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  • Donald Trump Fast Facts | CNN Politics

    Donald Trump Fast Facts | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the life of Donald Trump, the 45th president of the United States.

    Birth date: June 14, 1946

    Birth place: New York, New York

    Birth name: Donald John Trump

    Father: Fred Trump, real estate developer

    Mother: Mary (Macleod) Trump

    Marriages: Melania (Knauss) Trump (January 22, 2005-present); Marla (Maples) Trump (December 1993-June 1999, divorced); Ivana (Zelnicek) Trump (1977-1990, divorced)

    Children: with Melania Trump: Barron, March 20, 2006; with Marla Maples: Tiffany, October 13, 1993; with Ivana Trump: Eric, 1984; Ivanka, October 30, 1981; Donald Jr., December 31, 1977

    Education: Attended Fordham University; University of Pennsylvania, Wharton School of Finance, B.S. in Economics, 1968

    As Trump evolved from real estate developer to reality television star, he turned his name into a brand. Licensed Trump products have included board games, steaks, cologne, vodka, furniture and menswear.

    He has portrayed himself in cameo appearances in movies and on television, including “Zoolander,” “Sex and the City” and “Home Alone 2: Lost in New York.”

    Trump’s slogan, “Make America Great Again,” was first used by Ronald Reagan while he was running against President Jimmy Carter.

    For details on investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 election, visit 2016 Presidential Election Investigation Fast Facts.

    1970s – After college, works with his father on apartment complexes in Queens and Brooklyn.

    1973 – Trump and his father are named in a Justice Department lawsuit alleging Trump property managers violated the Fair Housing Act by turning away potential African American tenants. The Trumps deny the company discriminates and file a $100 million countersuit, which is later dismissed. The case is settled in 1975, and the Trumps agree to provide weekly lists of vacancies to Black community organizations.

    1976 – Trump and his father partner with the Hyatt Corporation, purchasing the Commodore Hotel, an aging midtown Manhattan property. The building is revamped and opens four years later as the Grand Hyatt Hotel. The project kickstarts Trump’s career as a Manhattan developer.

    1983-1990 – He builds/purchases multiple properties in New York City, including Trump Tower and the Plaza Hotel, and also opens casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey, including the Trump Taj Mahal and the Trump Plaza. Trump buys the New Jersey Generals football team, part of the United States Football League, which folds after three seasons.

    1985 – Purchases Mar-a-Lago, an oceanfront estate in Palm Beach, Florida. It is renovated and opens as a private club in 1995.

    1987 – Trump’s first book, “Trump: The Art of the Deal,” is published, and becomes a bestseller. The Donald J. Trump Foundation is established in order to donate a portion of profits from book sales to charities.

    1990 – Nearly $1 billion in personal debt, Trump reaches an agreement with bankers allowing him to avoid declaring personal bankruptcy.

    1991 – The Trump Taj Mahal files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

    1992 – The Trump Plaza and the Trump Castle casinos file for bankruptcy.

    1996 – Buys out and becomes executive producer of the Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA pageants.

    October 7, 1999 – Tells CNN’s Larry King that he is going to form a presidential exploratory committee and wants to challenge Pat Buchanan for the Reform Party nomination.

    February 14, 2000 – Says that he is abandoning his bid for the presidency, blaming discord within the Reform Party.

    January 2004 – “The Apprentice,” a reality show featuring aspiring entrepreneurs competing for Trump’s approval, premieres on NBC.

    November 21, 2004 – Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts Inc. files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

    2005 – Establishes Trump University, which offers seminars in real estate investment.

    February 13, 2009 – Announces his resignation from his position as chairman of Trump Entertainment Resorts. Days later, the company files for bankruptcy protection.

    March 17, 2011 – During an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” Trump questions whether President Barack Obama was born in the United States.

    June 16, 2015 – Announces that he is running for president during a speech at Trump Tower. He pledges to implement policies that will boost the economy and says he will get tough on immigration. “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best…They’re sending people who have lots of problems,” Trump says. “They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime, they’re rapists, and some, I assume, are good people.”

    June 28, 2015 – Says he’s giving up the TV show “The Apprentice” to run for president.

    June 29, 2015 – NBCUniversal says it is cutting its business ties to Trump and won’t air the Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants because of “derogatory statements by Donald Trump regarding immigrants.”

    July 8, 2015 – In an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Trump says he “can’t guarantee” all of his employees have legal status in the United States. This is in response to questions about a Washington Post report about undocumented immigrants working at the Old Post Office construction site in Washington, DC, which Trump is converting into a hotel.

    July 22, 2015 – Trump’s financial disclosure report is made public by the Federal Election Commission (FEC).

    August 6, 2015 – During the first 2016 Republican debate, Trump is questioned about a third party candidacy, his attitude towards women and his history of donating money to Democratic politicians. He tells moderator Megyn Kelly of Fox News he feels he is being mistreated. The following day, Trump tells CNN’s Don Lemon that Kelly was singling him out for attack, “You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.”

    September 11, 2015 – Trump announces he has purchased NBC’s half of the Miss Universe Organization, which organizes the annual Miss USA and Miss Universe pageants.

    December 7, 2015 – Trump’s campaign puts out a press release calling for a “complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.”

    May 26, 2016 – Secures enough delegates to clinch the Republican Party nomination.

    July 16, 2016 – Introduces Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate.

    July 19, 2016 – Becomes the Republican Party nominee for president.

    September 13, 2016 – During an interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman says his office is investigating Trump’s charitable foundation “to make sure it’s complying with the laws governing charities in New York.”

    October 1, 2016 – The New York Times reports Trump declared a $916 million loss in 1995 which could have allowed him to legally skip paying federal income taxes for years. The report is based on a financial document mailed to the newspaper by an anonymous source.

    October 7, 2016 – Unaired footage from 2005 surfaces of Trump talking about trying to have sex with a married woman and being able to grope women. In footage obtained by The Washington Post, Trump is heard off-camera discussing women in vulgar terms during the taping of a segment for “Access Hollywood.” In a taped response, Trump declares, “I said it, I was wrong and I apologize.”

    October 9, 2016 – During the second presidential debate, CNN’s Cooper asks Trump about his descriptions of groping and kissing women without their consent in the “Access Hollywood” footage. Trump denies that he has ever engaged in such behavior and declares the comments were “locker room talk.” After the debate, 11 women step forward to claim that they were sexually harassed or sexually assaulted by the real estate developer. Trump says the stories aren’t true.

    November 8, 2016 – Elected president of the United States. Trump will be the first president who has never held elected office, a top government post or a military rank.

    November 18, 2016 – Trump agrees to pay $25 million to settle three lawsuits against Trump University. About 6,000 former students are covered by the settlement.

    December 24, 2016 – Trump says he will dissolve the Donald J. Trump Foundation “to avoid even the appearance of any conflict with my role as President.” A spokeswoman for the New York Attorney General’s Office says that the foundation cannot legally close until investigators conclude their probe of the charity.

    January 10, 2017 – CNN reports that intelligence officials briefed Trump on a dossier that contains allegations about his campaign’s ties to Russia and unverified claims about his personal life. The author of the dossier is a former British spy who was hired by a research firm that had been funded by both political parties to conduct opposition research on Trump.

    January 20, 2017 – Takes the oath of office from Chief Justice John Roberts during an inauguration ceremony at the Capitol.

    January 23, 2017 – Trump signs an executive action withdrawing the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a 12-nation trade deal negotiated by the Obama administration and awaiting congressional approval.

    January 27, 2017 – Trump signs an executive order halting all refugee arrivals for 120 days and banning travel to the United States from seven Muslim-majority countries for 90 days. Additionally, refugees from Syria are barred indefinitely from entering the United States. The order is challenged in court.

    February 13, 2017 – Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, resigns amid accusations he lied about his communications with Russian ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak. Flynn later pleads guilty to lying to the FBI.

    May 3, 2017 – FBI Director James Comey confirms that there is an ongoing investigation into ties between the Trump campaign and Russia during a hearing on Capitol Hill. Less than a week later, Trump fires Comey, citing a DOJ memo critical of the way he handled the investigation into Clinton’s emails.

    May 2017 – Shortly after Trump fires Comey, the FBI opens an investigation into whether Trump “had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests,” citing former law enforcement officials and others the paper said were familiar with the probe.

    May 17, 2017 – Former FBI Director Robert Mueller is appointed as special counsel to lead the probe into Russian meddling in the 2016 election, including potential collusion between Trump campaign associates and Russian officials. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein makes the appointment because Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from investigations into Trump’s campaign.

    May 19, 2017 – Departs on his first foreign trip as president. The nine-day, five-country trip includes stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican, a NATO summit in Brussels and a G7 summit in Sicily.

    June 1, 2017 – Trump proclaims that the United States is withdrawing from the Paris climate accord but adds that he is open to renegotiating aspects of the environmental agreement, which was signed by 175 countries in 2016.

    July 7, 2017 – Meets Russian President Vladimir Putin in person for the first time, on the sidelines of the G20 meeting in Hamburg, Germany.

    August 8, 2017 – In response to nuclear threats from North Korea, Trump warns that Pyongyang will “face fire and fury like the world has never seen.” Soon after Trump’s comments, North Korea issues a statement saying it is “examining the operational plan” to strike areas around the US territory of Guam.

    August 15, 2017 – After a violent clash between neo-Nazi activists and counterprotesters leaves one dead in Charlottesville, Virginia, Trump holds an impromptu press conference in the lobby of Trump Tower and declares that there were “fine people” on both sides.

    August 25, 2017 – Trump’s first pardon is granted to former Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio, who was convicted of criminal contempt for disregarding a court order in a racial-profiling case. Trump did not consult with lawyers at the Justice Department before announcing his decision.

    September 5, 2017 – The Trump administration announces that it is ending the DACA program, introduced by Obama to protect nearly 800,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children. Trump calls on Congress to introduce legislation that will prevent DACA recipients from being deported. Multiple lawsuits are filed opposing the policy in federal courts and judges delay the end of the program, asking the government to submit filings justifying the cancellation of DACA.

    September 19, 2017 – In a speech at the United Nations General Assembly, Trump refers to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as “Rocket Man” and warns that the United States will “totally destroy North Korea” if forced to defend itself or its allies.

    September 24, 2017 – The Trump administration unveils a third version of the travel ban, placing restrictions on travel by certain foreigners from Chad, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen. (Chad is later removed after meeting security requirements.) One day before the revised ban is set to take effect, it is blocked nationwide by a federal judge in Hawaii. A judge in Maryland issues a similar ruling.

    December 4, 2017 – The Supreme Court rules that the revised travel ban can take effect pending appeals.

    December 6, 2017 – Trump recognizes Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and announces plans to relocate the US Embassy there.

    January 11, 2018 – During a White House meeting on immigration reform, Trump reportedly refers to Haiti and African nations as “shithole countries.”

    January 12, 2018 – The Wall Street Journal reports that Trump allegedly had an affair with a porn star named Stephanie Clifford, aka Stormy Daniels. The newspaper states that Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, arranged a $130,000 payment for a nondisclosure agreement weeks before Election Day in 2016. Trump denies the affair occurred. In March, Clifford sues Trump seeking to be released from the NDA. In response, Trump and his legal team agree outside of court not to sue or otherwise enforce the NDA. The suit is dismissed. A California Superior Court judge orders Trump to pay $44,100 to Clifford, to reimburse her attorneys’ fees in the legal battle surrounding her nondisclosure agreement.

    March 13, 2018 – Trump announces in a tweet that he has fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and will nominate CIA Director Mike Pompeo as Tillerson’s replacement.

    March 20, 2018 – A New York Supreme Court judge rules that a defamation lawsuit against Trump can move forward, ruling against a July 2017 motion to dismiss filed by Trump’s lawyers. The lawsuit, filed by Summer Zervos, a former “Apprentice” contestant, is related to sexual assault allegations. In November 2021, attorneys for Zervos announce she is dropping the lawsuit.

    March 23, 2018 – The White House announces that it is adopting a policy, first proposed by Trump via tweet in July 2017, banning most transgender individuals from serving in the military.

    April 9, 2018 – The FBI raids Cohen’s office, home and a hotel room where he’d been staying while his house was renovated. The raid is related to a federal investigation of possible fraud and campaign finance violations.

    April 13, 2018 – Trump authorizes joint military strikes in Syria with the UK and France after reports the government used chemical weapons on civilians in Douma.

    May 7, 2018 – The Trump administration announces a “zero tolerance” policy for illegal border crossings. Sessions says that individuals who violate immigration law will be criminally prosecuted and warns that parents could be separated from children.

    May 8, 2018 – Trump announces that the United States is withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal.

    May 31, 2018 – The Trump administration announces it is imposing tariffs on steel and aluminum imported from allies Canada, Mexico and the European Union.

    June 8-9, 2018 – Before leaving for the G7 summit in Quebec City, Trump tells reporters that Russia should be reinstated in the group. The annexation of Crimea in 2014 led to Russia’s suspension. After leaving the summit, Trump tweets that he will not endorse the traditional G7 communique issued at the end of the meeting. The President singles out Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for making “false statements” at a news conference.

    June 12, 2018 – Trump meets Kim in person for the first time during a summit in Singapore. They sign a four-point statement that broadly outlines the countries’ commitment to a peace process. The statement contains a pledge by North Korea to “work towards” complete denuclearization but the agreement does not detail how the international community will verify that Kim is ending his nuclear program.

    June 14, 2018 – The New York attorney general sues the Trump Foundation, alleging that the nonprofit run by Trump and his three eldest children violated state and federal charity law.

    June 26, 2018 – The Supreme Court upholds the Trump administration’s travel ban in a 5-4 ruling along party lines.

    July 16, 2018 – During a joint news conference with Putin in Helsinki, Trump declines to endorse the US government’s assessment that Russia interfered in the election, saying he doesn’t “see any reason why” Russia would be responsible. The next day, Trump clarifies his remark, “The sentence should have been, ‘I don’t see any reason why it wouldn’t be Russia.” He says he accepts the intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia meddled in the election but adds, “It could be other people also.”

    August 21, 2018 – Cohen pleads guilty to eight federal charges, including two campaign finance violations. In court, he says that he orchestrated payments to silence women “in coordination and at the direction of a candidate for federal office.” On the same day, Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort is convicted on eight counts of federal financial crimes. On December 12, Cohen is sentenced to three years in prison.

    October 2, 2018 – The New York Times details numerous tax avoidance schemes allegedly carried out by Trump and his siblings. In a tweet, Trump dismisses the article as a “very old, boring and often told hit piece.”

    November 20, 2018 – Releases a statement backing Saudi Arabia in the wake of the murder of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi, a Virginia resident, killed in October at a Saudi consulate in Turkey. Khashoggi was a frequent critic of the Saudi regime. The Saudis initially denied any knowledge of his death, but then later said a group of rogue operators were responsible for his killing. US officials have speculated that such a mission, including the 15 men sent from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, to murder him, could not have been carried out without the authorization of Saudi leader Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. In the statement, Trump writes, “Our intelligence agencies continue to assess all information, but it could very well be that the Crown Prince had knowledge of this tragic event, maybe he did and maybe he didn’t!”

    December 18, 2018 – The Donald J. Trump Foundation agrees to dissolve according to a document filed in Manhattan Supreme Court. The agreement allows the New York attorney general’s office to review the recipients of the charity’s assets.

    December 22, 2018 – The longest partial government shutdown in US history begins after Trump demands lawmakers allocate $5.7 billion in funding for a border wall before agreeing to sign a federal funding package.

    January 16, 2019 – After nearly two years of Trump administration officials denying that anyone involved in his campaign colluded with the Russians to help his candidacy, Trump lawyer and former New York City mayor, Rudy Giuliani, says “I never said there was no collusion between the campaign, or people in the campaign. I said the President of the United States.

    January 25, 2019 – The government shutdown ends when Trump signs a short-term spending measure, providing three weeks of stopgap funding while lawmakers work on a border security compromise. The bill does not include any wall funding.

    February 15, 2019 – Trump declares a national emergency to allocate funds to build a wall on the border with Mexico. During the announcement, the President says he expects the declaration to be challenged in court. The same day, Trump signs a border security measure negotiated by Congress, with $1.375 billion set aside for barriers, averting another government shutdown.

    February 18, 2019 – Attorneys general from 16 states file a lawsuit in federal court challenging Trump’s emergency declaration.

    March 22, 2019 – Mueller ends his investigation and delivers his report to Attorney General William Barr. A senior Justice Department official tells CNN that there will be no further indictments.

    March 24, 2019 – Barr releases a letter summarizing the principal conclusions from Mueller’s investigation. According to Barr’s four-page letter, the evidence was not sufficient to establish that members Trump’s campaign tacitly engaged in a criminal conspiracy with the Russian government to interfere with the election.

    April 18, 2019 – A redacted version of the Mueller report is released. The first part of the 448-page document details the evidence gathered by Mueller’s team on potential conspiracy crimes and explains their decisions not to charge individuals associated with the campaign. The second part of the report outlines ten episodes involving possible obstruction of justice by the President. According to the report, Mueller’s decision not to charge Trump was rooted in Justice Department guidelines prohibiting the indictment of a sitting president. Mueller writes that he would have cleared Trump if the evidence warranted exoneration.

    May 1, 2019 – The New York Times publishes a report that details how Giuliani, in his role as Trump’s personal attorney, is investigating allegations related to former Vice President Joe Biden, a potential Trump opponent in the 2020 presidential race. Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, served on the board of a Ukrainian energy company called Burisma Holdings. In 2016, the elder Biden pressured Ukraine to oust a prosecutor who had investigated Burisma for corruption. Giuliani suggests that Biden’s move was motivated by a desire to protect his son from criminal charges. Giuliani’s claims are undermined after Bloomberg reports that the Burisma investigation was “dormant” when Biden pressed the prosecutor to resign.

    June 12, 2019 – Trump says he may be willing to accept information about political rivals from a foreign government during an interview on ABC News, declaring that he’s willing to listen and wouldn’t necessarily call the FBI.

    June 16, 2019 – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu unveils a sign at the proposed site of a Golan Heights settlement to be named Trump Heights.

    June 18, 2019 – Trump holds a rally in Orlando to publicize the formal launch of his reelection campaign.

    June 28, 2019 – During a breakfast meeting at the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan, Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman reportedly discuss tensions with Iran, trade and human rights.

    June 30, 2019 – Trump becomes the first sitting US president to enter North Korea. He takes 20 steps beyond the border and shakes hands with Kim.

    July 14, 2019 – Via Twitter, Trump tells Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Illhan Omar and Ayanna Pressley to “go back” to their home countries. Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib and Pressley are natural-born US citizens; Omar was born in Somalia, immigrated to the United States and became a citizen.

    July 16, 2019 – The House votes, 240-187, to condemn the racist language Trump used in his tweets about Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, Omar and Pressley.

    July 24, 2019 – Mueller testifies before the House Judiciary Committee and the House Intelligence Committee.

    July 25, 2019 – Trump speaks on the phone with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump asks Zelensky for a “favor,” encouraging him to speak with Giuliani about investigating Biden. In the days before the call, Trump blocked nearly $400 million in military and security aid to Ukraine.

    August 12, 2019 – A whistleblower files a complaint pertaining to Trump’s conduct on the Zelensky call.

    September 11, 2019 – The Trump administration lifts its hold on military aid for Ukraine.

    September 24, 2019 – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announces the beginning of an impeachment inquiry related to the whistleblower complaint.

    September 25, 2019 – The White House releases notes from the July 25 call between Trump and Zelensky. The readout contains multiple references to Giuliani and Barr. In response, the Justice Department issues a statement that says Barr didn’t know about Trump’s conversation until weeks after the call. Further, the attorney general didn’t talk to the President about having Ukraine investigate the Bidens, according to the Justice Department. On the same day as the notes are released, Trump and Zelensky meet in person for the first time on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly. During a joint press conference after the meeting, both men deny that Trump pressured Zelensky to investigate Biden in exchange for aid.

    September 26, 2019 – The House releases a declassified version of the whistleblower complaint. According to the complaint, officials at the White House tried to “lock down” records of Trump’s phone conversation with Zelensky. The complaint also alleges that Barr played a role in the campaign to convince Zelensky that Biden should be investigated. Trump describes the complaint as “fake news” and “a witch hunt” on Twitter.

    September 27, 2019 – Pompeo is subpoenaed by House committees over his failure to provide documents related to Ukraine. Kurt Volker, US special envoy to Ukraine, resigns. He was named in the whistleblower complaint as one of the State Department officials who helped Giuliani connect with sources in Ukraine.

    October 3, 2019 – Speaking to reporters outside the White House, Trump says both Ukraine and China should investigate alleged corruption involving Biden and his son. CNN reports that the President had brought up Biden and his family during a June phone call with Xi Jinping. In that call, Trump discussed the political prospects of Biden as well as Elizabeth Warren. He also told Xi that he would remain quiet on the matter of Hong Kong protests. Notes documenting the conversation were placed on a highly secured server where the transcript from the Ukraine call was also stored.

    October 6, 2019 – After Trump speaks on the phone with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the White House announces that US troops will move out of northern Syria to make way for a planned Turkish military operation. The move marks a major shift in American foreign policy and effectively gives Turkey the green light to attack US-backed Kurdish forces, a partner in the fight against ISIS.

    October 9, 2019 – Turkey launches a military offensive in northern Syria.

    October 31, 2019 – Trump says via Twitter that he is changing his legal residency from New York to Florida, explaining that he feels he is treated badly by political leaders from the city and state.

    November 7, 2019 – A judge orders Trump to pay $2 million to settle a lawsuit against his charity filed by the New York state attorney general. According to the suit, Trump breached his fiduciary duty by allowing his presidential campaign to direct the distribution of donations. In a statement, Trump accuses the attorney general of mischaracterizing the settlement for political purposes.

    November 13, 2019 – Public impeachment hearings begin and Trump meets Erdogan at the White House.

    November 20, 2019 – During a public hearing, US Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland says he worked with Giuliani on matters related to Ukraine at the “express direction of the President of the United States” and he says “everyone was in the loop.” Sondland recounts several conversations between himself and Trump about Ukraine opening two investigations: one into Burisma and another into conspiracies about Ukrainian meddling in the 2016 US election.

    December 10, 2019 – House Democrats unveil two articles of impeachment, one for abuse of power and one for obstruction of Congress.

    December 11, 2019 – Trump signs an executive order to include discrimination against Jewish people as a violation of law in certain cases, with an eye toward fighting antisemitism on college campuses.

    December 13, 2019 – The House Judiciary Committee approves the two articles of impeachment in a party line vote.

    December 18, 2019 – The House of Representatives votes to impeach Trump, charging a president with high crimes and misdemeanors for just the third time in American history.

    January 3, 2020 – Speaking at Mar-a-Lago, Trump announces that a US airstrike in Iraq has killed Qasem Soleimani, the leader of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps Quds Force.

    January 8, 2020 – Iran fires a number of missiles at two Iraqi bases housing US troops in retaliation for the American strike that killed Soleimani. No US or Iraqi lives are reported lost, but the Pentagon later releases a statement confirming that 109 US service members had been diagnosed with mild traumatic brain injuries in the wake of the attack.

    January 24, 2020 – Makes history as the first President to attend the annual March for Life rally in Washington, DC, since it began nearly a half-century ago. Trump reiterates his support for tighter abortion restrictions.

    January 29, 2020 – Trump signs the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement into law, which replaces the North American Free Trade Agreement.

    January 31, 2020 – The Trump administration announces an expansion of the travel ban to include six new countries. Immigration restrictions will be imposed on: Nigeria, Eritrea, Tanzania, Sudan, Kyrgyzstan and Myanmar (known as Burma), with exceptions for immigrants who have helped the United States.

    February 5, 2020 – The Senate votes to acquit Trump on two articles of impeachment. Sen. Mitt Romney is the sole Republican to vote to convict on the charge of abuse of power, joining with all Senate Democrats in a 52-48 not guilty vote. On the obstruction of Congress charge, the vote falls along straight party lines, 53-47 for acquittal.

    May 29, 2020 – Trump announces that the United States will terminate its relationship with the World Health Organization.

    July 10, 2020 – Trump commutes the prison sentence of his longtime friend Roger Stone, who was convicted of crimes that included lying to Congress in part, prosecutors said, to protect the President. The announcement came just days before Stone was set to report to a federal prison in Georgia.

    October 2, 2020 – Trump announces that he has tested positive for coronavirus. Later in the day, Trump is transferred to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and returns to the White House on October 5.

    November 7, 2020 – Days after the presidential election on November 3, CNN projects Trump loses his bid for reelection to Biden.

    November 25, 2020 – Trump announces in a tweet that he has granted Michael Flynn a “full pardon,” wiping away the guilty plea of the intelligence official for lying to the FBI.

    December 23, 2020 – Announces 26 new pardons, including for Stone, Manafort and son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, Charles.

    January 6, 2021 Following Trump’s rally and speech at the White House Ellipse, pro-Trump rioters storm the US Capitol as members of Congress meet to certify the Electoral College results of the 2020 presidential election. A total of five people die, including a Capitol Police officer the next day.

    January 7-8, 2021 Instagram and Facebook place a ban on Trump’s account from posting through the remainder of his presidency and perhaps “indefinitely.” Twitter permanently bans Trump from the platform, explaining that “after close review of recent Tweets…and the context around them we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement of violence.”

    January 13, 2021 – The House votes to impeach Trump for “incitement of insurrection.” He is the only president to be impeached twice.

    January 20, 2021 – Trump issues a total of 143 pardons and commutations that include his onetime political strategist, Steve Bannon, a former top fundraiser and two well-known rappers but not himself or his family. He then receives a military-style send-off from Joint Base Andrews on Inauguration morning, before heading home to Florida.

    February 13, 2021 – The US Senate acquits Trump in his second impeachment trial, voting that Trump is not guilty of inciting the deadly January 6 riots at the US Capitol. The vote is 43 not guilty to 57 guilty, short of the 67 guilty votes needed to convict.

    May 5, 2021 – Facebook’s Oversight Board upholds Trump’s suspension from using its platform. The decision also applies to Facebook-owned Instagram.

    June 4, 2021 Facebook announces Trump will be suspended from its platform until at least January 7th, 2023 – two years from when he was initially suspended.

    July 1, 2021 – New York prosecutors charge the Trump Organization and Trump Payroll Corporation with 10 felony counts and Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg with 15 felony counts in connection with an alleged tax scheme stretching back to 2005. Trump himself is not charged. On December 6, 2022, both companies are found guilty on all charges.

    February 14, 2022 – Accounting firm Mazars announces it will no longer act as Trump’s accountant, citing a conflict of interest. In a letter to the Trump Organization chief legal officer, the firm informs the Trump Organization to no longer rely on financial statements ending June 2011 through June 2020.

    May 3, 2022 – The Trump Organization and the Presidential Inaugural Committee agree to pay a total of $750,000 to settle with the Washington, DC, attorney general’s office over allegations they misspent money raised for former President Donald Trump’s inauguration.

    June 9-July 21, 2022 – The House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol holds eight hearings, where it hears from witnesses including top ex-Trump officials, election workers, those who took part in the attack and many others. Through live testimony, video depositions, and never-before-seen material, the committee attempts to paint the picture of the former president’s plan to stay in power and the role he played on January 6.

    August 8, 2022 – The FBI executes a search warrant at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, as part of an investigation into the handling of presidential documents, including classified documents, that may have been brought there.

    August 12, 2022 – A federal judge unseals the search warrant and property receipt from the FBI search of Mar-a-Lago. The unsealed documents indicate the FBI recovered 11 sets of classified documents from its search, including some materials marked as “top secret/SCI” – one of the highest levels of classification, and identify three federal crimes that the Justice Department is looking at as part of its investigation: violations of the Espionage Act, obstruction of justice and criminal handling of government records.

    September 21, 2022 – The New York state attorney general files a lawsuit against Trump, three of his adult children and the Trump Organization, alleging they were involved in an expansive fraud lasting over a decade that the former President used to enrich himself. According to the lawsuit, the Trump Organization deceived lenders, insurers and tax authorities by inflating the value of his properties using misleading appraisals.

    October 3, 2022 – Trump files a lawsuit against CNN for defamation, seeking $475 million in punitive damages.

    November 15, 2022 – Announces that he will seek the Republican presidential nomination in 2024.

    November 19, 2022 – Trump’s Twitter account, which was banned following the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, is reinstated after users respond to an online poll posted by Twitter CEO and new owner Elon Musk.

    December 19, 2022 – The Jan. 6 insurrection committee votes to refer Trump to the Department of Justice on at least four criminal charges. Four days later the panel releases its final report recommending Trump be barred from holding office again.

    February 9, 2023 – Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts are restored following a two-year ban in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection, a Meta spokesperson confirms to CNN. On March 17, 2023, YouTube restores Trump’s channel.

    March 30, 2023 – A grand jury in New York votes to indict Trump, the first time in American history that a current or former president has faced criminal charges.

    April 4, 2023 – Surrenders and is placed under arrest before pleading not guilty to 34 felony criminal charges of falsifying business records in Manhattan criminal court. Prosecutors allege that Trump sought to undermine the integrity of the 2016 election through a hush money scheme with payments made to women who claimed they had extramarital affairs with Trump. He has denied the affairs. Hours after his arraignment, Trump rails against the Manhattan district attorney and the indictment during a speech at his Florida resort at Mar-a-Lago.

    May 9, 2023 – A Manhattan federal jury finds Trump sexually abused former magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll in a luxury department store dressing room in the spring of 1996 and awards her $5 million for battery and defamation.

    May 15, 2023 – A report by special counsel John Durham is released. In it he concludes that the FBI should never have launched a full investigation into connections between Donald Trump’s campaign and Russia during the 2016 election. The report does not recommend any new charges against individuals or “wholesale changes” about how the FBI handles politically charged investigations, despite strongly criticizing the agency’s behavior.

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  • Voting rights advocates in the South emboldened by Supreme Court win | CNN Politics

    Voting rights advocates in the South emboldened by Supreme Court win | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    With a sense of relief that the conservative Supreme Court did not use a major Alabama redistricting case to further gut the Voting Rights Act, civil rights advocates and election attorneys are preparing for a new flood of redistricting litigation lawsuits challenging political maps – especially in the South – they say discriminate against minorities.

    In the 5-4 case decided Thursday, Alabama must now draw a second majority-Black US congressional district after Republicans were sued by African American voters over a redistricting plan for the 27% percent Black state that made White voters the majority in six of the seven districts.

    The six White majority districts are represented by Republicans; the Black majority district is represented by a Democrat.

    “I don’t think it’s going to stop Republicans from drawing racist maps,” Aunna Dennis, executive director of the voting rights group Common Cause, told CNN. “But I think that this empowers those of us pushing back and fighting that.”

    The majority opinion – written by Chief Justice John Roberts, who was joined by the court’s three liberals and, in most parts, by Justice Brett Kavanaugh – effectively maintained the status quo around how courts should approach Voting Rights Act lawsuits that allege a legislative map discriminates by race.

    By letting old precedent around the Voting Rights Act to stand in the case, called Allen v. Milligan, the Supreme Court has likely emboldened voting rights advocates to bring cases they previously thought would have been doomed.

    Several election law attorneys and voting rights advocates have suggested to CNN they believe the decision could have a ripple effect across the South, in states like Louisiana, Georgia, Mississippi and Texas where cases claiming Section 2 violations are already working through the courts.

    According to the Democracy Docket, a liberal-leaning voting rights media platform that tracks election litigation, there are 31 active federal cases involving Voting Rights Act redistricting claims similar to those in the Alabama case.

    “I suspect that there are a number of states with lawyers who were considering filing a lawsuit similar to the Milligan lawsuit, but they held off because the prospects of how everyone thought Milligan would go were so dim. But now, you’re going to have a whole range of suits filed,” said Alabama voting rights attorney J.S. “Chris” Christie, who filed one of the two lawsuits that were before the justices in the Milligan case.

    “Some of those will win, and some of them won’t. All redistricting suits are not the same,” Christie said, noting that Kavanaugh did not join an important part of Roberts’ opinion, depriving that section of a majority.

    Still, he said, “Lawyers who file these types of lawsuits are going to be encouraged and are going to pursue those cases aggressively, knowing that the Voting Rights Act precedents are there.”

    The ruling was a shock. The right-leaning high court, sometimes in decisions penned by Roberts himself, had been on a spree of landmark rulings over the last several years that had whittled down the scope of the Voting Rights Act. And in the flurry of emergency litigation last year ahead of the 2022 midterms, the Supreme Court repeatedly put on hold lower court rulings – including in the Alabama case – that would have ordered the redrawing of political maps ahead of last year’s elections, helping Republicans to narrowly reclaim the US House.

    That meant that, at least in Alabama, the election was carried out under a redistricting plan that the Supreme Court has now affirmed to be likely unlawful.

    “The fact remains that the Supreme Court previously allowed the same map that they just determined unconstitutionally, and systemically diluted Black votes be used in the 2022 election,” the Congressional Black Caucus said in a statement.

    In Alabama, lower courts said early last year that the state’s congressional map likely violated the Voting Rights Act by diluting Black voting power. The courts ordered it redrawn in a way that was expected to produce a second majority-Black district, which would have shifted the partisan makeup of the state’s congressional delegation from 6-1 to 5-2.

    But, in February 2022, the Supreme Court put those decisions on hold until the justices could hear and decide the case themselves.

    At the heart of the dispute in the Alabama case was the way that, under longstanding Supreme Court precedent, race was used to determine if a map violated Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act, which prohibits voting procedures “not equally open to participation by members” of a protected class, like racial minorities. Alabama was putting forward an argument for a supposedly “race-blind” approach to VRA redistricting compliance, that if endorsed, would have defanged the provision.

    Already, the Supreme Court led by Roberts had gutted a separate provision of the VRA that required certain jurisdictions (including Alabama and other states in the South) with a history of racially discriminatory voting policies to get federal approval for the maps that they drew.

    The Supreme Court’s emergency move last year to allow the Republican-drawn Alabama map to stay in place had cascading effects in lawsuits across the country.

    Some cases, like a challenge brought to Alabama’s state legislative redistricting plan, were put on hold.

    In a Georgia case that concerned both the congressional and state legislative redistricting plans, a federal judge said that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed in at least some of the districts they were challenging, but he declined to grant the preliminary injunction, in part citing the Supreme Court’s emergency order.

    The Supreme Court, meanwhile, also froze a lower court order in a legal challenge brought against Louisiana’s congressional map that made similar arguments as the Milligan case, as Louisiana legislators had drawn just one majority-Black district of the six districts in the 33% percent Black state.

    The justices paused the case, where a federal judge was preparing to redraw the Louisiana map if the Republican lawmakers refused to do so, and said they were taking up the lawsuit but putting it on hold until the Milligan case was decided.

    Now the challengers’ lawyers in that case are anticipating that the Supreme Court will send it back to lower courts, where they were poised to prevail under the approach to VRA redistricting cases that the justices have now left undisturbed.

    Cases in Texas, Mississippi and elsewhere that inched ahead while the Milligan case was pending will go to trial without the threat that the challengers would need to prove their case under a drastically different Section 2 standard.

    “If anything, we no longer need to make adjustments that we had potentially been preparing for because the state of the law remains unchanged,” said Texas Civil Rights Project attorney Sarah Chen, whose group is involved in several challenges to Texas maps, including a lawsuit over Galveston County’s redistricting plan.

    “The Supreme Court did not endorse the radical changes proposed by Alabama in their arguments, the same changes that are also endorsed by opposing counsel in this Galveston redistricting matter,” Chen added.

    While challenges to statewide maps are what get the most national attention, the ruling’s effect on how the VRA is applied to local races like county commission elections and school board seats “is really going to impact voters’ everyday lives,” according to Christie, the Alabama voting rights attorney, who said that Thursday’s opinion will be “huge” in a newly filed challenge to a county commission map in the state.

    “Attorneys who file these types of lawsuits are going to be encouraged to pursue these cases knowing that the VRA precedent is there,” he said.

    Even before they get into a courtroom, voting rights advocates see the Milligan ruling as valuable for discouraging state and local map drawers from diminishing the political power of communities of color, as it squelched expectations that the Supreme Court was about to make VRA challenges more difficult to bring.

    “I am disappointed in today’s Supreme Court opinion but it remains the commitment of the Secretary of State’s Office to comply with all applicable election laws,” Alabama Secretary of State Wes Allen, the defendant in the Alabama case, said in a statement after the ruling.

    In North Carolina, voting rights advocates had been reeling from a major defeat with the state Supreme Court recently ruling that North Carolina courts couldn’t police partisan gerrymandering. (Litigation over the state’s congressional plan is also before the Supreme Court in a legal dispute that does not concern the Voting Rights Act). They are finding a silver lining in that, thanks to Thursday’s ruling, the GOP legislators will be redrawing North Carolina’s political maps knowing Voting Rights Act protections for minority voters remain in force.

    “We would hope that they would really take this decision to heart that they would make a genuine good faith effort to comply with Section 2,” said Hilary Harris Klein, the senior counsel for voting rights with the Southern Coalition for Social Justice.

    Thursday’s ruling, said Deuel Ross, the deputy director of litigation at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, “puts state legislatures and local redistricting bodies on notice that the Voting Rights Act is here to stay and if they deny communities of color the representation they deserve, that they will face lawsuits.”

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  • Nearly 5 million kids might miss out on food assistance if these states don’t act by Friday | CNN Politics

    Nearly 5 million kids might miss out on food assistance if these states don’t act by Friday | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Nearly 5 million children in eight states could lose out on some extra funds for food unless their state officials sign up for a federal relief program by Friday.

    The Pandemic Electronic Benefits Transfer program, known as P-EBT, is providing $120 over the summer to families whose children qualify for free or reduced-price meals or attend schools in low-income areas where all students receive free meals.

    While the vast majority of states are participating in the program this summer, Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Mississippi, Missouri, New Hampshire, South Dakota and Texas have yet to join.

    The funding is crucial for families who are having trouble affording groceries, housing, utilities and other necessities, which are all more expensive now, advocates say. Many of these parents depend on the free or reduced-price breakfast and lunch program during the school year, but only about 1 in 7 eligible kids receive meals over the summer.

    “For a lot of families that are struggling, the summer is the hungriest time of the year,” said Lisa Davis, senior vice president at Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry campaign.

    The P-EBT program was launched in the spring of 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic forced schools to close. The funds provided parents with money to buy groceries to make up for the meals their children were missing in school.

    Congress renewed the measure several times, most recently in December as part of the fiscal 2023 spending package. But this final extension cut the benefit to help offset the cost of a permanent summer EBT program that starts next year. Lawmakers also limited it to school-age children – younger kids are not eligible this summer because the Covid-19 public health emergency has ended.

    Last summer, families received $391 – providing a total of $13.7 billion in benefits to 35 million kids, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

    Alaska and South Dakota were the only states not to participate, while Idaho only provided the funds to younger children in day care programs, said Kelsey Boone, a senior child nutrition policy analyst at the Food Research & Action Center.

    Some states have said they don’t have the capacity to administer the summer program this year, according to Boone. However, she points out that each of the eight states participated in the summer P-EBT program either in 2021 or 2022, or both years.

    Mississippi opted not to sign up for this summer’s program now that the Covid-19 public health emergency has ended, the state’s Department of Human Services said.

    “Pandemic Electronic Benefits Transfer (P-EBT) was a supplemental benefit for households with students who temporarily lost access to free or reduced-price school meals due to pandemic-related school closures or distance learning,” the agency said. “Existing pre-pandemic summer feeding programs continue to operate across Mississippi school districts.”

    Alaska, meanwhile, decided not to apply for the summer benefits because of staffing constraints, said Gavin Northey, child nutrition program manager at the state’s Department of Education & Early Development.

    Agencies in the other six states did not return requests for comment.

    Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has urged the states that have yet to sign up for the summer program to do so, noting in a tweet in June that “hunger doesn’t take a break when school is out for the summer.”

    “I encourage these governors to enroll their states and ensure millions of children can receive the nutritional benefits essential to our nation’s economic health and security,” he tweeted.

    In Texas, at least 3.7 million children would be eligible for the summer P-EBT program, said Mia Medina, senior program manager for No Kid Hungry Texas. Some 40% of parents of children in public school experienced food insecurity, including skipping meals or running out of food, in the past 12 months, according to a poll the nonprofit group commissioned earlier this year.

    Last summer, about 3.5 million children in the Lone Star State received a total of more than $1.4 billion in benefits, according to Gov. Greg Abbott’s office.

    Families in Montana are also having a tougher time affording food, said Lorianne Burhop, chief policy officer at the Montana Food Bank Network. Some local pantries are seeing record demand, and parents are visiting multiple times a month.

    Some 32,000 children received a total of $12.5 million in summer P-EBT benefits last year, according to the state Department of Public Health and Human Services. But this year, officials said they were concerned about administering the program and about whether it was needed, according to Burhop.

    “Our state is really missing a key opportunity to help Montana families keep food on the table,” she said.

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  • ‘There is no universal school safety solution.’ Nashville attack renews debate over how best to protect students | CNN

    ‘There is no universal school safety solution.’ Nashville attack renews debate over how best to protect students | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Semiautomatic gunfire echoed in the hallways of The Covenant School, making a distinct noise teachers there would not soon forget.

    That was more than 14 months ago – before three children and three adults were gunned down on Monday in the stately stone school connected to Covenant Presbyterian Church, atop a tree-shrouded hill just south of downtown Nashville.

    The active shooter training session ended with live gunfire intended to familiarize school staff with real gunshots if they ever heard them.

    “Blanks don’t sound the same. They just don’t,” said security consultant Brink Fidler, whose firm conducted the exercise.

    A bullet trap the trainers wheeled around captured the rounds of a semiautomatic pistol and an AR-15-style rifle loaded with real ammunition.

    When a handful of teachers heard the very first shot of Monday’s rampage they initially mistook it for the din of ongoing construction at the building.

    “But then they said, ‘When we heard a few more after that we all knew because we had heard it before,” said Fidler, a former police officer who did a walk-through of the elementary school with Nashville officials on Wednesday – two days after another massacre in America renewed questions about what schools are doing to protect children and staff against mass murder.

    As investigators work to determine the motive for the carnage, students, parents and school leaders across the country are again asking what more can be done to secure schools in the era of active shooter drills, lockdowns and widespread anxiety amid recurring mass shootings.

    Fortified school buildings and entrance doors, glass panes coated in bullet-resistant laminate, locked classrooms and heavy surveillance have became a part of life in places where children are supposed to feel inspired to learn.

    A funeral service for Evelyn Dieckhaus, 9, the first victim to be laid to rest, was held Friday, which would have been the final school day before Easter break for the 200 or so private school students.

    The shooter was a former Covenant School student, who also killed William Kinney and Hallie Scruggs, both 9; Katherine Koonce, the 60-year-old head of the school; Cynthia Peak, a 61-year-old substitute teacher; and Mike Hill, a 61-year-old custodian.

    Police fatally shot the 28-year-old attacker – who was armed with an AR-15 military-style rifle, a 9 mm Kel-Tec SUB2000 pistol caliber carbine, and a 9 mm Smith and Wesson M&P Shield EZ 2.0 handgun – inside the school about 14 minutes after the shooter fired through locked glass doors to enter the building.

    The AR-15 and 9 mm pistol caliber carbine appeared to have 30-round magazines, according to experts who reviewed photos and video released by police.

    Officers were on scene at 10:24 a.m. and fatally shot the attacker three minutes later, police said.

    “The shooter, confronted in the second floor lobby, didn’t even have a chance to get to the classrooms,” said CNN analyst Jennifer Mascia, a writer and founding staffer of The Trace, a non-profit focused on gun violence. “That is something that is very reassuring to parents across the country. However, as we see, even a robust police response is not enough.”

    The attack was the 19th shooting at an American school or university in 2023 in which at least one person was wounded, according to a CNN count. It was the deadliest since the May attack in Uvalde, Texas, left 21 dead. There have been 42 K-12 school shootings since Uvalde, where the gunman fired 100 or so rounds before police breached a classroom more than an hour later and killed the attacker to end the siege.

    Once again, children, their parents and school leaders are left struggling with how to stop and handle mass shootings even though such incidents are rare and schools are still quite safe.

    “What a lot of school leaders have learned is don’t react quickly. You’ve got a lot of pressure to do something right away but it’s really better to be thoughtful,” said Michael Dorn, executive director of Safe Havens International, a nonprofit school safety firm that has evaluated security at thousands of schools.

    “You should assume that you don’t have a good picture of what really happened and what didn’t. Be very skeptical about claims that this saves lives or people died because of that. In Tennessee no one will have a really accurate picture of what happened there for months.”

    Coping with the nightmare scenario of a school shooting is now part of the mission to educate and counsel children.

    It’s been 24 years since the Columbine High School mass shooting left 13 people dead in 1999. And more than a decade since a gunman shot his way through glass at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, and killed six adults and 20 children.

    “We keep repeating the same mistakes because people don’t know what the same mistakes are,” Fidler said. “School resource officers are a great part of the solution. Security laminate – great part of the solution. Cameras – great part of the solution. But if the people in the building don’t know what to do, none of that other stuff means anything.”

    Audrey Hale shot throught the doors at The Covenant School to gain entry.

    Mass shootings have helped fuel a multibillion dollar school security industry in recent years – ranging from high-tech surveillance systems to weapon scanners and hand-held emergency panic devices to immediately alert law enforcement and lock down schools.

    “The message is really simple and it has been since before Nashville,” said Ken Trump, president of National School Safety and Security Services, who was scheduled to speak about school security this weekend at the annual conference of the National School Boards Association in Orlando, Florida. “One of the worst times to make knee jerk policy and administrative actions is after a high profile incident like this when you’re in a highly emotional state.”

    Experts said school officials should not give in to political pressures to take steps that are likely to be ineffective and wasteful of limited resources.

    “We’ve been in schools where, on the positive side, almost every staff member has a two-way walkie talkie, which is good,” Trump said. “And we’ve been in other schools, sometimes in the same district, where they’re sitting in a charger and the principal says, ‘Well, we have them but I prefer to not use them.’ “

    He added, “When security works, it works because of people. When it fails, it fails because of people.”

    Dorn said he has been inundated with emails since Monday from companies “I’ve never heard of,” with offers of technology they claim will heighten security in schools.

    “The three things that every school leader better pay a lot of attention to is, we have limited time, energy and budget for safety,” Dorn said. “So we can’t afford to waste any of that. We can’t spend our budget or training time on something that we don’t have pretty good evidence actually bears fruit. With the caution that nothing’s going to be 100 percent. This idea that we’re gonna stop all school shootings; there’s just, no country has been able to do that.”

    Dorn and others pointed to a 2016 school safety technology report from Johns Hopkins University that found there was insufficient evidence to show devices such as weapons detectors and high-tech alarms and sensors helped curb mass shootings.

    “There is no universal school safety solution – no one technology will solve all school safety and security issues,” the researchers wrote. “The sheer number of schools and school districts across the country – with different geography, funding, building construction and layout, demographics, and priorities – make each one different.”

    Pictures of the victims killed in the mass shooting  at The Covenant School are fixed to a memorial by Noah Reich from the non-profit Classroom of Compassion near the school on Wednesday.

    Fidler and others said more resources should be devoted to educating and training students and school staff on recognizing and responding to threats.

    “I can’t tell you how many of our school clients still have classroom doors that are not lockable from inside the classroom,” he said.

    Referring to training and preparation for catastrophic school events like a mass shooting, Fidler said: “As a society we suck at this – which is terrible, but we do.”

    On Wednesday, two days after the massacre, Fidler did a walk-through of the blood-stained school corridors with investigators. “It was hard, man. I’m struggling,” the law enforcement veteran of nearly 20 years said Saturday. “Some of that blood belonged to people I know.”

    Fidler found that upon recognizing they were under attack teachers and staff relied on their training.

    The shooter fired multiple rounds into several classroom doors but didn’t hit any students inside “because the teachers knew exactly what to do, how to fortify their doors and where to place their children in those rooms,” Fidler said.

    “Their ability to execute, literally flawlessly, under that amount of stress while somebody is trying to murder them and their children, that is what made the difference here,” he said.

    “These teachers are the reason those kids went home to their families.”

    Koonce, the head of the school, had been adamant about training school staff on how to respond during an active shooter situation, Fidler said.

    “She understood the severity of the topic and the severity of the teachers needing to have the knowledge of what to do in that situation,” he said.

    “Katherine went to find out what was happening” when she was shot, Fidler said. “You know, Katherine Koonce, I could have had a lasso around her waist and she would drag me down the hall. She was going to go find out what’s going on and try and figure out what’s best for her students… She went right to it.”

    Metro Nashville Police Chief John Drake could not confirm how Koonce died but said, “I do know she was in the hallway by herself. There was a confrontation, I’m sure. You can tell the way she is lying in the hallway.”

    Fidler said teachers covered windows. They shut off lights. Unused medical kits sat on desks.

    “Countless teachers had their bleeding control kits out, staged and ready to treat people in their classroom,” he recalled.

    “The fact that they had the wherewithal to do that. ‘Ok, I’ve got my kids secure. I’ve got the door locked and barricaded.’ And now, as a teacher, to have the wherewithal to remember the last piece, the medical, because we can potentially save a lot of people. They crushed it. They were able to perform under that amount of stress… They were able to recall all this information and put it into practice.”

    The six shooting victims were trapped in hallways and killed, Fidler said.

    “How many teachers in America could walk into their classroom right now and throw a tourniquet on the table and put that on? How many of them could do it?”

    His message for anxious parents: “Ask questions. Find out what your kids’ school is doing or not doing. And don’t stop asking until something’s done.”

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  • Meta opens up its Horizon Worlds VR app to teens for the first time, prompting outcries from US lawmakers | CNN Business

    Meta opens up its Horizon Worlds VR app to teens for the first time, prompting outcries from US lawmakers | CNN Business

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Meta is forging ahead with plans to let teenagers onto its virtual reality app, Horizon Worlds, despite objections from lawmakers and civil society groups that the technology could have possible unintended consequences for mental health.

    On Tuesday, the social media giant said children as young as 13 in Canada and the United States will gain access to Horizon Worlds for the first time in the coming weeks.

    The app, which is already available to users above the age of 17, represents Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s vision for a next-generation internet, where users can physically interact with each other in virtual spaces resembling real life.

    “Now, teens will be able to explore immersive worlds, play games like Arena Clash and Giant Mini Paddle Golf, enjoy concerts and live comedy events, connect with others from around the world, and express themselves as they create their own virtual experiences,” Meta said in a blog post.

    Zuckerberg has pushed to spend billions developing VR hardware and software, even as Meta has scaled back significantly in other parts of its business. Last year alone, the company spent nearly $16 billion in its Reality Labs segment and warned investors not to expect profitability from that unit anytime soon.

    Tuesday’s expansion reflects Meta’s attempt to capture early adopters in a key demographic. But it immediately triggered criticism from lawmakers who had pleaded with the company to postpone its plan.

    “Meta is despicably attempting to lure young teens to Horizon Worlds in an attempt to boost its failing platform,” said Connecticut Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal, who last month, along with Massachusetts Democratic Sen. Ed Markey, urged Zuckerberg to reconsider letting teens use the app.

    Lawmakers have previously raised alarms about the impact of some of Meta’s other products, including Instagram, on younger users.

    “Meta has a record of abject failure to protect children and teens, and yet again, this company has chosen to put young users at risk so that it can make more money,” Markey said, accusing Meta of “inviting digital disaster.”

    “I’m calling on the company to reverse course and immediately abandon this policy change,” Markey added.

    Those calls were echoed earlier this month by dozens of civil society groups who wrote in an open letter that Meta’s VR offerings could expose users to new privacy risks through the collection of biometric and other data; new forms of unfair and deceptive marketing; and abuse or bullying.

    Meta said in its announcement that in opening up Horizon Worlds to teens, the company would provide protective guardrails, such as by using default settings to make teenage users’ profiles and activity less visible to other users and by applying content ratings to potentially mature virtual spaces. Meta added that its safety controls were developed with input from parents and online safety experts.

    “I hope no one is assuming there is any inclination on our part to simply open the floodgates,” Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of global affairs, told CNN during a recent tech demonstration at the company’s Washington offices. “Clearly we can’t do that. We have to build experiences which are tailored to the unique vulnerabilities of teens.”

    Meta’s announcement Tuesday came as other US government officials said they were beefing up scrutiny of social media’s potential effects on mental health.

    The Federal Trade Commission is “actively working” on hiring in-house psychologists to address concerns linking social media use to teen mental health harms, said Alvaro Bedoya, an FTC commissioner.

    In recent weeks, members of the FTC have been consulting with public health officials and medical professionals to understand the available scientific evidence on the matter, Bedoya told lawmakers on a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee.

    “There is evidence that some uses of social media do, in fact, hurt certain groups of teenagers and children,” Bedoya said, though he cautioned that there were important nuances and caveats in the research. “This is not some moral panic. There is a ‘there’ there.”

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  • Snapchat’s new AI chatbot is already raising alarms among teens and parents | CNN Business

    Snapchat’s new AI chatbot is already raising alarms among teens and parents | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    Less than a few hours after Snapchat rolled out its My AI chatbot to all users last week, Lyndsi Lee, a mother from East Prairie, Missouri, told her 13-year-old daughter to stay away from the feature.

    “It’s a temporary solution until I know more about it and can set some healthy boundaries and guidelines,” said Lee, who works at a software company. She worries about how My AI presents itself to young users like her daughter on Snapchat.

    The feature is powered by the viral AI chatbot tool ChatGPT – and like ChatGPT, it can offer recommendations, answer questions and converse with users. But Snapchat’s version has some key differences: Users can customize the chatbot’s name, design a custom Bitmoji avatar for it, and bring it into conversations with friends.

    The net effect is that conversing with Snapchat’s chatbot may feel less transactional than visiting ChatGPT’s website. It also may be less clear you’re talking to a computer.

    “I don’t think I’m prepared to know how to teach my kid how to emotionally separate humans and machines when they essentially look the same from her point of view,” Lee said. “I just think there is a really clear line [Snapchat] is crossing.”

    The new tool is facing backlash not only from parents but also from some Snapchat users who are bombarding the app with bad reviews in the app store and criticisms on social media over privacy concerns, “creepy” exchanges and an inability to remove the feature from their chat feed unless they pay for a premium subscription.

    While some may find value in the tool, the mixed reactions hint at the risks companies face in rolling out new generative AI technology to their products, and particularly in products like Snapchat, whose users skew younger.

    Snapchat was an early launch partner when OpenAI opened up access to ChatGPT to third-party businesses, with many more expected to follow. Almost overnight, Snapchat has forced some families and lawmakers to reckon with questions that may have seemed theoretical only months ago.

    In a letter to the CEOs of Snap and other tech companies last month, weeks after My AI was released to Snap’s subscription customers, Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet raised concerns about the interactions the chatbot was having with younger users. In particular, he cited reports that it can provide kids with suggestions for how to lie to their parents.

    “These examples would be disturbing for any social media platform, but they are especially troubling for Snapchat, which almost 60 percent of American teenagers use,” Bennet wrote. “Although Snap concedes My AI is ‘experimental,’ it has nevertheless rushed to enroll American kids and adolescents in its social experiment.”

    In a blog post last week, the company said: “My AI is far from perfect but we’ve made a lot of progress.”

    In the days since its formal launch, Snapchat users have been vocal about their concerns. One user called his interaction “terrifying” after he said it lied about not knowing where the user was located. After the user lightened the conversation, he said the chatbot accurately revealed he lived in Colorado.

    In another TikTok video with more than 1.5 million views, a user named Ariel recorded a song with an intro, chorus and piano chords written by My AI about what it’s like to be a chatbot. When she sent the recorded song back, she said the chatbot denied its involvement with the reply: “I’m sorry, but as an AI language model, I don’t write songs.” Ariel called the exchange “creepy.”

    Other users shared concerns about how the tool understands, interacts with and collects information from photos. “I snapped a picture … and it said ‘nice shoes’ and asked who the people [were] in the photo,” a Snapchat user wrote on Facebook.

    Snapchat told CNN it continues to improve My AI based on community feedback and is working to establish more guardrails to keep its users safe. The company also said that similar to its other tools, users don’t have to interact with My AI if they don’t want to.

    It’s not possible to remove My AI from chat feeds, however, unless a user subscribes to its monthly premium service, Snapchat+. Some teens say they have opted to pay the $3.99 Snapchat+ fee to turn off the tool before promptly canceling the service.

    But not all users dislike the feature.

    One user wrote on Facebook that she’s been asking My AI for homework help. “It gets all of the questions right.” Another noted she’s leaned on it for comfort and advice. “I love my little pocket, bestie!” she wrote. “You can change the Bitmoji [avatar] for it and surprisingly it offers really great advice to some real life situations. … I love the support it gives.”

    ChatGPT, which is trained on vast troves of data online, has previously come under fire for spreading inaccurate information, responding to users in ways they might find inappropriate and enabling students to cheat. But Snapchat’s integration of the tool risks heightening some of these issues, and adding new ones.

    Alexandra Hamlet, a clinical psychologist in New York City, said the parents of some of her patients have expressed concern about how their teenager could interact with Snapchat’s tool. There’s also concern around chatbots giving advice and about mental health because AI tools can reinforce someone’s confirmation bias, making it easier for users to seek out interactions that confirm their unhelpful beliefs.

    “If a teen is in a negative mood and does not have the awareness desire to feel better, they may seek out a conversation with a chatbot that they know will make them feel worse,” she said. “Over time, having interactions like these can erode a teens’ sense of worth, despite their knowing that they are really talking to a bot. In an emotional state of mind, it becomes less possible for an individual to consider this type of logic.”

    For now, the onus is on parents to start meaningful conversations with their teens about best practices for communicating with AI, especially as the tools start to show up in more popular apps and services.

    Sinead Bovell, the founder of WAYE, a startup that helps prepare youth for future with advanced technologies, said parents need to make it very clear “chatbots are not your friend.”

    “They’re also not your therapists or a trusted adviser, and anyone interacting with them needs to be very cautious, especially teenagers who may be more susceptible to believing what they say,” she said.

    “Parents should be talking to their kids now about how they shouldn’t share anything personal with a chatbot that they would a friend – even though from a user design perspective, the chatbot exists in the same corner of Snapchat.”

    She added that federal regulation that would require companies to abide by specific protocols is also needed to keep up the rapid pace of AI advancement.

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  • Miami Mayor Francis Suarez files to run for president in 2024 | CNN Politics

    Miami Mayor Francis Suarez files to run for president in 2024 | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Miami GOP Mayor Francis Suarez has filed paperwork to run for president, according to new FEC filings, marking the long-shot candidate’s formal entry to the race.

    Suarez is set to speak Thursday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California. During an appearance on Fox News over the weekend, the mayor said he would make a “major announcement” in the coming weeks and pointed to his remarks at the Reagan Library as “one that Americans should tune in to.”

    Suarez, a Cuban American, is currently in his second term as mayor of Miami, Florida’s second-most populous city. Until recently, he also served as the president of the bipartisan US Conference of Mayors.

    Ahead of his filing, a super PAC supporting Suarez on Wednesday released a two-minute video touting his leadership of the Florida city as he teased a longshot bid for the White House.

    “Conservative mayor Francis Suarez chose a better path for Miami,” the video’s narrator says, highlighting his approach to crime and support for law enforcement.

    The first major Hispanic candidate to enter the Republican race, Suarez starts off as a decided underdog in the primary, with former President Donald Trump, a resident of nearby Palm Beach, and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis towering over the field in polling. The primary also includes former Vice President Mike Pence, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.

    Trump’s recent federal indictment over his alleged mishandling of classified documents after leaving office has also roiled the Republican contest. The former president remains popular with the party base, and candidates have been split in their reactions to the indictment.

    Suarez, who has previously been critical of Trump, told Fox News on Sunday that the news of the former president’s first federal indictment felt “un-American” and “wrong at some level.”

    In an interview with CBS News last month, Suarez said deciding on a presidential bid was a “soul-searching process.” He also nodded to his lack of national name recognition, saying, “I’m someone who needs to be better known by this country.”

    Suarez’s late entry into the GOP primary, relative to other rivals, could affect his chances of qualifying for the first Republican primary debate, scheduled to take place in Milwaukee on August 23. The Republican National Committee has laid out strict polling and donor thresholds that candidates must meet to make the stage.

    Prior to his first election as mayor in 2017, Suarez served a Miami city commissioner for eight years. His father, Xavier Suarez, also served as mayor of Miami in the 1980s and 1990s, though his last victory in 1997 was overturned following an investigation into voter fraud.

    As mayor, Suarez has sought to bring a new era of technology, innovation and entrepreneurship to his city, including promoting industries such as cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence. He has advocated making Miami the new Silicon Valley and even invited Elon Musk to move Twitter headquarters to the city.

    Suarez has also spoken about combating climate change – “It’s not theoretical for us in the city of Miami, it’s real,” he told CBS News last year.

    The mayor has on occasion locked horns with DeSantis, including over the governor’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, his claims of election fraud in the state and, most recently, his feud with Disney.

    Still, Suarez is a proponent of the Florida law championed by DeSantis that critics have dubbed “Don’t Say Gay,” which bans certain instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity in schools. But Disney’s opposition to the measure led DeSantis to plot a takeover of the special taxing district that allowed the entertainment giant to build its iconic theme park empire in Central Florida. The move has alarmed some Republicans, who question whether elected executives should use state power to punish a company.

    Disney announced last month it was scrapping plans to build a $1 billion office campus that is estimated to have created 2,000 white-collar jobs.

    “He took an issue that was a winning issue that we all agreed on,” Suarez told NewsNation in May, “and it looks like now it’s something that’s spite or maybe potentially a personal vendetta, which has cost the state now potentially 2,000 jobs in a billion-dollar investment.”

    When DeSantis proposed a police force to investigate election fraud, Suarez told CNN’s Jake Tapper last year that he didn’t see it “as a major problem in our state, or in our city, frankly.”

    During the pandemic, Suarez opposed DeSantis’ reopening of bars as Covid-19 cases continued to increase in the state. He pointed to “the issue of whether the decisions (made by the state) are data-driven or political.”

    Suarez told the Miami Herald he voted for DeSantis’ Democratic opponent in 2018, but he voted for the governor.

    Suarez’s presidential bid comes as Florida, long a swing state, has been trending red, with Republicans making gains in the past few election cycles, especially among Hispanic voters.

    In 2020, Trump lost Hispanic-majority Miami-Dade County – the state’s most populous county, which includes the city of Miami – by 7 points. Four years earlier, he had lost the county to Hillary Clinton by 30 points. Similarly, last year, DeSantis coasted to reelection, in part due to his success in Miami-Dade, which has historically been a huge source of Democratic votes. DeSantis also won Osceola County in the Orlando area, another recent Democratic stronghold with a large Puerto Rican population.

    In a Fox News op-ed last fall, Suarez said that the GOP success in Miami “can be replicated nationally if Republicans, and all elected officials, learn the lessons we learned about building an inclusive conservative majority.”

    “In Miami, we’ve grown a high-tech economy that delivers results, and voters have responded to our work by voting Republican at all levels, from my nearly 80% re-election results as mayor to the increasing large margins of Republican congressional candidates,” he wrote.

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  • Meta is giving parents more visibility into who their teens are messaging on social media | CNN Business

    Meta is giving parents more visibility into who their teens are messaging on social media | CNN Business

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    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Meta is adding new safeguards and monitoring tools for teens across its social platforms: parental controls on Messenger, suggestions for teens to step away from Facebook after 20 minutes, and nudges urging young night-owl Instagrammers to stop scrolling.

    The features announced Tuesday come as Meta

    (META)
    and other social media platforms face heightened pressure from lawmakers over the impact that their platforms have on younger users, who can be just 13 when they sign up for Meta

    (META)
    ’s apps.

    Messenger, Meta’s instant-messaging app, is adding parental supervision tools for the first time that are similar to those that exist on Instagram already: Parents and guardians can see how much time their teens spend on the chat tool, view and receive updates on their contacts list, and get notified if their teen reports someone.

    Another new feature is the ability for parents and teens to have discussions directly through notifications if their accounts are synced up.

    “We heard from parents and teens about the value they’re seeing from how a two-way dialogue can foster and encourage discussions,” Diana Williams, who oversees product changes for youth and families at Meta, told CNN in an interview.

    On Facebook, Meta will start to nudge teen users to take time away from the app after 20 minutes.

    Instagram will add introduce a new nudge that suggests teens close Instagram if they’re scrolling Reels videos for too long during nighttime hours. The effort builds on existing Instagram features like Quiet Mode, which temporarily holds notifications and lets people know if you’re trying to focus.

    In addition, Instagram is testing a feature that limits how people interact with non-followers. Users must now send an invite to connect with someone if they’re not a follower, and they cannot call the recipient or send photos, videos or voice messages or make calls until the user accepts their request. The feature aims to cut down on unwanted content from strangers, particularly for women, the company said.

    It’s the latest in a series of new tools and guardrails for teens from Meta, following the release of leaked internal documents that found Instagram can negatively impact the mental health of its young users. Instagram, for example, has since introduced an educational hub for parents with resources, tips and articles from experts on user safety.

    The company said it’s also taking a “stricter approach” to the content it recommends to teens and will actively nudge them toward different topics, such as architecture and travel destinations, if they’ve been dwelling on any type of content for too long.

    Few changes have been made to Facebook and Messenger until now. Facebook does, however, have a Safety Center that provides supervision tools and resources, such as articles and advice from leading experts.

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  • Why Anne Hathaway and other women are saying enough to the haters | CNN

    Why Anne Hathaway and other women are saying enough to the haters | CNN

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    Some pop culture moments, as they age, feel more and more like bouts of collective madness. Why did everyone hate Anne Hathaway all of those years ago? Around 2013, despite winning a slew of awards for her role in “Les Miserables,” it seemed the actress couldn’t catch a break. Despite a lack of scandal or outright offensive behavior, she was “the star we love to loathe,” ” the bad kind of theater kid,” “the kind of person who inexplicably bugs people.”

    Since then, the criticism has all but faded from public consciousness, a half-remembered Hollywood fever dream akin to the time everyone ragged on Taylor Swift for writing about her exes or that one 2009 concert when everyone called a perfectly normal-looking Jessica Simpson fat.

    Hathaway hasn’t forgotten, though, and she’s not the only one reminding people that ruthless celebrity criticism – a treasured and lucrative Hollywood pastime – is not as fashionable as it once was.

    At Elle’s 2022 Women in Hollywood event this week, Hathway commented on the bygone “Hathahate” with painful intimacy, saying the outward hatred only increased her inner hatred of herself.

    “When your self-inflicted pain is suddenly amplified back at you, it’s a thing,” she said. The experience taught her to not “hold space” for such language, for herself or anyone else. She also urged others to do the same.

    “You can judge behavior. You can forgive behavior or not,” she said. “But you do not have the right to judge – and especially not hate – someone for existing.”

    Hathaway’s discussion of mental health highlights a relatively new addition to the conversation. Stars have been speaking out against bullying for quite some time, but it has only been in the past few years that we have seen abundant conversations about how fame affects their mental health.

    In her new memoir “Making a Scene,” actress Constance Wu writes about struggling with her identity, and balancing the person she is with the person she thought she had to be to make it in the entertainment business.

    “I write about wanting to be the cool girl in my 20s, not wanting to make a scene,” she told Shondaland. “Because I thought that’s what would make me cool and loved and valued. But it doesn’t work because it’s not authentic.”

    Wu also writes about the sexual harassment she endured on her sitcom “Fresh Off the Boat.”

    “I endured all this sexual harassment and intimidation and abuse the first two years of the show, but then once it was a success, I no longer talked to my abuser, and I was able to continue my job professionally and even joyfully,” she says. “So, I thought I handled it. But I realized that repressed abuse and feelings don’t go away just because you will them to.”

    While the particulars of being a celebrity may be remote to most people, working through trauma and contending with damaging expectations are universal experiences. By discussing these issues head-on, women like Hathaway and Wu are indicating a sea change in celebrity culture.

    Of course, ruthless celebrity gossip isn’t just a favorite pastime of the masses. It’s a lucrative cog in the Hollywood machine. Entire franchises, like Bravo’s “Real Housewives” series, are built around the sport of pitting women against each other in rivalries both real and imagined. But in the same way that some stars are pulling the curtain back on the real effects of bullying and criticism, others are severing these traditions closer to the root.

    Hailey Bieber and Selena Gomez defused longstanding rumors and hate by posing together at the 2022 Academy Museum Gala.

    Social media had a minor meltdown recently when Selena Gomez and Hailey Bieber posed together for the first time at the Academy Museum Gala. To those outside the sphere of Hollywood gossip, this means absolutely nothing. But to those in the know – those that know Gomez is the longtime ex of Bieber’s husband, Justin Bieber, the moment was close to iconic.

    The two women have long been pitted against each other by fans, with Gomez cast as the one that got away and Bieber as the usurping, second-best wife. They have both used their platforms to warn against online hate and harassment, but the proxy feud fueled by their fans has been insistent.

    To see them together, then, was as monumental as a photo op with, say, Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie would have been in the early 2000s, when everyone was “Team Aniston” or “Team Jolie” following the former’s divorce from Brad Pitt.

    In the present media environment, it isn’t necessarily unusual for famous women to show some solidarity with each other, or get personal about the damaging effects of fame. What’s remarkable is seeing fans so eager for and receptive to these developments.

    The comments on photographer Tyrell Hampton’s Instagram post of Gomez and Bieber paint a clear picture of this:

    “Is this what world peace feels like?”

    “Everyone wants them to hate each other so badly, and for what?”

    “I’m proud of them.”

    They’re not dissimilar to the social media reactions that followed Hathaway’s recent comments.

    “Why did everyone hate Anne Hathaway for no reason?”

    “They were just being haters.”

    It’s one thing for stars to reveal how cruel the churn of celebrity gossip can be. More often, we are seeing fans listen and agree, interrogating their own role in these obsessions. Together, both sides of the screen are searching for a more positive relationship with fame.

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  • The crisis pregnancy center next door: How taxpayer money intended for poor families is funding a growing anti-abortion movement | CNN

    The crisis pregnancy center next door: How taxpayer money intended for poor families is funding a growing anti-abortion movement | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    A few blocks from the Ohio State University campus in Columbus, America’s battle over abortion is playing out under one roof.

    On one side of a squat single-story office building, a Planned Parenthood clinic offers reproductive health care and refers patients for abortions. Next door is a branch of Pregnancy Decision Health Center, a crisis pregnancy center that offers counseling and support for pregnant women – but also works to dissuade them from terminating their pregnancies and has been accused of promoting misinformation about abortion.

    Of the two neighboring organizations, only Planned Parenthood provides medical services such as Pap smears, birth control and STD treatments.

    But the crisis pregnancy center is the one receiving money from the state government. Ohio has funneled nearly $14 million in taxpayer funds to the center and others like it over the last decade, according to government records – even as state leaders have cut funding that previously went to Planned Parenthood for programs such as breast and cervical cancer screenings. 

    Ohio isn’t alone. More than a dozen states devote some of their budget to funding crisis pregnancy centers, a CNN review found. About half of those states distribute federal money intended to help needy families to the centers.

    Some of the organizations that receive money have been accused of spreading abortion misinformation or using the funds to advocate anti-abortion causes instead of helping women. 

    “Public dollars should go to promoting public health,” said Ashley Underwood, the director of Equity Forward, an abortion rights advocacy group. Crisis pregnancy centers, she said, “solely exist to deter people from getting abortion services.”

    Since the US Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade this summer, a wave of abortion restrictions has swept the country, leaving millions of women with easier access to crisis pregnancy centers than abortion care. Crisis pregnancy centers far outnumbered abortion clinics across the US even before the court’s ruling, and anti-abortion groups are now planning to expand. 

    Pregnancy center leaders and their state government allies say the organizations deserve taxpayer funds because they provide pregnant women with resources like free diapers and ultrasounds. But some of the centers also lie to women about the safety and potential risks of abortion, according to multiple studies, abortion rights activists, and women who have been to the centers. 

    That kind of deception isn’t typical in any other area of health care, said Dr. Amy Addante, an Illinois OB-GYN who performs abortions and has been a vocal critic of crisis pregnancy centers.

    “The purpose of these centers is to try to stop someone from having an abortion,” said Addante. “I cannot think of any other medical decision or any other aspect of health care where there is a group of individuals whose only intent is to stop you from receiving that health care.”

    Big open windows invite patients and passersby into the waiting room at the Pregnancy Decision Health Center (PDHC). With velvety green chairs, leafy plants, and a coffee station that greets visitors as they come in the door, the crisis pregnancy center could pass for an upscale dental office or spa.

    Outside, PDHC’s sign towers over the neighboring Planned Parenthood, literally casting a shadow over the clinic’s entrance. Inside, the contrast is even starker: Planned Parenthood’s waiting room looks run-down – old chairs crowd the small space, faded informational posters cover the walls, and daylight is blocked by signage on the windows and mirrored doors meant to protect patients’ privacy.

    Multiple times a week, patients looking for Planned Parenthood mistakenly walk through PDHC’s doors, according to a Planned Parenthood clinician, Jennifer, who asked CNN not to use her last name out of security concerns. Some patients have told Planned Parenthood that PDHC employees told them abortion wasn’t safe or said PDHC tried to delay them and make them late for their Planned Parenthood appointments.

    Lillian Williams is the vice president of health services of Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio.

    “They’ve provided an array of misinformation, whether it’s about abortion care or even about contraceptive services,” said Lillian Williams, the vice president of health services of Planned Parenthood of Greater Ohio.

    Ayla Krueger, a 23-year-old Columbus resident, visited PDHC earlier this month with a friend who was seeking an STD test. She said that during their hour-and-a-half visit, an employee claimed that condoms were only 50% effective, the spread of STDs could only be prevented if people followed “God’s plan” of avoiding sex before marriage, and that if a woman who has an STD gets an abortion, “your STDs travel up your cervix into your organs and could kill you.”

    “I was dumbfounded,” Krueger said of the encounter. “My heart was breaking, thinking about girls who don’t understand what they’re walking into there… and possibly getting coerced.”

    Experts said that the center’s rhetoric was not medically accurate. “We do worry about ascending infections in abortions and pregnancy, but the risk is really, really low,” said Dr. Jonas Swartz, an OB-GYN and professor at Duke University Medical Center. “Crisis pregnancy centers regularly overstate the risk of abortions and this is just one example of that.”

    The center also offers “abortion pill reversal,” according to its website, annual reports and pamphlets at the office. Abortion reversal is a medically dubious, unproven treatment that purports to undo a medication abortion but has been denounced by medical groups and found to be dangerous by researchers. A clinical trial that attempted to study abortion reversal was halted prematurely in 2019 when several participants suffered hemorrhaging.

    Kathy Scanlon, PDHC’s president, declined an interview request and didn’t respond to CNN’s questions about Krueger’s allegations or abortion pill reversal.

    “Every woman deserves care and compassion when facing an unexpected pregnancy,” Scanlon wrote in an email, adding that the center provides “practical pregnancy care and support ranging from free pregnancy tests and ultrasounds to parenting education classes and much-needed baby items” such as diapers and car seats.

    Anti-abortion signs sit on a table during the Ohio March for Life in Columbus.

    Research has found that crisis pregnancy centers commonly disseminate misinformation. A study released last year by The Alliance, an abortion rights advocacy group, found that almost two-thirds of crisis pregnancy centers in nine states promoted false or biased information about abortion on their websites. That included false claims that abortions increased the risk of cancer or infertility.  More than a third of clinics also advertised that they offered abortion pill reversal – and state-funded clinics were more likely than privately-funded ones to offer the unproven procedure and less likely to offer prenatal care, according to the study. 

    Similarly, a 2012 academic study of crisis pregnancy centers in North Carolina found that 86% of centers promoted false or misleading medical information on their websites. 

    Crisis pregnancy center leaders say they are working to help women. Peggy Hartshorn, who founded the Columbus center and is now the chair of Heartbeat International, one of the largest global networks of crisis pregnancy centers, said the allegations that the groups spread misinformation are “a false narrative.”

    She said that the information her centers provide to clients is “very well-researched, medically referenced – we document everything with multiple sources.”

    “Deep down in their hearts, women do not want to have abortion,” Hartshorn said. “Pregnancy centers are good for America, they really are.”

    In Ohio, a new six-week abortion ban that went into effect after the Supreme Court decision, is currently on hold amid court battles. The Planned Parenthood clinic near Ohio State University doesn’t perform abortions – it refers patients to a Planned Parenthood surgical center on the other side of town that does.

    The waiting room in the Planned Parenthood near campus.

    That facility, too, has a state-funded crisis pregnancy center operating across the street. On a recent afternoon, a handful of protesters lined the clinic’s fence with signs depicting bloody fetuses and shouted “you are already a mother” and “abortion is murder” whenever a patient came within earshot. One protester – wearing a reflective vest and holding a clipboard, similar to Planned Parenthood volunteers – tried to direct patients away from the abortion clinic and to the crisis pregnancy center across the street. The center told CNN the protesters weren’t affiliated with their organization.

    It’s not rare for pregnancy centers to operate near abortion clinics. More than 100 pregnancy centers around the country are located within 200 meters of an abortion clinic or Planned Parenthood location, according to a CNN analysis. Some – in states like Delaware, Indiana and Michigan – are next door to clinics. 

    Abortion rights advocates say the intention is to mislead women and block them from accessing abortion.  

    “The purpose of co-locating near a legitimate provider is to intercept someone seeking legitimate health care and divert them into walking through their doors instead,” said Tara Murtha, the co-author of a report about pregnancy centers and a spokesperson for the Women’s Law Project. “It’s basically an obstacle course and a systemic barrier to abortion care.”

    Despite the groups’ apparent spreading of misinformation, at least 18 states have funded crisis pregnancy centers with taxpayer money, according to a CNN review of government records and statements from state agencies. The largest is Texas, which has sent more than $200 million to the groups over the last decade. 

    More than a half-dozen states bankroll crisis pregnancy centers at least partly with funds from Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), a federal welfare program. Those federal funds are sent to states as a block grant, which gives state officials wide latitude in how to spend it, including on programs like “alternatives to abortion” grants for crisis pregnancy centers. 

    Research has shown that a smaller percentage of poor families are now receiving cash assistance from the TANF program than in previous decades.

    While about 68% of families with children in poverty received cash assistance through TANF in 1996, when the program was created, that percentage declined to just 21% by 2020, according to a study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan think tank. The percentage was even lower in some of the GOP-dominated states that use TANF funding to support crisis pregnancy centers, such as Texas and Louisiana.

    “When you look at successes in reducing poverty by strengthening the safety net, cash assistance is the most effective way to help families,” said Aditi Shrivastava, who co-authored the study. “We are seeing states spend less of their money directly on cash assistance, and we don’t think that is what the program should be doing.”

    In the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, some states are piloting new efforts to fund crisis pregnancy centers. Lawmakers in Arkansas and Iowa approved state funding for such groups for the first time this year.

    The states have argued that crisis pregnancy centers deserve taxpayer funding because they provide services to pregnant women in need. 

    “If we are going to be the most pro-life state in the union, we have to be prepared when those mothers come to a facility and they need help,” Arkansas state Rep. Robin Lundstrum said at a legislative hearing about the state’s new program earlier this year.

    In Columbus, Pregnancy Decision Health Center is receiving more than $528,000 from the state government in the current fiscal year, according to government records. All of that comes from federal TANF funds. The funding amounts for about a fourth of the center’s total revenue, while the rest comes from private donations, according to the group’s most recent tax records available.

    People participate in the Ohio March for Life.

    Despite the large amounts of money, there’s little oversight of how the taxpayer dollars are being used. 

    Many of the appropriations are written into spending bills passed by GOP-dominated state legislatures. Pennsylvania, for example, has sent more than $70 million over the last decade to crisis pregnancy centers through Real Alternatives, an anti-abortion group that distributes state funding to crisis pregnancy centers. 

    A 2017 report by the state auditor general found that Real Alternatives used hundreds of thousands of dollars of the money it received from Pennsylvania “to fund its activities in other states,” in what the auditor said was an example of the group “siphoning funds intended to benefit Pennsylvania women.” Real Alternatives denied the allegations in a statement, saying that they had “no basis in fact or law.”

    Michigan, which had contracted with Real Alternatives to distribute funding for crisis pregnancy centers, canceled its contract after Gov. Gretchen Whitmer vetoed the funding for it in 2019. In a letter about the veto, Whitmer thanked a watchdog group that had issued a report accusing the organization of only helping a fraction of the pregnant women it had agreed to support.

    Real Alternatives, which also receives TANF money from Indiana, said the Michigan report was “riddled with inaccuracies, distortions, half-truths and defamatory statements.”

    A bill in the Ohio legislature that would have required crisis pregnancy centers receiving state funding to provide their clients with only medically accurate information died in committee in multiple recent legislative sessions. The state’s GOP legislative leaders did not respond to requests for comment.

    Meanwhile, some of the same red states that have bankrolled crisis pregnancy centers have stripped funding from Planned Parenthood. In Ohio, for example, the group never received state funding for abortions, but for years it received money for other services like cancer screenings, STD prevention and treatment, and sex education for teens.

    In 2016, however, Ohio lawmakers banned the state from funding any organization that performs abortions, and the law went into effect after it was upheld by a federal appeals court in 2019. That meant that Planned Parenthood affiliates in Ohio lost about $600,000 a year in state funding, and led to the cancellation of some of their non-abortion health programs.

    While Planned Parenthood does receive some additional reimbursements through Ohio’s Medicaid program for providing non-abortion health care to people on Medicaid plans, it no longer receives state grants.

    Planned Parenthood also lost additional federal funding under Title X, a program that funds birth control and reproductive health services, under a Trump administration rule. But the organization started receiving that money again this year after the Biden administration reversed the rule.

    Maria Gallo, a sexual and reproductive health epidemiologist at Ohio State University, said that state funding for crisis pregnancy centers shows how conservative lawmakers prioritize anti-abortion rhetoric over medical care for women.

    “It’s dangerous in part because they are legitimizing (crisis pregnancy centers),” Gallo said. “They are legitimizing that as a source of medical care when they’re not licensed medical facilities.”

    Crisis pregnancy centers drastically outnumber abortion clinics in the United States. There were 790 abortion clinics operating in 2021, compared with about 2,600 crisis pregnancy centers, according to a database compiled by Reproaction, an abortion-rights group.

    That disparity is only likely to grow in the wake of the Supreme Court decision. Hartshorn, the chair of Heartbeat International, said the organization has created an online training program to help people open new pregnancy centers, especially in places without existing ones.

    “We need more people, we need more places, and we need more paths to pregnancy health,” Hartshorn said.

    Thank you notes are displayed in the Planned Parenthood in Columbus.

    A study by the National Center for Responsive Philanthropy found that the groups have taken in more and more money in recent years: They received over $1 billion in revenue in 2019, the most recent year data was available, compared to about $771 million in 2015. 

    Several women who went to state-funded crisis pregnancy centers told CNN they felt misled and manipulated by the groups, and disturbed that they were getting taxpayer money.

    Last year, a woman who asked to be identified by her middle name, Eve, had just lost her job when she suspected she might be pregnant. She and her boyfriend went to Women’s Care Center in Columbus after finding the group on Google. Money was tight, and she chose the center – which is receiving more than $700,000 from the state of Ohio in the current fiscal year – because it promised free pregnancy testing. 

    Eve’s test was positive, and she asked the staff about an abortion. She said they handed her a pamphlet that warned her the procedure could cause infertility – though abortion doesn’t typically affect a person’s ability to become pregnant in the future. For three hours, Eve said the staff pressured her to carry the pregnancy to term.

    “It became very clear that they were against abortion really quickly,” said Eve, who left the center feeling upset and later got an abortion. The center didn’t respond to questions about Eve’s visit but said in an email they are “absolutely committed to accuracy, excellence and transparency in all we do.”

    One day, Eve said she hopes to have kids. But at the time, she didn’t feel financially or emotionally stable enough to have a baby.

    “Nobody wants to make a decision to have an abortion,” Eve said. “And they made me feel really guilty and bad about it.”

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