural hub – was left in ruins, with entire neighborhoods and businesses reduced to ash. Some residents were forced to jump into the ocean to survive as flames overtook the town.

Search crews and cadaver dogs have searched 100% of single-story homes in the disaster area, Maui County officials said Tuesday. They are now going through multistory homes and commercial properties.

And an FBI team that specializes in using cell phone data has launched in Maui to help identify potential fire victims, a law enforcement source told CNN. The Cellular Analysis Survey Team was on the island working with local law enforcement, the official said.

The team can get and analyze cell phone company subscriber records and cellular tower registration data, which could prove useful to the search efforts by geolocating the last known area where a victim’s cell phone was operating.

The team in the past has used information obtained through court orders to help with terrorism, kidnapping and criminal investigations.

“Cellular telephone analysis” is among the resources being provided by the bureau, Steven Merrill, special agent in charge of the FBI’s office in Hawaii, said during news conference Tuesday without giving specifics.

Additionally, Maui County has named a new interim administrator of the Maui Emergency Management Agency after its prior chief resigned from the post August 17.

In announcing Darryl Oliveira’s hiring Friday, Maui County Mayor Richard Bissen said he has a track record of “invaluable experience and skill during challenging times.”

Oliveira, who previously served as the administrator of the Hawaii County Civil Defense Agency, is expected to begin leading the county’s emergency agency Monday.

In pictures: The deadly Maui wildfires

As the human toll of the fire comes into focus, investigators also are trying to determine what sparked the flames, and while no official cause has been announced, the Hawaiian Electric Company is facing scrutiny over its actions before and after the fires broke out.

Some evidence potentially vital in determining the cause of the deadly fire in Lahaina may have been compromised, Hawaiian Electric Company (HECO) acknowledged in an exchange with attorneys included in court documents obtained by CNN.

The company said fallen power poles, power lines and other equipment were moved during firefighting efforts and as officials worked to make the area safe for residents, according to letters part of a class action lawsuit. The company told attorneys, who are representing Lahaina residents in the class action suit, that it was “possible, even likely” that evidence that “relate(s) to the cause of the fire” might be lost, correspondence obtained by CNN shows.

The equipment was removed from the area around the Lahaina substation – which is thought to be where the blaze started – before federal investigators arrived.

Those actions could have violated national guidelines, which say the fire scenes should be heavily preserved for investigators and any and all evidence should be secured and not removed from the site without documentation, court documents filed by attorneys say.

The ATF said on August 17 that its National Response Team was being deployed to Hawaii to help determine the cause and origin of the deadly fire – days after the utility company acknowledged equipment and evidence had likely been moved or lost.

On August 10 – two days after the wildfire devastated the town of Lahaina, a group of attorneys notified the utility of anticipated litigation and requested that all electrical equipment that may relate to the origin of the fire – including power poles, lines and conductors – be preserved.

An attorney for Hawaiian Electric responded on August 11 that some potential evidence may have already been compromised during the firefight, not by the utility itself, but by others.

John Moore, an attorney for the utility wrote to attorneys for the families on August 11 that the company’s main focus was the safety of first responders and displaced residents and restoring power.

The company also noted it was taking steps to preserve property but local, state and federal agencies were on the ground and it was possible “that the actions of these third parties, whose actions Hawaiian Electric does not control, may result in the loss of property or other items that relate to the cause of the fire.”

The families’ attorneys then submitted a request for a temporary restraining order to stop Hawaiian Electric from altering the scene where it’s believed the Lahaina fire started, court documents show.

A judge signed an interim discovery order on August 18, detailing how the company should handle evidence around the scene, including preserving and protecting all physical evidence within a defined area and refraining from destructive testing.

The order also specified that it was not making any findings of any wrongdoing at this time.

The class action lawsuit was filed several days after the fires ignited alleging Hawaiian Electric failed to deenergize power lines ahead of the fire despite high wind and red flag warnings. The cause of the fire has not yet been determined. It is believed to have ignited near a power substation where “where authorities reported a downed power line early on August 8, 2023,” the complaint says.

Hawaiian Electric vice president Jim Kelly previously told CNN that, “as has always been our policy, we don’t comment on pending litigation.”

“At this early stage, the cause of the fire has not been determined and we will work with the state and county as they conduct their review,” he said.

Hawaiian Electric has been “in regular communication with ATF and local authorities and are cooperating to provide them, as well as attorneys representing people affected by the wildfires, with inventories and access to the removed equipment, which we have carefully photographed, documented and stored,” spokesman Darren Pai told The Washington Post.

CNN has requested further comment on the potentially compromised evidence.

The ATF’s National Response Team, which is investigating the cause of the fire, declined to comment.

While the investigation continues, Maui County officials made their position clear in a lawsuit filed Thursday, claiming “the negligence, carelessness, and recklessness, and/or unlawfulness” of Hawaiian Electric Company and its subsidiaries is directly responsible for the fires.

The utility, known as HECO, “inexcusably kept their power lines energized” in early August, despite the National Weather Service issuing a High Wind Watch and a Fire Warning, the lawsuit alleges. The warnings cautioned that strong winds could knock down power lines and ignite a fire that would spread quickly due to dry conditions, the lawsuit indicated.

Maui County is seeking damages from HECO that may total tens or hundreds of millions of dollars, said John Fiske, an attorney representing the county in the suit.

“Our primary focus in the wake of this unimaginable tragedy has been to do everything we can to support not just the people of Maui, but also Maui County. We are very disappointed that Maui County chose this litigious path while the investigation is still unfolding,” a spokesperson from Hawaiian Electric told CNN in a statement.

Hawaiian Electric Company serves 95% of the state’s customer base.

As of Thursday, officials still were tracking at least three active fires on Maui, including the Lahaina fire, which was 90% contained after burning more than 2,170 acres. The Olinda fire, which has burned an estimated 1,081 acres, was 85% contained, and the Kula fire was also 85% contained, with just over 200 acres burned, county officials said.

And even as fire crews work to find and contain hot spots, a Hawaii police union official said firefighters “were set up for failure” ahead of the outbreak.

Following a destructive wildfire that broke out in 2018 under similar conditions in the same area, no wildfire management or other preventative methods were taken to mitigate future disasters, Nicholas Krau, the Maui Chapter Chair for the State of Hawaii Organization of Police Officers, told CNN.

“We all knew this was going to happen again. While no one could have predicted this much destruction or loss of life, we all knew there would be another destructive fire that would threaten these same businesses and homes again,” Krau said. “I don’t know who’s responsible for preventing wildland fires and managing the private owned land where the fire started, but they should definitely answer for it.”

More than 2,000 acres burned and 20 homes were damaged in the 2018 fire, county officials have said.

Many police officers who helped with evacuations this month suffered smoke inhalation because they didn’t have proper respiratory protection, even after it was requested following previous fires, Krau said.

“If someone needs help, (the police) are going to rush in and do everything they can to help. But the department and county of Maui have the obligation to properly equip them,” he said.

CNN has reached out to Maui County and the Maui Police Department for comment on Krau’s claims.

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August 26, 2023
Savannah renames historic square after Black woman who taught emancipated slaves to read and write | CNN

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The city council of Savannah, Georgia, voted Thursday to rename a downtown square after Susie King Taylor, a Black woman who once taught slaves to read and write.

The change marks the first time a Savannah square has been specifically named after a woman and a person of color.

“It’s one thing to make history, it’s another thing to make sense, and in this case, we’re making both,” Savannah Mayor Van R. Johnson II said during Thursday’s city council meeting.

Susie King Taylor was born to enslaved parents in 1848. She moved to Savannah when she was seven to live with her grandmother, who arranged for her to receive clandestine schooling due to Georgia’s severe restrictions on education, according to the Library of Congress.

During the Civil War, she became an Army nurse and organized a school to teach emancipated slaves to read and write. She later opened more schools for Black students and wrote a memoir about her experience during the war as an African American woman.

The town square that will now bear her name is a popular tourist attraction in Georgia’s oldest city in the state. The square was originally named after John C. Calhoun, a former vice president of the United States who owned slaves and defended the institution of slavery.

“What he stood for is not what Savannah stands for,” Johnson said.

The effort to change the square’s name began in 2021, according to the Coalition to Rename Calhoun Square. The council voted to rename the square last year and considered 300 name submissions before choosing Taylor.

In 2020, a statue of Calhoun was removed from a square in Charleston, South Carolina. Clemson University also removed his name from its honors college, CNN previously reported. The university was built on Calhoun’s plantation.

Johnson said the city will be installing signage not only about Taylor’s accomplishments but Calhoun’s history and the reason why his name was replaced.

“It’s important that we don’t erase history, it’s important that people who come long after us understand the time that we are in today,” Johnson said.

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August 25, 2023
Buckle up because Selena Gomez, Miley Cyrus and Ariana Grande are all releasing new music on the same day | CNN

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CNN
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Buckle up – it’s a big week for pop music, with artists such as Selena Gomez, Miley Cyrus and Ariana Grande among others all set to release new music starting Thursday night.

Gomez first began teasing her new music last week when she tweeted, “Y’all have been asking for new music for a while.” She added that while she continues to work on her third studio album, she “wanted to put out a fun little song I wrote a while back that’s perfect for the end of summer.”

That song, she revealed, is titled “Single Soon,” and will be released Thursday night along with an accompanying music video.

Cyrus also announced last week that she’s releasing her new single “Used to be Young” at midnight on Thursday and that in celebration of the new song, a TV special “Endless Summer Vacation (Backyard Sessions)” will air this Thursday on ABC at 10pm local time.

She wrote that the TV special is “a retrospective interview sharing stories about the first 30 years of my life,” and that the song “Used to be Young” is “dedicated to my loyal fans. I love YOU for loving every version of ME.”

On Tuesday, Cyrus posted the full lyrics of “Used to be Young,” saying the lyrics were written almost two years ago, during a time she said she felt “misunderstood.”

“I have spent the last 18 months painting a sonic picture of my perspective to share with you,” Cyrus wrote, adding “the time has arrived to release a song that I could perfect forever. Although my work is done, this song will continue to write itself everyday. The fact it remains unfinished is a part of its beauty. That is my life at this moment… unfinished yet complete.”

Grande, for her part, is celebrating the 10-year anniversary of the 2013 release of her debut album “Yours Truly” with a week’s worth of new content.

In a video posted to the “Sweetener” singer’s Instagram page last week, the entire schedule was revealed, starting with the release of a digital deluxe version of “Yours Truly” on Thursday at 9pm PST, along with newly recorded live performances of “Honeymoon Avenue” and “Daydreamin’.”

On Saturday, she’ll be releasing the first of a two-part Q&A along with new merchandise, followed by the release of another live performance of “Baby I Live” on Sunday. The second part of the Q&A will arrive on Monday, with Tuesday bringing the release of the “Tattooed Heart” and “Right There” live performances.

The week of celebration culminates on Wednesday with the release of a live performance of the album’s top single “The Way,” a track Grande recorded with the late rapper, and her ex-boyfriend, Mac Miller. She’ll also release “some behind the scenes stuff we found” on Wednesday, too.

If that wasn’t enough, this Friday will also herald the release of new music from Iggy Azalea, BLACKPINK, and a new music video from Sza.

Got all that? Now might be a good time to go make some room in that music library, because there are about to be a lot of new late summer jams to add in.

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August 24, 2023
Moscow court extends WSJ reporter Evan Gershkovich’s pre-trial detention | CNN

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A Moscow court has extended the pre-trial detention of Wall Street Journal journalist Evan Gershkovich, who had been arrested on espionage charges, by three months.

His pretrial detention has been extended until November 30, the press service of the Lefortovo Court said Thursday. It had been due to end on August 30.

Gershkovich has been detained in Russia since March following his arrest on charges that he, the WSJ, and the US government vehemently deny.

The US State Department has officially designated Gershkovich as wrongfully detained in Russia. US President Joe Biden has also been blunt about Gershkovich’s arrest, urging Russia to “let him go.”

This is a breaking news story. More details to follow.

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August 24, 2023
Fact check: The first Republican presidential debate of the 2024 election | CNN Politics
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Republican presidential candidates delivered a smattering of false and misleading claims at the first debate of the 2024 election – though none of the eight candidates on stage in Milwaukee delivered anything close to the bombardment of false statements that typically characterized the debate performances of former President Donald Trump, the Republican front-runner who skipped the Wednesday event.

Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina inaccurately described the state of the economy in early 2021 and repeated a long-ago-debunked false claim about the Biden-era Justice Department. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie misstated the sentence attached to a gun law relevant to the investigation into the president’s son Hunter Biden. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis misled about his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, omitting mention of his early pandemic restrictions.

Below is a fact check of those claims and various others from the debate, some of which left out key context. In addition, below is a brief fact check of some of Trump’s claims from a pre-taped interview he did with Tucker Carlson, which was posted online shortly before the debate aired. Trump made a variety of statements that were not true.

DeSantis and the pandemic

DeSantis criticized the federal government for its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, claiming it had locked down the economy, and then said: “In Florida, we led the country out of lockdown, and we kept our state free and open.”

Facts First: DeSantis’s claim is misleading at best. Before he became a vocal opponent of pandemic restrictions, DeSantis imposed significant restrictions on individuals, businesses and other entities in Florida in March 2020 and April 2020; some of them extended months later into 2020. He did then open up the state, with a gradual phased approach, but he did not keep it open from the start.

DeSantis received criticism in March 2020 for what some critics perceived as a lax approach to the pandemic, which intensified as Florida beaches were packed during Spring Break. But that month and the month following, DeSantis issued a series of major restrictions. For example, DeSantis:
Closed Florida’s schools, first with a short-term closure in March 2020 and then, in April 2020, with a shutdown through the end of the school year. (In June 2020, he announced a plan for schools to reopen for the next school year that began in August. By October 2020, he was publicly denouncing school closures, calling them a major mistake and saying all the information hadn’t been available that March.)

On March 14, 2020, announced a ban on most visits to nursing homes. (He lifted the ban in September 2020.)

On March 17, 2020, ordered bars and nightclubs to close for 30 days and restaurants to operate at half-capacity. (He later approved a phased reopening plan that took effect in May 2020, then issued an order in September 2020 allowing these establishments to operate at full capacity.)

On March 17, 2020, ordered gatherings on public beaches to be limited to a maximum of 10 people staying at least six feet apart, then, three days later, ordered a shutdown of public beaches in two populous counties, Broward and Palm Beach. (He permitted those counties’ beaches to reopen by the last half of May.)

On March 20, 2020, prohibited “any medically unnecessary, non-urgent or non-emergency” medical procedures. (The prohibition was lifted in early May 2020.)

On March 23, 2020, ordered that anyone flying to Florida from an area with “substantial community spread” of the virus, “to include the New York Tri-State Area (Connecticut, New Jersey and New York),” isolate or quarantine for 14 days or the duration of their stay in Florida, whichever was shorter, or face possible jail time or a fine. Later that week, he added Louisiana to the list. (He lifted the Louisiana restriction in June 2020 and the rest in August 2020.)

On April 3, 2020, imposed a statewide stay-home order that temporarily required people in Florida to “limit their movements and personal interactions outside of their home to only those necessary to obtain or provide essential services or conduct essential activities.” (Beginning in May 2020, the state switched to a phased reopening plan that, for months, included major restrictions on the operations of businesses and other entities; DeSantis described it at the time as a “very slow and methodical approach” to reopening.)
-From CNN’s Daniel Dale

Nikki Haley, the former South Carolina governor and US ambassador to the United Nations, said: “Donald Trump added $8 trillion to our debt, and our kids are never going to forgive us for this.”

Facts First: Haley’s figure is accurate. The total public debt stood at about $19.9 trillion on the day Trump took office in 2017 and then increased by about $7.8 trillion over Trump’s four years, to about $27.8 trillion on the day he left office in 2021.

It’s worth noting, however, that the increase in the debt during any president’s tenure is not the fault of that president alone. A significant amount of spending under any president is the result of decisions made by their predecessors – such as the creation of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid decades ago – and by circumstances out of a president’s control, notably including the global Covid-19 pandemic under Trump; the debt spiked in 2020 after Trump approved trillions in emergency pandemic relief spending that Congress had passed with overwhelming bipartisan support.

Still, Trump did choose to approve that spending. And his 2017 tax cuts, unanimously opposed by congressional Democrats, were another major contributor to the debt spike.

-From CNN’s Daniel Dale and Katie Lobosco

North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum claimed that Biden’s signature climate bill costs $1.2 trillion dollars and is “just subsidizing China.”

Facts First: This claim needs context. The clean energy pieces of the Inflation Reduction Act – Democrats’ climate bill – passed with an initial price tag of nearly $370 billion. However, since that bill is made up of tax incentives, that price tag could go up depending on how many consumers take advantage of tax credits to buy electric vehicles and put solar panels on their homes, and how many businesses use the subsidies to install new utility scale wind and solar in the United States.

Burgum’s figure comes from a Goldman Sachs report, which estimated the IRA could provide $1.2 trillion in clean energy tax incentives by 2032 – about a decade from now.

On Burgum’s claim that Biden’s clean energy agenda will be a boon to China, the IRA was specifically written to move the manufacturing supply chain for clean energy technology like solar panels and EV batteries away from China and to the United States.

In the year since it was passed, the IRA has spurred 83 new or expanded manufacturing facilities in the US, and close to 30,000 new clean energy manufacturing jobs, according to a tally from trade group American Clean Power.

-From CNN’s Ella Nilsen

With the economy as one of the main topics on the forefront of voters’ minds, Scott aimed to make a case for Republican policies, misleadingly suggesting they left the US economy in record shape before Biden took office.

“There is no doubt that during the Trump administration, when we were dealing with the COVID virus, we spent more money,” Scott said. “But here’s what happened at the end of our time in the majority: we had low unemployment, record low unemployment, 3.5% for the majority of the population, and a 70-year low for women. African Americans, Hispanics, and Asians had an all-time low.”

Facts First: This is false. Scott’s claims don’t accurately reflect the state of the US economy at the end of the Republican majority in the Senate. And in some cases, his exaggerations echo what Trump himself frequently touted about the economy under his leadership.

By the time Trump left office and the Republicans lost the Senate majority in January 2021, US unemployment was not at a record low. The US unemployment rate dropped to a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.5% in September 2019, the country’s lowest in 50 years. While it hovered around that level for five months, Scott’s assertion ignores the coronavirus pandemic-induced economic destruction that followed. In April 2020, the unemployment rate spiked to 14.7% — the highest level since monthly records began in 1948. As of December 2020, the unemployment rate was at 6.7%.

Nor was the unemployment rate for women at a 70-year low by the end of Trump’s time in office. It reached a 66-year low during certain months of 2019, at 3.4% in April and 3.6% in August, but by December 2020, unemployment for women was at 6.7%.

The unemployment rates for African Americans, Hispanics, and Asians were also not at all-time lows at the end of 2020, but they did reach record lows during Trump’s tenure as president.

-From CNN’s Tara Subramaniam

Scott said that the Justice Department under President Joe Biden is targeting “parents that show up at school board meetings. They are called, under this DOJ, they’re called domestic terrorists.”

Facts First: It is false that the Justice Department referred to parents as domestic terrorists. The claim has been debunked several times – during the uproar at school boards over Covid-19 restrictions and anti-racism curriculums; after Kevin McCarthy claimed Republicans would investigate Merrick Garland with a majority in the House; and even by a federal judge. The Justice Department never called parents terrorists for attending or wanting to attend school board meetings.

The claim stems from a 2021 letter from The National School Boards Associations asking the Justice Department to “deal with” the uptick in threats against education officials and saying that “acts of malice, violence, and threats against public school officials” could be classified as “the equivalent to a form of domestic terrorism and hate crimes.” In response, Garland released a memo encouraging federal and local authorities to work together against the harassment campaigns levied at schools, but never endorsed the “domestic terrorism” notion.

A federal judge even threw out a lawsuit over the accusation, ruling that Garland’s memo did little more than announce a “series of measures” that directed federal authorities to address increasing threats targeting school board members, teachers and other school employees.

-From CNN’s Hannah Rabinowitz

Haley, the former ambassador to the United Nations and governor of South Carolina, said the US is spending “less than three and a half percent of our defense budget” on Ukraine aid, and that in terms of financial aid relative to GDP, “11 of the European countries have given more than the US.”

Facts First: This is partly true. Haley’s claim regarding the US aid to Ukraine compared to the total defense budget is slightly under the actual percentage, but it is accurate that 11 European countries have given more aid to Ukraine as a percentage of their total GDP than the US.

As of August 14, the US has committed more than $43 billion in military aid to Ukraine since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, according to the Defense Department. In comparison, the Fiscal Year 2023 defense budget was $858 billion – making aid to Ukraine just over 5% of the total US defense budget.

As of May 2023, according to a Council of Foreign Relations tracker, 11 countries were providing a higher share in aid to Ukraine relative to their GDP than the US – led by Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland.

-From CNN’s Haley Britzky

Former Vice President Mike Pence said Wednesday that the Trump administration “spent funding to backfill on the military cuts of the Obama administration.”

Facts First: This is misleading. While military spending decreased under the Obama administration, it was largely due to the 2011 Budget Control Act, which received Republican support and resulted in automatic spending cuts to the defense budget.

Mike Pence, a senator at the time, voted in favor of the Budget Control Act.

-From CNN’s Haley Britzky

Christie said President Biden’s son Hunter Biden was “facing a 10-year mandatory minimum” for lying on a federal form when he purchased a gun in 2018.

Facts First: Christie, a former federal prosecutor, clearly misstated the law. This crime can lead to a maximum prison sentence of 10 years, but it doesn’t have a 10-year mandatory minimum.

These comments are related to the highly scrutinized Justice Department investigation into Hunter Biden, which is currently ongoing after a plea deal fell apart earlier this summer.

As part of the now-defunct deal, Hunter Biden agreed to plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors and enter into a “diversion agreement” with prosecutors, who would drop the gun possession charge in two years if he consistently stayed out of legal trouble and passed drug tests.

The law in question makes it a crime to purchase a firearm while using or addicted to illegal drugs. Hunter Biden has acknowledged struggling with crack cocaine addiction at the time, and admitted at a court hearing and in court papers that he violated this law by signing the form.

The US Sentencing Commission says, “The statutory maximum penalty for the offense is ten years of imprisonment.” There isn’t a mandatory 10-year punishment, as Christie claimed.

During his answer, Christie also criticized the Justice Department for agreeing to a deal in June where Hunter Biden could avoid prosecution on the felony gun offense. That deal was negotiated by special counsel David Weiss, who was first appointed to the Justice Department by former President Donald Trump.

-From CNN’s Marshall Cohen

Burgum and Scott got into a back and forth over IRS staffing with Burgum saying that the “Biden administration wanted to put 87,000 people in the IRS,” and Scott suggesting they “fire the 87,000 IRS agents.”

Facts First: This figure needs context.

The Inflation Reduction Act, which passed last year without any Republican votes, authorized $80 billion in new funding for the IRS to be delivered over the course of a decade.

The 87,000 figure comes from a 2021 Treasury report that estimated the IRS could hire 86,852 full-time employees with a nearly $80 billion investment over 10 years.

While the funding may well allow for the hiring of tens of thousands of IRS employees over time, far from all of these employees will be IRS agents conducting audits and investigations.

Many other employees will be hired for the non-agent roles, from customer service to information technology, that make up most of the IRS workforce. And a significant number of the hires are expected to fill the vacant posts left by retirements and other attrition, not take newly created positions.

The IRS has not said precisely how many new “agents” will be hired with the funding. But it is already clear that the total won’t approach 87,000. And it’s worth noting that the IRS may not receive all of the $80 billion after Republicans were able to claw back $20 billion of the new funding as part of a deal to address the debt ceiling made earlier this year.

-From CNN’s Katie Lobosco

Trump repeated a frequent claim during his interview with Carlson that streamed during the GOP debate that his retention of classified documents at Mar-a-Lago after leaving the White House was “covered” under the Presidential Records Act and that he is “allowed to do exactly that.”

Facts First: This is false. The Presidential Records Act says the exact opposite – that the moment presidents leave office, all presidential records are to be turned over to the federal government. Keeping documents at Mar-a-Lago after his presidency concluded was in clear contravention of that law.

According to the Presidential Records Act, “upon the conclusion of a President’s term of office, or if a President serves consecutive terms upon the conclusion of the last term, the Archivist of the United States shall assume responsibility for the custody, control, and preservation of, and access to, the Presidential records of that President.”

The sentence makes clear that a president has no authority to keep documents after leaving the White House.

The National Archives even released a statement refuting the notion that Trump’s retention of documents was covered by the Presidential Records Act, writing in a June news release that “the PRA requires that all records created by Presidents (and Vice-Presidents) be turned over to the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) at the end of their administrations.”

-From CNN’s Hannah Rabinowitz

While discussing electric vehicles, Trump claimed that California “is in a big brownout because their grid is a disaster,” adding that the state’s ambitious electric vehicle goals won’t work with the grid in such shape.

Facts First: Trump’s claim that California’s grid is currently in a “big brownout” and is a “disaster” isn’t true. California’s grid suffered rolling blackouts in 2020, but it has performed quite well in the face of extreme heat this summer, owing in large part to a massive influx of renewable energy including battery storage. These big batteries keep energy from wind and solar running when the wind isn’t blowing and sun isn’t shining. (Batteries are also being deployed at a rapid rate in Texas, a red state.)

Another reason California’s grid has stayed stable this year even during extreme temperature spikes is the fact that a deluge of snow and rain this winter and spring has refilled reservoirs that generate electricity using hydropower.

As Trump insinuated, there are real questions about how well the state’s grid will hold up as California’s drivers shift to electric vehicles by the millions by 2035 – the same year it will phase out selling new gas-powered cars. California state officials say they are preparing by adding new capacity to the grid and urging more people to charge their vehicles overnight and during times of the day when fewer people are using energy. But independent experts say the state needs to exponentially increase its clean energy while also building out huge amounts of new EV chargers to achieve its goals.

-From CNN’s Ella Nilsen

Trump and the border wall

Trump claimed to Carlson, “I had the strongest border in the history of our country, and I built almost 500 miles of wall. You know, they’d like to say, ‘Oh, was it less?’ No, I built 500 miles. In fact, if you check with the authorities on the border, we built almost 500 miles of wall.”

Facts First: This needs context. Trump and his critics are talking about different things when they use different figures for how much border wall was built during his presidency. Trump is referring to all of the wall built on the southern border during his administration, even in areas that already had some sort of barrier before. His critics are only counting the Trump-era wall that was built in parts of the border that did not have any previous barrier.

A total of 458 miles of southern border wall was built under Trump, according to a federal report written two days after Trump left office and obtained by CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez. That is 52 miles of “primary” wall built where no barriers previously existed, plus 33 miles of “secondary” wall that was built in spots where no barriers previously existed, plus another 373 miles of primary and secondary wall that was built to replace previous barriers the federal government says had become “dilapidated and/or outdated.”

Some of Trump’s rival candidates, such DeSantis and Christie, have used figures around 50 miles while criticizing Trump for failing to finish the wall – counting only the primary wall built where no barriers previously existed.

While some Trump critics have scoffed at the replacement wall, the Trump-era construction was generally much more formidable than the older barriers it replaced, which were often designed to deter vehicles rather than people on foot. Washington Post reporter Nick Miroff tweeted in 2020: “As someone who has spent a lot of time lately in the shadow of the border wall, I need to puncture this notion that ‘replacement’ sections are ‘not new.’ There is really no comparison between vehicle barriers made from old rail ties and 30-foot bollards.”

Ideally, both Trump and his opponents would be clearer about what they are talking about: Trump that he is including replacement barriers, his opponents that they are excluding those barriers.

-From CNN’s Daniel Dale
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August 23, 2023
Hilary moves through Southwest with historic amount of rainfall | CNN

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Hilary has triggered deadly flooding, heavy rains and powerful gusts across parts of the southwest and Mexico, transforming streets into raging rivers and forcing some residents to flee, and leaving others in need of rescue, even after the storm weakened to a post-tropical cyclone.

More rain is expected to fall throughout Monday and Tuesday as officials clean up the aftermath. After hitting Southern California on Sunday as a tropical storm – the state’s first since 1997 – Hilary headed into Nevada as its first-ever recorded tropical storm. As Hilary moves across the southwest, the storm has brought power outages, life-threatening flooding and calls for residents to evacuate or shelter in place.

Live updates: Hilary brings major flood risk to California

The storm broke rainfall records across Southern California: Palm Springs got nearly a year’s worth of rain with 4.3 inches in 24 hours, one of its rainiest days ever. Death Valley nearly set a record with 1.68 inches, and the Furnace Creek area, which usually gets about two-tenths of an inch in August, got 0.63 inches.

And the storm is the rainiest tropical storm system in Nevada’s history, nearly doubling the state’s 116-year-old all-time record, according to preliminary data from NOAA’s Weather Prediction Center. Hilary has released 8.7 inches of rain on Lee Canyon, Nevada, smashing the previous record of 4.36 inches in 1906.

Watch: Massive mudslide sends firefighters scrambling to safety

More rain is expected to cause dangerous flash, urban and arroyo flooding in some places, including landslides, mudslides and debris flows. Localized flooding is expected into Tuesday morning across northern portions of the Intermountain West.

In Palm Springs, a section of Interstate 10 is shut down while road crews clear away mud left behind by floodwaters from Tropical Storm Hilary, but other routes in and out of the desert oasis near Joshua Tree National Park are open.

In addition, many freeway off-ramps are limited because of mud, and CalTrans crews are working to clear those in an effort to ease accessibility.

Emergency telephone service, which had been down since midmorning, has been restored, the police department said, but an outage continues to affect other areas of the Coachella Valley.

“We are not used to this level of precipitation, generally – certainly not in the middle of summer,” San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria told CNN on Sunday.

“With what we’re expecting, it may overwhelm us.”

Here’s the latest:

• Heavy rains and some flooding may continue Tuesday morning in parts of the Intermountain West, according to the National Hurricane Center. The rain will cause “mostly localized areas of flash flooding,” the National Weather Service Prediction Center said. Flood watches remain in place across eight Western states.

• Strong and gusty winds will blow in Nevada, western Utah, southern Idaho and southwest Montana, the hurricane center said. Coastal tropical storm warnings have been discontinued.

• Some portions of Southern California lost power during the storm but electricity was mostly restored by Monday evening. A total of about 41,000 customers in Los Angeles were without power at one point, Marty Adams, general manager and chief engineer at the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, said Monday.

• People in parts of Southern California should not travel unless they are fleeing an area under flooding or under an evacuation order, the National Weather Service has warned.

• Flooding, mudslides and downed trees and wires were widely reported across Southern California on Sunday and Monday. At least nine people were rescued Sunday in a San Diego riverbed, San Diego Fire-Rescue said, with water rescues also reported in Ventura County and Palm Springs.

• In Mexico, where the storm first landed, power has been restored to 80% of customers in the three states affected by Hilary, according to the national power company. “379,850 users have been affected, and electricity supply has been restored to 302,134, equivalent to 80%,” said the Federal Electricity Commission in a statement Monday.

To the west, Los Angeles and Ventura counties saw “considerable damage” Sunday night amid reports of dangerous flash flooding, and rock and mudslides, the National Weather Service said, adding up to half an inch of rain could fall per hour.

Cars were stuck in floodwaters in the Spanish Hills area, the National Weather Service reported.

Crowley urged residents to take precautions on the roads.

“A relatively small amount of water can sweep a vehicle away,” she said.

In Los Angeles, the worst of the storm was over as of Monday morning, according to officials. All weather warnings in the city were canceled. “We are past the brunt of the impact,” said National Weather Service meteorologist Ariel Cohen.

Schools in San Diego and Los Angeles are set to reopen Tuesday after closing Monday in anticipation of the storm. Officials canceled classes for the more than 121,000 students in the San Diego Unified School District.

The Los Angeles Unified School District, the second-largest in the nation, also shut down Monday. The district spans about 700 square miles, meaning the impact of the storm varied for its students.

Schools in the Los Angeles district will reopen on Tuesday, according to superintendent Alberto Carvalho.

“Our teams have been scouring our schools, and so far, conditions are pretty good,” Carvalho said. A couple dozen schools have lost phone and internet service, and one school has been impacted by a minor mudslide.

“It would have been reckless for us to make a different decision,” Carvalho said of the decision to close schools Monday.

“Los Angeles was tested but we came through it and we came through it with minimal impacts, considering what we endured,” said Los Angeles City Council President Paul Krekorian.

The Nye County School District in Nevada also canceled classes Monday, with plans to reopen Tuesday.

Cars stranded in roads deluged with mud and water

Once a hurricane, Hilary weakened as it made landfall Sunday in Mexico – where at least one person died – then crossed into the Golden State. The storm’s center was roughly 10 miles southeast of downtown Los Angeles around 8 p.m. local time Sunday, moving north with weakened 45-mph winds, according to the hurricane center.

The Los Angeles Fire Department fielded more than 4,000 emergency calls on Sunday and responded to about 1,800 incidents, Chief Kristin Crowley said in a news conference on Monday. The calls included a request for help for five cars stranded in a flooded intersection of Sun Valley. One person was safely rescued and no one was injured in the Sun Valley incident, Crowley said.

Flood water affected an underground power vault, leading to an outage for about 6,000 customers in the Beverly Grove area, with other outages reported in Hollywood, Hyde Park and Brentwood. The vast majority of city power customers remain unaffected by the storm, according to Los Angeles officials.

As the storm barreled through, covering roadways with debris and water, roads were blocked across Southern California by Sunday night. A section of Interstate 8 in Imperial County, east of San Diego, was closed Sunday after boulders came loose from an adjoining slope and fell into the road.

In San Bernardino County, a stretch of State Route 127 covered in floodwaters was closed, while a section of Interstate 15 was shuttered in Barstow because of downed power lines after a lightning strike, authorities said.

Crews across the region Sunday evening rescued people caught in the storm, including at least nine in a riverbed area in San Diego. “Crews are still looking for more people who may need help. #riverrescue,” San Diego Fire-Rescue said.

And Ventura County firefighters searched the Santa Clara River for people trapped in the waters on Sunday night, videos show.

The storm led to other disruptions across Southern California, with many parks, beaches and other locations closed as officials called on residents to stay indoors.

And Hilary continued to cause damage as it moved into Nevada. In Mt. Charleston, Nevada, the storm brought significant flooding on Monday morning, washing out the roadways. Residents are sheltering in place, the power is shut off, and the Nevada National Guard is on its way to assist, according to a Facebook post from Clark County.

West of Las Vegas, rushing water is flowing like a river down Echo Road, leaving vehicles stranded from Mary Jane Trailheads and Trail Canyon, according to the U.S. Forest Service. Emergency crews are evaluating and ask for people to stay out of the area, the service said.

California had been preparing for difficult conditions, positioning first responders across Southern California to brace for water rescues in flood-prone areas like wildfire burn scars and deserts amid fears areas unaccustomed to rain could suddenly receive a year’s worth or more, triggering flash floods and landslides.

Rainfall totals have been significant:

Daily and monthly rainfall records were broken Sunday, with 1.53 inches falling in downtown Los Angeles, 1.56 inches in Long Beach and 2.95 inches in Palmdale, according to the weather service.

At least three swift water rescues were conducted in Palm Springs, police department Lt. Gustavo Araiza told CNN.

In Cathedral City, a desert community roughly a 110-mile drive east of Los Angeles, at least 14 people were rescued from a senior boarding care facility Monday afternoon after “a blockade” of mud trapped them inside, city spokesperson Ryan Hunt said.

All of the people rescued are doing well, Hunt said.

The fire department had to borrow a dozer truck from a recycling center so they could carry out the rescue, Hunt said. The department had firefighters sit in the dozer and then had those being rescued sit on top to be brought out of the structure, he added.

Despite the “unorthodox method,” everyone stayed calm, he said.

Santa Clarita, about 30 miles north of Los Angeles, experienced steady rain for about 10 hours, with the storm dropping well over four inches of rain on the valley. Parts of Sand Canyon Road could be seen falling into rushing water.

ATTN DRIVERS: State Route 127 is now closed between Baker Blvd. in Baker (San Bernardino County) and Tecopa Hot Springs Road (Inyo County) due to flooding. @Caltrans9 maintenance crews are on scene. pic.twitter.com/fvcI9Vhss3

— Caltrans District 9 (@Caltrans9) August 21, 2023

As the storm continues to affect the West, officials with Oregon’s emergency management are bracing for possible flooding across portions of the state.

“At this point, we’re concerned about the substantial rainfall and the potential for fast-moving water and flooding. Flood watches have been issued for areas of Central and Eastern Oregon,” Oregon Department of Emergency Management spokesperson Chris Crabb told CNN Monday afternoon.

“We have reports of minor flooding currently and communities using sandbags to mitigate the impacts, but there have been no requests for state support at this point,” Crabb went on.

According to Crabb, the office is working with county and tribal partners.

Portions of Oregon are under a flood watch through Tuesday afternoon, according to the National Weather Service.

“The remnants of Hurricane Hilary will bring periods of moderate to heavy rain to portions of northeastern Oregon through Tuesday,” the weather service said in a forecast message.

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August 21, 2023
Ryan Gosling has ‘Barbie’ director Greta Gerwig cracking up in new ‘I’m Just Ken’ behind-the-scenes footage | CNN

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Even “Barbie” director Greta Gerwig can’t get “Kenough” of Ryan Gosling.

The actor, who stars as Ken in the movie, had Gerwig in the throes of laughter on set while filming the “I’m Just Ken” musical sequence, as seen in new behind-the-scenes footage that was released on Monday.

The video showcases the pair cracking up while watching a playback of Gosling singing about living a life of “blond fragility,” and later bending over in laughter after the cast of Kens dance around the set during the infamous “Beach off.”

In another clip, Gerwig hilariously throws her hands to her mouth after watching Gosling furiously rip off his coat, and even Simu Liu, who also plays Ken, is seen losing it alongside Gosling during the 1950’s dance sequence.

And as if Gosling’s commitment to nailing this role wasn’t clear enough, the triple-threat’s talent is reinforced when he’s seen fully nailing his dance moves in bonus footage of him performing parts of the musical number during various rehearsals.

Guns N’ Roses guitarist Slash is also seen recording his guitar part for the song, and producers Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt are showcased working their magic in the studio as the cast of Kens sing with passion while recording their backup vocals.

“Barbie” premiered in theaters last month and has seen massive box office success. The movie has grossed over $1 billion globally, making Gerwig the first solo female director with a billion-dollar movie.

The “I’m Just Ken” sequence in the film illustrates Ken’s frustration with the dynamic between himself and Margot Robbie’s Barbie. The pair are best friends, but Ken’s feelings for Barbie go beyond that.

“I’m just Ken. Where I see love she sees a friend,” he sings. “What will it take for her to see the man behind the tan, and fight for me?”

It’s clear though that Gosling is so much more than just Ken, and he’s Kenough.

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August 21, 2023
Ecuador votes in historic referendum on oil extraction in the Amazon | CNN

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The people of Ecuador are heading to the polls – but they’re voting for more than just a new president. For the first time in history, the people will decide the fate of oil extraction in the Ecuadorian Amazon.

The referendum will give voters the chance to decide whether oil companies can continue to drill in one of the most biodiverse places on the planet, the Yasuní National Park, home to the last uncontacted indigenous communities in Ecuador.

The park encompasses around one million hectares at the meeting point of the Amazon, the Andes and the Equator. Just one hectare of Yasuní land supposedly contains more animal species than the whole of Europe and more tree species than exist in all of North America.

But underneath the land lies Ecuador’s largest reserve of crude oil.

“We are leading the world in tackling climate change by bypassing politicians and democratizing environmental decisions,” said Pedro Bermo, the spokesman for Yasunidos, an environmental collective who pushed for the referendum.

It’s been a decade-long battle that began when former President Rafael Correa boldly proposed that the international community give Ecuador $3.6 billion to leave Yasuní undisturbed. But the world wasn’t as generous as Correa expected. In 2016, the Ecuadorian state oil company began drilling in Block 43 – around 0.01% of the National Park – which today produces more than 55,000 barrels a day, amounting to around 12% of Ecuador’s oil production.

A continuous crusade of relentless campaigning and a successful petition eventually made its mark – in May, the country’s constitutional court authorized the vote to be included on the ballot of the upcoming election.

It’s a decision that will likely be instrumental to the future of Ecuador’s economy. Supporters who want to continue drilling believe the loss of employment opportunities would be disastrous.

“The backers of the request for crude to remain underground made it ten years ago when there wasn’t anything. 10 years later we find ourselves with 55,000 barrels per day, that’s 20 million barrels per year,” Energy Minister Fernando Santos told local radio.

“At $60 a barrel that’s $1.2 billion,” he added. “It could cause huge damage to the country,” he said, referring to economic damage and denying there has been environmental harm.

Alberto Acosta-Burneo, an economist and editor of the Weekly Analysis bulletin, said Ecuador would be “shooting itself in the foot” if it shut down drilling. In a video posted on X, formerly known as Twitter, he said that without cutting consumption all it would mean is another country selling Ecuador fuel.

But ‘yes’ campaigners have ideas to fill the gap, from the promotion of eco-tourism and the electrification of public transport to eliminating tax exemptions. They claim that cutting the subsidies to the richest 10% of the country would generate four times more than what is obtained extracting oil from Yasuní.

“This election has two faces,” explained Bermo.

“On one hand we have the violence, the candidates, parties, and the same political mafias that governed Ecuador without significant changes.

“On the other hand, the referendum is the contrary – a citizen campaign full of hope, joy, art, activism and a lot of collective work to save this place. We are very optimistic.”

Among those campaigning to stop the drilling is Helena Gualinga, an indigenous rights advocate who hails from a remote village in the Ecuadorian Amazon – home of the Kichwa Sarayaku community.

“This referendum presents a huge opportunity for us to create change in a tangible way,” she told CNN.

For Gualinga, the most crucial part of the referendum is that if Yasunidos wins, the state oil company will have a one-year deadline to wrap up its operations in Block 43.

She explained that some oil companies have left areas in the Amazon without properly shutting down operations and restoring the area.

“This sentence would mean they have to do that.”

Those who wish to continue drilling in the area argue that meeting the one-year deadline to dismantle operations would be impossible.

The referendum comes as the world faces blistering temperatures, with scientists declaring July as the hottest month on record, and the Amazon approaching what studies are suggesting is a critical tipping point that could have severe implications in the fight to tackle climate change.

And according to Antonia Juhasz, a Senior Researcher on Fossil Fuels, it’s time for Ecuador to transition to a post-oil era. Ecuador’s GDP from oil has dropped significantly from around 18% in 2008, to just over 6% in 2021.

She believes the benefits of protecting the Amazon outweigh the benefits of maintaining dependence on oil, particularly considering the cost of regular oil spills and the consequences of worsening the climate crisis.

“The Amazon is worth more intact than in pieces, as are its people,” she said.

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August 20, 2023
Thousands scramble to evacuate capital of Canada’s Northwest Territories as more than 200 ‘unprecedented’ wildfires blanket region | CNN

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Thousands of residents are rushing to evacuate the capital of Canada’s Northwest Territories as more than 200 fires burn, leaving many to face dangerous road conditions or stand in line for hours for desperately needed emergency flights. Evacuations were also under way in British Columbia.

The Northwest Territories capital Yellowknife – home to about 20,000 – and several other Northwest Territories communities have been ordered to evacuate as crews battle 236 active wildfires, and a massive fire creeps toward the city and a major highway.

The infernos in the Northwest Territories are among more than 1,000 fires burning across Canada as the country endures its worst fire season on record. Smoke from the fires has drifted into the US, bringing harmful pollution and worsening air quality.

A little rain was possible but strong northwest and west-northwest winds could push the fire to the outskirts of Yellowknife by the weekend, according to a Facebook post from a government fire-monitoring account.

At a Friday news briefing, Canadian leaders pledged no one would be left behind during the unprecedented evacuation from Yellowknife and getting residents out safely would continue through the weekend.

“We’ll continue to focus on helping the most vulnerable and will be there for as long as it takes,” Defense Minister Bill Blair said.

While most were encouraged to leave via the only road out of the community, as many as 5,000 residents had requested flights out of the city.

Smoke continues to shroud Yellowknife, as it has for weeks, but an unpredictable wind and a raging fire, now about 10 miles from Yellowknife, forced officials to order a complete evacuation.

However, federal officials said they were confident they could continue to protect the majority of the community from fire damage and are working on building fire breaks by clearing trees and applying fire retardant.

In West Kelowna, officials confirmed several structures were lost in the fire, including many homes. However, officials said there were no reports of loss of life despite descriptions of harrowing rescues.

The Canadian Armed Forces are assisting with firefighting and airlifting efforts in the Northwest Territories. The Royal Canadian Air Force has deployed several planes and helicopters to support regional emergency crews.

The first CAF aircraft, a CC-130 J Hercules, conducted an evacuation flight Thursday and transported 79 passengers to Edmonton, the CAF said. Additional flights are scheduled for Friday.

Incoming and outgoing commercial flights at airports in the Northwest Territories have been canceled because of the wildfires. Commercial flights in and out of Yellowknife Airport will stop after the last flight departs on Friday evening, according to an update on the government website.

Evacuation flights will still be able to operate out of the airport as well as medical evacuations, firefighting and military-related flights, the government site said.

More than 1,000 people were flown out of Yellowknife on emergency flights Thursday, and close to an additional 2,000 seats were available Friday, territory officials said in an online update. Many hoping to fly out Thursday stood for hours in a winding, slow-moving line only to be told they would need to try again on Friday, CNN partner CBC reports.

“We understand that this is deeply frustrating for those who have been in line for several hours and who will need to line up again tomorrow,” the territory update said. It added people who are immunocompromised, have mobility issues or have other high-risk conditions were moved up in the line.

Officials are encouraging people to leave by car, if possible, and carpool to reduce traffic and assist those without vehicles.

“Evacuation flights should be used as a last resort for those who do not have the option to evacuate by road,” territory officials said.

But some driving out of the area have faced thick smoke and roadways flanked with flames. Yellowknife resident Ruoy Pineda told CNN he and his family struggled to navigate through the heavy haze after the evacuation order was announced Wednesday.

“We were not actually fully prepared,” Pineda said. “On the road, we were all scared of what we saw ahead of us, but we keep reminding ourselves it is better to be out than stranded.”

Pineda described the dangerous road conditions as he and others tried to flee the capital.

“On the road you could see the fire and we were struggling because of the smoke,” he said. “The visibility on the road was very bad. We couldn’t even see if someone was ahead of us.”

He and his family were still on the road Thursday morning and were headed to seek shelter in Edmonton, about 900 miles to the south.

“We are very exhausted right now. We’ve barely slept and are very worried about our house in Yellowknife and if we’ll still have a home,” Pineda said.

Fires in Canada have burned more than six times more land this year when compared to the 10-year annual average, according to data from the Canadian Wildland Fire Information System.

There have been more fires in Canada this year than compared to the 10-year average, with a 128% difference. Yet the fires appear to be spreading much wider than before, and so far this year, more than 13 million hectares have been burned – an area larger than Pennsylvania.

The data, current as of August 9, show the 10-year average of area burned to date sits at just over 2 million hectares.

British Columbia evacuates thousands

Approximately 4,500 people are under evacuation orders in British Columbia due to threats from wildfires, Canadian officials said in a press conference Friday.

“People who choose to ignore evacuation orders put themselves and emergency personnel at risk,” said Bowinn Ma, the province’s Minister of Emergency Management and Climate Readiness.

Another 23,500 people in British Columbia are under evacuation alerts, which means they must be prepared to evacuate immediately if an order is issued, Ma said.

Some fires have reached over 400 feet tall and are moving “faster than we can effectively put firefighting resources on them,” said Cliff Chapman, director of provincial operations for BC Wildfire Service.

“There is very little that response tactics can do with these winds and that type of fire behavior,” Chapman said.

The McDougall Creek fire near West Kelowna has experienced “significant growth” in the past 12 hours and currently spans more than 6,000 hectares, he said.

Kelowna International Airport closed to commercial flights to allow space for fire fighting activity to take place, according to a news release from the airport.

British Columbia has more than 360 active fires – more than any other Canadian province, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre. The forecast winds and lightning may cause fires to move and grow quickly, officials have warned. Chapman said that lightning has been the primary cause of new fires.

Nearly 60 evacuation orders were in effect across the province Thursday, the British Columbia Wildfire Service said.

Among the displaced are residents of at least 4,800 properties who were ordered to evacuate in the province’s West Kelowna area on Wednesday and Thursday as the McDougall Creek fire advanced, local emergency officials announced.

A state of emergency has been declared in Kelowna, as crews are combating spot fires coming from across the Central Okanagan Lake, stemming from the McDougall Creek fire, according to a news release Friday.

Video taken by resident Todd Ramsay shows a lake rimmed by large hills engulfed in a wall of fire.

“Absolutely devastating,” Ramsay said of the devastation in a Facebook post. “The fire jumped the lake and was right behind our house.”

Ramsay said he was eventually able to evacuate to safety.

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August 18, 2023
Tesla cuts Model S and X prices by over 6% in China | CNN Business

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Beijing
Reuters
—

Tesla has cut prices for its existing inventories of its premium Model S and Model X cars in China by as much as 6.9%, it said on Wednesday.

A post from the carmaker on social media platform Weibo showed the price of the Model S cut by 6.7% to 754,900 yuan ($103,477.58) from 808,900 yuan earlier.

The Model X now starts from 836,900 yuan, down 6.9% from 898,900 yuan earlier.

Tesla

(TSLA) on Monday said it cut prices in China for its Model Y’s long-range and performance versions starting on August 14, which triggered concerns around its profit margins.

The moves come after sales of Tesla’s China-made vehicles fell 31% in July from June, their first month-on-month decline since December, as the automaker idled some production to prepare for a revamped Model 3 launch.

By contrast, China’s BYD

(BYDDF)increased sales from June.

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August 16, 2023
Australian surfers rescued in waters off remote Indonesian island after 38 hours missing at sea | CNN

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CNN
—

Four Australian surfers who went missing after their boat was struck by a storm in a remote part of Indonesia have been rescued after more than 38 hours at sea, according to parents of the missing tourists.

Australians Steph Weisse, Will Teagle, Jordan Short and two unnamed Indonesian nationals were found “bobbing on surfboards” by a surf charter boat involved in the frantic rescue to locate the group.

Dramatic video of that moment showed both the stranded castaways on their surfboards cheering and hollering alongside their rescuers as they realized they had successfully found each other in a vast expanse of ocean.

A further search picked up Australian Elliot Foote, however one Indonesian crew member remains missing.

Foote’s father, Peter Foote, said his son was separated from the rest of the group because he’d gone looking for assistance.

“He left his mates bobbing in the water to go to search for help. The charter boat found them and then went and found Elliot,” Peter said.

“I’m really happy it’s all turned out well and I hope he continues with his holiday,” Peter told CNN.

“He’s in a great place to celebrate, with his girlfriend [Weisse] and 10 mates in paradise. He’s still got eight nights to enjoy then I’m looking forward to him coming straight home.”

The group’s boat was last seen Sunday evening local time after they encountered bad weather and heavy rain on a journey to the remote Pinang island from Nias, a popular surfing destination some 150 kilometers from Indonesia’s Sumatra Island.

A second boat with the rest of the party successfully reached Pinang Island Sunday evening, the families said, helping to raise the alarm.

While Indonesian authorities conducted search and rescue efforts with support from the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the families of the four Australians said the surf charter boats made all the difference by using their local knowledge of the currents to locate where the group may have drifted.

According to their families, the four Australians were on a surf trip in Indonesia to celebrate Foote’s 30th birthday.

Friends in Australia have hailed what they described as a near miraculous rescue.

“Now that all four have been found we can just be so so grateful,” Ellie Sedgwick, who described herself as Weisse’s best friend since they were 17, told CNN.

“Her mum and I were speaking the whole way through, just saying if anyone can survive this, it’s Steph,” she added.

“It’s funny because Steph actually had that conversation with us before she left. The last thing she said to us was, it’s amazing that you know we only get one life…we kept replaying that conversation over and over in our heads.”

In a statement issued Tuesday afternoon, DFAT said “the Australian Government expresses its deep gratitude” to those involved in the search and rescue efforts.

Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong said in a tweet that the government will “continue to provide support to the four Australians and their families.”

“The search continues for a crew member who is still missing,” she wrote. “Our thoughts are with them and their loved ones.”

The names of the Indonesian crew who were on board the boat have not been shared yet by authorities.

Indonesia has long been a popular destination for Australian tourists thanks to its proximity and a wealth of budget flights to places like Bali.

The western island of Sumatra is one of Indonesia’s less commonly traveled destinations but the coral-fringed islands around Nias are popular with intrepid surfers and boast multiple world class breaks, particularly around Lagundri Bay.

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August 15, 2023
Biden urges UAW and Big Three automakers to reach deal to avoid strike | CNN Business

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Washington DC
CNN
—

President Joe Biden sought to ramp up pressure on the United Auto Workers union and the nation’s three unionized automakers – Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis, known as the “Big Three” – one month ahead of a critical deadline for labor talks.

“As the Big Three auto companies and the United Auto Workers come together — one month before the expiration of their contract — to negotiate a new agreement, I want to be clear about where I stand. I’m asking all sides to work together to forge a fair agreement,” Biden said in a new statement Monday.

The White House has been closely monitoring the talks as the two sides appear far apart. The union is demanding significant pay raises of 40% or more for members to match increases in CEO pay at the companies over the last four years and a reversal of past concessions by the union.

Negotiations could put the White House at odds with the union. While the AFL-CIO, which is made up of multiple independent unions, has already endorsed Biden’s reelection bid, calling him the “most pro-union president in our lifetimes,” the UAW itself has yet to join in that endorsement. A strike could have massive economic – and political – consequences. Biden and UAW President Shawn Fain met briefly in the West Wing last month while UAW leadership was at the White House briefing senior staff on their positions.

The three contracts between the UAW and General Motors, Ford and Stellantis, which sells cars and trucks under the Dodge, Ram and Chrysler brands, are due to expire September 14. Fain last week denounced the most recent offer from Stellantis, throwing a copy of the offer in the trash during a video for members. Plans for strike authorization votes at all three companies is expected to be announced soon, the union said Monday.

Traditionally the UAW will select one of the three companies to go first and have the other two put on hold while it concentrates on reaching a deal, then the union will push for similar from the other two automakers as part of a “pattern.”

The UAW is pushing for an aggressive set of demands at the negotiating table, and has been critical of the Biden administration’s financial support for the transition to electric vehicles, arguing that the Biden administration has been overly supportive of automakers’ plans for EV battery plants that are expected to pay far less than union wages. Fain has publicly warned that UAW is prepared to strike, saying nearly 150,000 members will strike if the three automakers do not meet their demands.

CNN has previously reported that while Biden enjoys hefty support from leadership of many unions, he has also faced lingering mistrust and concern among some of the rank-and-file of the UAW, according to people familiar with the dynamics, a perception fueled in part by the president’s intervention to avert a freight rail strike in December.

In a nod to the UAW’s demands, Biden used the union’s “fair transition” to clean energy language.

“I support a fair transition to a clean energy future. That means ensuring that Big Three auto jobs are good jobs that can support a family; that auto companies should honor the right to organize; take every possible step to avoid painful plant closings; and ensure that when transitions are needed, the transitions are fair and look to retool, reboot, and rehire in the same factories and communities at comparable wages, while giving existing workers the first shot to fill those jobs,” Biden said in the statement.

The UAW said it saw the White House statement as an endorsement of it bargaining position.

“We appreciate President Biden’s support for strong contracts that ensure good paying union jobs now and pave the way for a just transition to an EV future,” Fain said in a statement. “We agree with the president that the Big Three’s joint venture battery plants should have the same strong pay and safety standards that generations of UAW members have fought for.”

The three automakers said they, too, want to reach deals that would avoid a strike.

Ford pointed out that it employs more UAW members and builds more cars and trucks at US plants than any other automaker.

“We look forward to working with the UAW on creative solutions during this time when our dramatically changing industry needs a skilled and competitive workforce more than ever,” it said.

“Stellantis remains committed to working constructively and collaboratively with the UAW to negotiate a new agreement that balances the concerns of our 43,000 employees with our vision for the future,” said that company.

“We will continue to bargain in good faith with the UAW to maintain our momentum and to provide opportunities for all in our EV future,” GM said in a statement.

The union is concerned about the plans by all three automakers to convert from traditional gasoline powered vehicles to EVs in the coming decades. it takes an estimated one third less hours of work to assemble an EV than a car with an internal combustion engine, since that engine and the transmission that goes with it has so many moving parts missing from an EV.

The Biden administration has been active in supporting the switch to EVs, providing tax credits for EV buyers and loans to build plants necessary for EVs, such as those that make batteries.

There are about a dozen EV battery plants now under construction nationwide. For the most part, those plants are joint ventures between automakers and battery makers, and thus will not be covered under the UAW contracts with the Big Three. Workers at the one battery plant for one of the Big Three to open so far, a Warren, Ohio, plant for the joint venture between GM and LG, voted 98% in favor of joining the UAW. But the union has yet to reach a deal with plant management on a contract, and workers there are paid about half of what UAW members are paid at the Big Three.

– CNN’s Vanessa Yurkevich contributed to this story

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August 14, 2023
Dozens of news organizations condemn police raid on Kansas newspaper and call for seized materials to be returned | CNN Business

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CNN
—

Dozens of news organizations on Sunday condemned a police raid on a Kansas newspaper and its publisher’s home, sending a letter to the local police department’s chief urging him to immediately return all seized materials.

The four-page letter, sent by the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press to Marion Police Chief Gideon Cody, was signed by 34 news and press freedom organizations, including CNN, The Associated Press, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and others.

“Newsroom searches and seizures are among the most intrusive actions law enforcement can take with respect to the free press, and the most potentially suppressive of free speech by the press and the public,” the letter said.

The Marion County Record’s co-owner and publisher, Eric Meyer, believes Friday’s raid was prompted by a story published Wednesday about a local business owner. Authorities countered they are investigating what they called “identity theft” and “unlawful acts concerning computers,” according to a search warrant.

“Based on public reporting, the search warrant that has been published online, and your public statements to the press, there appears to be no justification for the breadth and intrusiveness of the search —particularly when other investigative steps may have been available — and we are concerned that it may have violated federal law strictly limiting federal, state, and local law enforcement’s ability to conduct newsroom searches,” the letter said.

Computers, cell phones, and other materials were seized during the raid at the Marion County Record, Meyer confirmed to CNN. The search warrant identified a list of items law enforcement officials were allowed to seize, including “documents and records pertaining to Kari Newell,” the business owner who was the subject of the story, Meyer said.

Newell told CNN the Marion County Record unlawfully used her credentials to get information that was available only to law enforcement, private investigators and insurance agencies.

Chief Cody was not able to provide details on Friday’s raid, saying it remains an ongoing criminal investigation – but offered a justification.

“I believe when the rest of the story is available to the public, the judicial system that is being questioned will be vindicated,” Cody told CNN in a statement. “I appreciate all the assistance from all the state and local investigators along with the entire judicial process thus far.”

But the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said the police department should give back the items to the paper and its reporters.

“We urge you to immediately return the seized material to the Record, to purge any records that may already have been accessed, and to initiate a full independent and transparent review of your department’s actions.”

– CNN’s Sarah Moon contributed to this report

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August 13, 2023
16 people were injured when a boat exploded at Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks | CNN

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CNN
—

Sixteen people were injured in a boat explosion at a marina in the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri, authorities said.

The explosion, which took place at the Millstone Marina, was set off by a spark and gas fumes that “built up in the engine area,” the Missouri State Highway Patrol said in an online post on Friday.

Photos posted online by authorities showed shattered glass on the boat and other damage that appears to have been caused by the explosion.

Most of those injured were on the boat, authorities said.

In an incident information report, the highway patrol said the vessel was fueling at the marina’s gas docks, and when its operator started the boat, it caused “an explosion in the engine compartment.”

At least three passengers were ejected from the boat, the report said.

The injuries range from minor to moderate, the highway patrol said in its post.

Eleven people, including a 6-year-old girl, were treated on the scene and released, according to the report, while five others were taken to a hospital.

An investigation into the incident is ongoing.

Lake of the Ozarks, a popular summer vacation spot in the Midwest, boasts more than 1,100 miles of shoreline.

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August 13, 2023
AI fears overblown? Theoretical physicist calls chatbots ‘glorified tape recorders’ | CNN Business

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New York
CNN
—

The public’s anxiety over new AI technology is misguided, according to theoretical physicist Michio Kaku.

In an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria on Sunday, the futurologist said chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT will benefit society and increase productivity. But fear has driven people to largely focus on the negative implications of the programs, which he terms “glorified tape recorders.”

“It takes snippets of what’s on the web created by a human, splices them together and passes it off as if it created these things,” he said. “And people are saying, ‘Oh my God, it’s a human, it’s humanlike.’”

However, he said, chatbots cannot discern true from false: “That has to be put in by a human.”

According to Kaku, humanity is in its second stage of computer evolution. The first was the analog stage, “when we computed with sticks, stones, levers, gears, pulleys, string.”

After that, around World War II, he said, we switched to electricity-powered transistors. It made the development of the microchip possible and helped shape today’s digital landscape.

But this digital landscape rests on the idea of two states like “on” and “off,” and uses binary notation composed of zeros and ones.

“Mother Nature would laugh at us because Mother Nature does not use zeros and ones,” Kaku said. “Mother Nature computes on electrons, electron waves, waves that create molecules. And that’s why we’re now entering stage three.”

He believes the next technological stage will be in the quantum realm.

Quantum computing is an emerging technology utilizing the various states of particles like electrons to vastly increase a computer’s processing power. Instead of using computer chips with two states, quantum computers use various states of vibrating waves. It makes them capable of analyzing and solving problems much faster than normal computers.

Several tech giants – IBM

(IBM), Microsoft

(MSFT), Google

(GOOG) and Amazon

(AMZN), among others – are developing their own quantum computers, and have granted access to a number of companies to use their technology through the cloud. The computers could help businesses with risk analysis, supply chain logistics, and machine learning.

But beyond business applications, Kaku said quantum computing could also help advance health care. “Cancer, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s disease – these are diseases at the molecular level. We’re powerless to cure these diseases because we have to learn the language of nature, which is the language of molecules and quantum electrons.”

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August 13, 2023
Russia says it shot down Ukrainian missiles over key Crimea bridge | CNN

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CNN
—

Russian officials say multiple missiles were shot down over the crucial bridge connecting the annexed Crimea to the mainland on Saturday, the latest in a series of apparent Ukrainian attacks in the region.

The bridge is one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s pet projects and has frequently been targeted as a hated symbol of occupation.

Two Ukrainian missiles were shot down on Saturday afternoon, the Russia-appointed Head of Crimea Sergey Aksyonov wrote in a post on Telegram, adding that the bridge was undamaged.

Photos and videos circulating on social media platforms showed white smoke billowing from the bridge. CNN has not independently verified the images.

An update from Aksyonov said later Saturday that another Ukrainian missile had been shot down in the area.

“Another enemy missile was shot down over the Kerch Strait. Thank you to our air defense troops for their high professionalism and vigilance!” Aksyonov wrote on Telegram.

Oleg Kryuchkov, an adviser to the Russian-appointed Head of Crimea, said special services put up a “smoke screen,” which are used to conceal any damage caused.

Russia’s defense ministry also said earlier Saturday that its forces had destroyed 20 Ukrainian drones launched at the peninsula overnight.

Following the attempted strikes, Russia’s foreign ministry condemned Ukraine for what it described as a “terrorist attack.”

“The Crimean bridge is an object of purely civilian infrastructure, attacks on which are unacceptable. It has been subjected to such attacks since the autumn of last year, which also led to the death of civilians,” Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said.

“Such barbaric actions cannot be justified and will not go unanswered,” Zakharova continued.

Meanwhile, traffic has resumed on the Crimean bridge, according to the Crimean bridge operative information Telegram account, after it was temporarily blocked.

The Crimean bridge is a vital artery for supplying Russia’s war on Ukraine, allowing people and goods to flow into the Ukrainian territories that Moscow has occupied in the south and east of the country.

Also known as the Kerch Bridge, it holds personal value for Russian President Vladimir Putin. In the Kremlin narrative it marks the “reunification” of Crimea with the Russian mainland.

In October, the bridge was partially destroyed when a fuel tanker exploded and damaged a large section of the road. The Kremlin was quick to blame Kyiv for that explosion, and Putin alleged that it was an act of “sabotage” by Ukrainian security services.

The bridge was also hit by two strikes in July in an attack a Ukrainian security official told CNN Kyiv was responsible for.

Last week the head of the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) Vasyl Maliuk said that any explosions that happen to Russian ships or the Crimean bridge are “an absolutely logical and effective step.”

Maliuk said that if the Russians wanted such explosions to stop “they have the only option to do so – to leave the territorial waters of Ukraine and our land.”

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August 12, 2023
Inflation may be cooling — but drivers can’t seem to catch a break | CNN Business

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New York
CNN
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If you’re sitting in rush-hour traffic in Arlington, Virginia, there’s a good chance you’ll spot Hunter Scott in his helmet and elbow pads scooting right past you on an adjacent path.

For the past year, Scott, a 38-year-old Navy pilot doing work for the government until his next deployment, has been commuting 12 miles from his home in Washington, DC, via motorized scooter. When it’s raining or snowing, he throws on his Navy-issued high-tech weather gear, if necessary.

Even though the second-hand scooter he bought from Craigslist for $500 can only go up to 20 miles an hour, he said it’s saving him a lot of time compared to when he drove to work. Now he doesn’t have to walk a mile from the nearest parking lot to his office or wait for the Metro, which can often be unreliable, Scott said. And it means he can spend more time with his one-year-old daughter.

It is also saving him a lot of money at a time when just about every car-related cost is more expensive.

Scott said he got the idea to scoot to work last year when gas prices were near record highs and inflation rose to a 40-year record high. “The cost of living was just getting more expensive,” Scott told CNN. “We weren’t willing to make sacrifices on the quality of food that we buy.”

Scott estimates he and his wife, who also commutes via scooter, are saving $4,500 this year from not driving to work. That’s according to calculations he made on an Excel spreadsheet that factors in savings from not having to repair their cars as much, the auto insurance reductions they get from driving less and the reduced fuel use.

Even though gas prices have been rising lately, they’re still significantly lower than a year ago. But other costs associated with car ownership are continuing to skyrocket. In fact, if Scott and his wife switched back to driving today they’d likely find that they’re saving well above the $4,500 he calculated.

It will cost you 19.5% more to repair your car now than it did a year ago, according to July’s Consumer Price Index report, released Thursday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Another hefty expense is car insurance, up 17.8% from a year ago. Car repairs and car insurance were the second- and third-largest annual price increases, respectively, tracked by the CPI.

On top of that, car maintenance and servicing, body work, tires, parts and equipment and even state registration and licensing fees are all costing drivers more.

Pam Franks, a retired Louisiana state Medicaid analyst, balked when she got a notice from State Farm informing her that her six-month policy for her 2017 Toyota Camry would increase by 41% to $408 this August.

“It’s aggravating when I haven’t had any wrecks or tickets,” Franks, who lives in Pineville, Louisiana, told CNN.

She said she tried shopping around for better rates, but couldn’t find anything cheaper since she bundles her auto insurance with her home insurance. Switching to another auto insurance policy would have pushed up the cost of her home insurance, she said.

She’s one of many Louisiana drivers seeing their rates increase after the state’s Department of Insurance signed off on State Farm’s 17% average rate hike across all policies earlier this month.

“Inflationary pressures and supply chain issues, along with higher claim costs continue to drive our rate changes in Louisiana and beyond,” Roszell Gadson, a State Farm spokesperson, told CNN. “We continue to adjust to these trends to make sure we are matching price to risk.”

One of the reasons car repair costs are up is that Americans aren’t replacing their older vehicles, said Kristin Brocoff, a spokeswoman spokesperson for CarMD, a vehicle diagnostics provider.

The average age of cars in use in the United States hit an all-time high of 12.5 years last year, according to an analysis from S&P Global Mobility of 284 million cars.

That’s partly because car production still hasn’t caught up with pent-up demand from the pandemic, resulting in more expensive new cars.

But trying to extend your car’s life span can add up.

Model year 2007 cars were the most likely to need a repair related to the “check engine light” message in the past year, according to CarMD’s April Vehicle Health Index report that analyzed 17.7 million check-engine light readings from model year 1996 to 2022 vehicles driven last year. Some of the most common check-engine light repair issues include replacing catalytic converters, oxygen sensors and ignition coil and spark plugs, according to CarMD’s report.

The average car repair cost $403.71 last year, a 2.8% uptick from 2021 and a record high since CarMD began reporting on this in 2009. CarMD estimates average repair costs using annual industry data on the cost of car parts, labor rates and the average amount of time required to complete a repair.

On the labor side, rates were down by 0.5% from last year. Car parts were up 5% from a year ago, which pushed up overall repair costs.

Paul Baxter, a mechanic who owns Bullet Proof Off-Road & Auto, a car repair shop in Mesa, Arizona, said he’s paying 30% more for car parts compared to before the pandemic. That’s a result of persistent supply chain issues and higher shipping costs, he said.

He said he has no bargaining power and has to accept the price manufacturers are charging for parts. To keep the lights on, he marks up car parts he sells to customers by 20% to 30%, he told CNN.

Baxter hasn’t had an issue finding and retaining qualified mechanics. Still, he raised his three workers’ wages by $5 an hour to $25 an hour over the past few years to keep up with the higher cost of living.

Baxter said the industry publications he subscribes to that are critical for him to learn how to repair the newest car models raised their prices. Even the company from which he purchases water coolers so customers can have a drink in the waiting room now charges more.

That’s why he recently charged $2,300 to replace a customer’s air conditioning. A few years ago he said he would have charged $1,500 for the same exact job.

Customers constantly tell him he’s charging too much, said Baxter, who’s been repairing cars professionally since 2008 before opening his shop in 2016. “People don’t understand the back end of running an auto shop and the expenses I take on to keep it open,” he told CNN.

When he explains how he arrives at an estimate, customers are more sympathetic, he said.

Ted Canty, a 67-year-old retired FedEx operations manager living in Wimauma, Florida, said he is at his wits end with car repairs. A year ago, he paid $1,950 to replace the water pump in his 2017 Volkswagen Golf. That’s around what his monthly Social Security check is, he said.

That meant Canty and his wife, who is also retired, had to cut back on dining out and seeing movies so they could save more money for future car repairs.

When his anti-lock braking system recently went out, though, he knew he couldn’t push it off for too long. In the past, he’s almost always gone to Volkswagen service centers for repairs because he says he doesn’t feel comfortable getting it done at shops that aren’t as familiar with his car. But the Volkswagen service center wanted to charge him $525 to repair it, he said, leading him to shop around for better rates at other places. In the end, he paid a quarter of what Volkswagen was charging.

Canty is worried about the next car repair he’ll inevitably need, especially because he and his wife have limited sources of income outside of their Social Security checks and his pension.

“We could be driving more because we’re retired and want to go places. But we cut it back to keep the miles off the car,” he told CNN.

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August 12, 2023
US wholesale inflation rose more than expected in July | CNN Business

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Minneapolis
CNN
—

US wholesale inflation rose more than expected in July, reversing a yearlong cooling trend, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday.

The Producer Price Index, which tracks the average change in prices that businesses pay to suppliers, rose 0.8% annually. That’s above June’s upwardly revised increase of 0.2% and higher than expectations for a 0.7% gain, according to consensus estimates on Refinitiv.

Producer price hikes increased 0.3% from June to July, the highest monthly increase since January.

PPI is a closely watched inflation gauge since it captures average price shifts before they reach consumers, and is a proxy for potential price changes in stores.

Services and demand for services were the primary culprits behind the lift higher for producer prices, said Kurt Rankin, senior economist for PNC Financial Services. Services prices rose 0.5% from June, the highest monthly increase since March 2022 for the category, BLS data shows.

“The inflation story now, be it for producers or consumers, is demand,” he told CNN. “Mainly that’s consumers still spending money on services.”

The food index, which had declined for three straight months, rose 0.5% in July, suggesting a 6.3% annualized pace of inflation, he said.

“Consumers continue to go out and spend money,” Rankin said. “And as long as consumers are spending money, that’s going to create demand from producers, so that’s going to drive up their costs for their raw materials, for their transportation needs, etc.”

“And they’re going to pass those prices on to consumers,” he added.

That’s an unpleasant cycle.

“The numbers over the past six months have been much more encouraging, but it’s a reminder that the Federal Reserve has an eye toward the possibility of inflation flaring up again,” he said.

The report comes just one day after the Consumer Price Index showed that prices rose 3.2% annually in July. That increase, which was below the 3.3% economists were anticipating, was largely driven by year-over-year comparisons to a softer inflation number the year before.

Similar base effects played their role in the headline PPI increase as well, noted Rankin.

The tick upward to 0.8% doesn’t tell the whole story, because the index decreased in five of the previous seven months. Annualizing the 0.3% monthly gain, however, would put the PPI rate at about 3.6% and core at 3.8%, he said.

“So the July number does suggest that there’s still some producer cost pressures,” he said.

When stripping out the more volatile categories of food and energy, core PPI rose 2.4% annually in July. That’s in line with what was seen in June but a tick above economists’ expectations for a slight cooling.

On a month-to-month basis, core PPI increased 0.3%, also the highest monthly gain since January.

“The underlying trends show that PPI inflation is reverting to its pre-pandemic run rate, though progress is likely to be slower in [the second half of 2023] than [the first half],” Oxford Economics economists Matthew Martin and Oren Klachkin wrote Friday in a note. “While these data will comfort Fed officials, policymakers will likely maintain a hawkish tone and keep a close eye on whether last month’s jump in services prices persists in the months ahead.”

US stock futures tumbled after the report was released, as the hotter-than-expected data fueled concerns that the Fed could continue to hike rates in order to rein in inflation. The Dow has since pared its losses and is back in the green.

One month does not make a trend, and this result alone should not trigger a September increase from the Fed, but it certainly could heighten concerns, Rankin said.

“One spark could reignite this,” he said. “We’re seeing energy prices, oil prices, rising over the past few weeks. Any flareup in oil prices goes straight through to not only manufacturing costs, but transportation of goods to market, even transportation of food to restaurants. So even services, leisure and hospitality get hit when energy prices spike, so that possibility is always there.”

The PPI’s energy index, which increased 0.7% in June, showed that prices were flat for July.

“So the fact that energy prices were not a contributor tho this month’s reading makes this number jumping a bit a stark reminder that the Federal Reserve’s fight against inflation and their rhetoric regarding that fight is going to remain hawkish in the near term.”

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August 11, 2023