ReportWire

Tag: iab-law

  • Biden’s student loan policies continue to face legal challenges | CNN Politics

    Biden’s student loan policies continue to face legal challenges | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Legal challenges are continuing to target some of President Joe Biden’s student loan policies.

    While the president’s major student loan forgiveness program was blocked by the Supreme Court in late June, the Biden administration is also facing lawsuits over some of its other policy changes aimed at making it easier for borrowers to pay back their loans.

    On Monday, the US 5th Circuit Court of Appeals temporarily blocked new provisions that were meant to be implemented in July, which would make it easier for borrowers to get their debts erased when they’re misled or defrauded by their college under a rule known as borrower defense to repayment.

    The rule has been in place for decades. But the lawsuit targets new provisions – including one allowing for automatic debt discharges a year after a college’s closure date and another that bans colleges from requiring borrowers to agree to mandatory arbitration – which are now blocked.

    The emergency injunction request was made by Career Colleges and Schools of Texas, a group of for-profit universities. The appeals court order did not explain the reasoning for the decision but said that the case will be heard on November 6.

    Student loan borrowers may still submit applications for debt relief under the borrower defense rule during this time, but the Department of Education “will not adjudicate or process affected applications under the new regulations while the court’s order is in place,” according to the agency’s website.

    Aaron Ament, president of the nonprofit National Student Legal Defense Network, warned that “countless students are at risk of being taken advantage of by higher ed profiteers” until the protections are restored.

    Meanwhile, in a separate lawsuit filed last week, two conservative groups sued to stop the Biden administration from carrying out a one-time adjustment to some borrowers’ accounts, which was aimed at more accurately counting certain payments made previously under an income-driven repayment plan.

    These plans calculate payments based on a borrower’s income and family size – regardless of the person’s total outstanding debt. Generally, they lower monthly payments to help borrowers avoid defaulting on their loans and wipe away remaining balances after qualifying payments are made for 20 to 25 years.

    What the administration has referred to as “fixes” are expected to result in the cancellation of $39 billion worth of federal student loan debt for 804,000 borrowers, according to the Department of Education.

    The lawsuit, which was filed by the New Civil Liberties Alliance on behalf of the conservative groups Cato Institute and the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, argues that one-time adjustment “is substantively and procedurally unlawful” – similar, it says, to the broader student loan forgiveness program struck down by the Supreme Court.

    The Department of Education announced in July – weeks after the other forgiveness program was blocked – that it would begin to notify the 804,000 borrowers of their forthcoming debt cancellation.

    But the one-time adjustment had been planned for more than a year. First announced in April 2022, the move was meant to help borrowers whose payments were miscounted and were already eligible for debt relief under an income-driven repayment plan.

    The changes followed a Government Accountability Office report that found that the Department of Education had trouble tracking borrowers’ payments and hadn’t done enough to ensure that all eligible borrowers receive the forgiveness to which they are entitled. In fact, 7,700 loans in repayment, or about 11% of loans analyzed, could have potentially already been eligible for forgiveness.

    In a statement sent to CNN, the Department of Education said the lawsuit “is nothing but a desperate attempt from right wing special interests to keep hundreds of thousands of borrowers in debt, even though these borrowers have earned the forgiveness that is promised through income-driven repayment plans.”

    This latest legal challenge does not appear to immediately impact the Biden administration’s new income-driven repayment plan known as SAVE (Saving on a Valuable Education), which launched last week.

    Once the SAVE plan is fully phased in, which is expected to happen next year, some borrowers could see their monthly bills cut in half and remaining debt canceled after making at least 10 years of payments.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • First on CNN: Fulton County DA to present Trump election subversion case to grand jury early next week | CNN Politics

    First on CNN: Fulton County DA to present Trump election subversion case to grand jury early next week | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    An Atlanta-area prosecutor has notified at least two witnesses to appear before a grand jury early next week, the most significant indication of her intention to seek indictments in the investigation of how Donald Trump and others tried to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia.

    Former Georgia Lt. Gov Geoff Duncan, a Republican, said Saturday on CNN that he has been told to appear Tuesday before a Fulton County grand jury to testify about the efforts by Trump and his allies. Independent journalist George Chidi posted on social media later Saturday that he’d been told to appear before the grand jury on Tuesday, too.

    The upcoming appearances signal that Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis is moving forward with a grand jury presentation where she’s expected to seek charges against more than a dozen people stemming from her investigation into the efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

    The Fulton County probe brings the possibility of a fourth indictment against Trump, taking the GOP frontrunner even further into uncharted legal territory. Trump’s legal troubles have dominated the Republican primary for months, with the former president casting his indictments as politically motivated and frequently utilizing them in fundraising pitches.

    “I did just receive notification to appear on Tuesday morning at the Fulton County grand jury and I certainly will be there to do my part in recounting the facts,” Duncan, a CNN contributor, told CNN’s Fredricka Whitfield on Saturday.

    “I have no expectations as to the questions, and I’ll certainly answer whatever questions are put in front of me,” Duncan said.

    Willis, an elected Democrat, has been eyeing conspiracy and racketeering charges in her probe, which would allow her to bring a case against multiple defendants. The wide-ranging criminal investigation has focused on efforts to pressure state election officials, the plot to put forward fake electors and a breach of voting systems in rural Coffee County, Georgia.

    A spokesperson for Willis declined to comment on Saturday.

    The expected charges would mark the culmination of a nearly three-year investigation, which Willis launched in early 2021 soon after Trump called Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger and pressured the Republican to “find” the votes necessary for Trump to win the state.

    At a campaign event earlier this week, Trump continued to insist it was a “perfect phone call.”

    The charges in Georgia would follow special counsel Jack Smith’s federal charges against Trump over efforts to overturn the 2020 election, as well as the special counsel’s indictment of Trump for the mishandling of classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida and New York state criminal charges over falsified business records. Trump denies wrongdoing in all cases.

    The witnesses Willis has subpoenaed to testify when she presents her case include Duncan, Chidi and former Georgia state Sen. Jen Jordan, a Democrat. All of them previously testified before a special purpose grand jury tasked with investigating the Trump case, which heard from more than 75 witnesses in all.

    Georgia law is unusual in that special purpose grand juries – which have broad investigative powers – are not permitted to issue indictments. When the subpoenaed witnesses appear before the regular grand jury, those grand jurors will hear the witnesses’ testimony for the first time with a narrower purpose at hand: to approve or reject indictments.

    As her investigation has expanded, Willis has been weighing racketeering charges in the Trump case. RICO – the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act – is a statute the district attorney has spoken fondly of and used in unorthodox ways to bring charges against teachers as well as musicians in the Atlanta area.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Lyft and Uber say they will leave Minneapolis if the mayor signs a minimum wage bill for drivers | CNN Business

    Lyft and Uber say they will leave Minneapolis if the mayor signs a minimum wage bill for drivers | CNN Business

    [ad_1]


    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Lyft and Uber threatened to stop doing business in Minneapolis after the city council adopted a new rule Thursday that would set a minimum wage for rideshare drivers.

    In a 7-5 vote, the Minneapolis City Council passed an ordinance that includes a number of rideshare worker protections, including a minimum wage for Uber and Lyft drivers. Mayor Jacob Frey has the opportunity to veto the ordinance and has until next Wednesday, August 23, to do so.

    The proposed ordinance mandates at least $1.40 per mile and $0.51 per minute within Minneapolis be paid to drivers. Minneapolis is debating the minimum wage as gig workers across the country are advocating for fair wages and job benefits. In recent years, states and cities have attempted to pass legislation regarding the growing “gig economy,” or freelance work through apps like Uber and Grubhub, but have generally met with fierce opposition.

    On Tuesday, Lyft sent a letter to the council saying “Should this proposal become law, Lyft will be forced to cease operations in the City of Minneapolis on its effective date of January 1, 2024.”

    Lyft, according to a statement sent to CNN Thursday, said the bill would be detrimental to drivers, who would ultimately earn less, “because prices could double and only the most wealthy could still afford a ride.”

    The company said the bill had been “jammed through the Council” and urged Frey to veto the bill and instead allow time for the state’s rideshare task force to complete its research.

    Uber sent an email to its drivers on Monday, urging them to contact the Mayor and City Council to ask them to oppose the move. Uber said its drivers sent over 700 emails on Thursday, but did not specify what was in those emails.

    In its email, Uber said the legislation could “greatly limit” its ability to remove unsafe drivers from the platform and increase the cost of rides.

    “If this bill were to pass, we would unfortunately have no choice but to greatly reduce service, and possibly shut down operations entirely,” Uber wrote.

    In an email to City Council on Wednesday, Frey said he was concerned about the ordinance.

    “This ordinance stands to significantly impact our city in terms of worker protections, public safety, disability rights, and transportation mode shift goals,” he said. After meeting with a broad group of stakeholders, Frey said “It is clear that we must allow more time for deliberation.”

    After the ordinance passed on Thursday, Ally Peters, spokesperson for the Office of Mayor Frey told CNN via email, “As the mayor laid out in his letter to the City Council yesterday, he supports drivers being paid more.

    In recent years, states have attempted to pass legislation regarding the growing “gig economy,” or freelance work through apps like Uber and Grubhub.

    In 2020, California passed Prop. 22, backed by more than $200 million from the most influential gig economy companies. The controversial ballot measure allows the companies to treat drivers as independent contractors rather as employees. Though it was a major win for the likes of Uber and Lyft, it did include a minimum earnings guarantee (though it doesn’t include the time a driver spends waiting for a gig).

    In June, New York City announced a new minimum pay-rate for app food delivery workers amid the rise in use of services like Uber Eats and DoorDash since the pandemic. Uber and other food delivery apps sued the city in July, maintaining that the law would hurt delivery workers more than help them.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Large US tech companies face new EU rules | CNN Business

    Large US tech companies face new EU rules | CNN Business

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The world’s largest tech companies must comply with a sweeping new European law starting Friday that affects everything from social media moderation to targeted advertising and counterfeit goods in e-commerce — with possible ripple effects for the rest of the world.

    The unprecedented EU measures for online platforms will apply to companies including Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Snapchat and TikTok, among many others, reflecting one of the most comprehensive and ambitious efforts by policymakers anywhere to regulate tech giants through legislation. It could lead to fines for some companies and to changes in software affecting consumers.

    The rules seek to address some of the most serious concerns that critics of large tech platforms have raised in recent years, including the spread of misinformation and disinformation; possible harms to mental health, particularly for young people; rabbit holes of algorithmically recommended content and a lack of transparency; and the spread of illegal or fake products on virtual marketplaces.

    Although the European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA) passed last year, companies have had until now to prepare for its enforcement. Friday marks the arrival of a key compliance deadline — after which tech platforms with more than 45 million EU users will have to meet the obligations laid out in the law.

    The EU also says the law intends “to establish a level playing field to foster innovation, growth and competitiveness both in the European Single Market and globally.” The action reinforces Europe’s position as a leader in checking the power of large US tech companies.

    For all platforms, not just the largest ones, the DSA bans data-driven targeted advertising aimed at children, as well as targeted ads to all internet users based on protected characteristics such as political affiliation, sexual orientation and ethnicity. The restrictions apply to all kinds of online ads, including commercial advertising, political advertising and issue advertising. (Some platforms had already in recent years rolled out restrictions on targeted advertising based on protected characteristics.)

    The law bans so-called “dark patterns,” or the use of subtle design cues that may be intended to nudge consumers toward giving up their personal data or making other decisions that a company might prefer. An example of a dark pattern commonly cited by consumer groups is when a company tries to persuade a user to opt into tracking by highlighting an acceptance button with bright colors, while simultaneously downplaying the option to opt out by minimizing that choice’s font size or placement.

    The law also requires all online platforms to offer ways for users to report illegal content and products and for them to appeal content moderation decisions. And it requires companies to spell out their terms of service in an accessible manner.

    For the largest platforms, the law goes further. Companies designated as Very Large Online Platforms or Very Large Online Search Engines will be required to undertake independent risk assessments focused on, for example, how bad actors might try to manipulate their platforms, or use them to interfere with elections or to violate human rights — and companies must act to mitigate those risks. And they will have to set up repositories of the ads they’ve run and allow the public to inspect them.

    Just a handful of companies are considered very large platforms under the law. But the list finalized in April includes the most powerful tech companies in the world, and, for those firms, violations can be expensive. The DSA permits EU officials to issue fines worth up to 6% of a very large platform’s global annual revenue. That could mean billions in fines for a company as large as Meta, which last year reported more than $116 billion in revenue.

    Companies have spent months preparing for the deadline. As recently as this month, TikTok rolled out a tool for reporting illegal content and said it would give EU users specific explanations when their content is removed. It also said it would stop showing ads to teens in Europe based on the data the company has collected on them, all to comply with the DSA rules.

    “We’ve been supportive of the objectives of the DSA and the creation of a regulatory regime in Europe that minimizes harm,” said Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of global affairs and a former deputy prime minister of the UK, in a statement Tuesday. He said Meta assembled a 1,000-person team to prepare for DSA requirements. He outlined several efforts by the company including limits on what data advertisers can see on teens ages 13 to 17 who use Facebook and Instagram. He said advertisers can no longer target the teens based on their activity on those platforms. “Age and location is now the only information about teens that advertisers can use to show them ads,” he said.

    In a statement, a Microsoft spokesperson told CNN the DSA deadline “is an important milestone in the fight against illegal content online. We are mindful of our heightened responsibilities in the EU as a major technology company and continue to work with the European Commission on meeting the requirements of the DSA.”

    Snapchat parent Snap told CNN that it is working closely with the European Commission to ensure the company is compliant with the new law. Snap has appointed several dedicated compliance employees to monitor whether it is living up to its obligations, the company said, and has already implemented several safeguards.

    And Apple said in a statement that the DSA’s goals “align with Apple’s goals to protect consumers from illegal and harmful content. We are working to implement the requirements of the DSA with user privacy and security as our continued North Star.”

    Google and Pinterest told CNN they have also been working closely with the European Commission.

    “We share the DSA’s goals of making the internet even more safe, transparent and accountable, while making sure that European users, creators and businesses continue to enjoy the benefits of the web,” a Google spokesperson said.

    A Pinterest spokesperson said the company would “continue to engage with the European Commission on the implementation of the DSA to ensure a smooth transition into the new legal framework.” The spokesperson added: “The wellbeing, safety and privacy of our users is a priority and we will continue to build on our efforts.”

    Many companies should be able to comply with the law, given their existing policies, teams and monitoring tools, according to Robert Grosvenor, a London-based managing director at the consulting firm Alvarez & Marsal. “Europe’s largest online service providers are not starting from ground zero,” Grosvenor said. But, he added: “Whether they are ready to become a highly regulated sector is another matter.”

    EU officials have signaled they will be scrutinizing companies for violations. Earlier this summer, European officials performed preemptive “stress tests” of X, the company formerly known as Twitter, as well as Meta and TikTok to determine the companies’ readiness for the DSA.

    For much of the year, EU Commissioner Thierry Breton has been publicly reminding X of its coming obligations as the company has backslid on some of its content moderation practices. Even as Breton concluded that X was taking its stress test seriously in June, the company had just lost a top content moderation official and had withdrawn from a voluntary EU commitment on disinformation that European officials had said would be part of any evaluation of a platform’s compliance with the DSA.

    X told CNN ahead of Friday’s deadline that it was on track to comply with the new law.

    Analysts anticipate that the EU will be watching even more closely after the deadline — and some hope that the rules will either encourage tech platforms to replicate their practices in the EU voluntarily around the world or else drive policymakers to adopt similar measures.

    “We hope that these new laws will inspire other jurisdictions to act because these are, after all, global companies which apply many of the same practices worldwide,” said Agustin Reyna, head of legal and economic affairs at BEUC, a European consumer advocacy group. “Europe got the ball rolling, but we need other jurisdictions to win the match against tech giants.”

    Already, Amazon has sought to challenge the very large platform label in court, arguing that the DSA’s requirements are geared toward ad-based online speech platforms, that Amazon is a retail platform and that none of its direct rivals in Europe have likewise been labeled, despite being larger than Amazon within individual EU countries.

    The legal fights could present the first major test of the DSA’s durability in the face of Big Tech’s enormous resources. Amazon told CNN that it plans to comply with the EU General Court’s decision, either way.

    “Amazon shares the goal of the European Commission to create a safe, predictable and trusted online environment, and we invest significantly in protecting our store from bad actors, illegal content, and in creating a trustworthy shopping experience,” an Amazon spokesperson said. “We have built on this strong foundation for DSA compliance.”

    TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment on this story.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Why Biden and Trump need each other in order to win in 2024 | CNN Politics

    Why Biden and Trump need each other in order to win in 2024 | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]

    A version of this story appears in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    Here is an often-repeated claim you’ll hear from reporters and analysts: Former President Donald Trump’s control over the Republican primary field solidified not in spite of, but because of, his four criminal indictments.

    It is a catch-22; the effort to seek accountability for his effort to stay in power despite his 2020 election loss has actually made him more politically powerful in the GOP heading into 2024.

    I went to CNN’s senior data reporter, Harry Enten, for his assessment of whether polling data bears out the claim. Did indicting Trump put him on a glide path to the Republican nomination?

    Enten’s thoughts on that point are below. But my main takeaway from our conversation actually has to do with his compelling argument that in a potential general election rematch, both President Joe Biden and Trump could be so unpopular that they need each other in order to have a chance at winning.

    It’s a symbiotic, needs-based relationship to make most Americans groan on their way to the voting booth. Can’t wait for 2024!

    Our full conversation, conducted by email, is below.

    WOLF: I have heard reporters suggest that Trump’s hold on the Republican nomination was strengthened by his four indictments. Is there data to support that?

    ENTEN: There’s actually been a lot of debate about this in polling, polling analysis and political science circles. What we know is Trump is ahead by more now than he was at the beginning of the year. The question is when exactly did that jump in the polls occur?

    Some polls (such as Fox News) seem to indicate it happened largely before any of the indictments occurred. Others (such as Quinnipiac University) seem to show a large jump post-indictment.

    On the whole, the average of polling indicates Trump did see a small bump (somewhere roughly between 5 and 10 points) in his primary polling after the first indictment in New York.

    To be clear, Trump would likely still be well ahead without any indictment bump. It’s just that he’d be in the mid- to high-40s instead of the low- to mid-50s.

    WOLF: Trump has been indicted four separate times:

    Is there anything to suggest that one or another of these indictments had a larger or smaller effect on his standing?

    ENTEN: You’ll notice in my previous answer I specifically mentioned New York. I haven’t seen any demonstrable evidence that any other indictment except the first one (maybe) gave Trump a boost. It doesn’t appear that any of the other indictments hurt his standing though.

    I will further point out that I’m talking about polling here. There’s been any number of articles written about Trump pulling in more fundraising after the different indictments. That doesn’t seem to have stopped, regardless of the charges.

    WOLF: Trump’s DC trial will get underway on March 4, the day before Super Tuesday. Is there any way for the outcome of these trials to affect the Republican primary?

    ENTEN: Funny enough, I was talking about this the other day with someone. I think the question is almost impossible to answer because this is (pardon me for saying) unprecedented. What we know from the data is that Republicans think the charges are politically motivated and haven’t moved Trump’s polling lead.

    Keep in mind Trump is not reliant on traditional campaigning in the way you might remember some candidates of past years doing retail campaigning. He’s going to dominate the media landscape and going to leave little media oxygen for the other GOP candidates.

    The only thing I can think of really shifting things would be a possible conviction, but I doubt any of the cases will move fast enough for that to happen.

    WOLF: Has a person with a Trump-level polling lead one year before Election Day ever blown it and not won the party’s nomination?

    ENTEN: The answer here is no, as measured by the margin between the leading candidate (Trump) and the candidate in second (Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis). Trump’s up by 40 points or so, which is one of the largest leads ever at this point.

    If you look at Trump’s share of the vote (in the 50s), then you could make the case that Ted Kennedy (who was in the 50s) blew his advantage over incumbent Jimmy Carter at this point.

    The Kennedy-Carter comparison to this year is an interesting one in so far as it involved an incumbent, and Trump, it could be argued, is a quasi-incumbent. Of course, in that case, it was the incumbent who made the comeback.

    WOLF: My impression is that Republican voters have largely come around to agree with Trump, despite the facts, that he won the 2020 election. Is that the kind of perception these trials could change? In other words, is a conviction the kind of thing that could break what seems like an intractable partisan divide?

    ENTEN: Again, we’re in unprecedented times, so I’ll never say never.

    I’ll give you this one, though. A CNN/SSRS poll from earlier this year asked whether Trump should drop out of the race if convicted of a federal crime. The vast majority of his own supporters (88%) said no he shouldn’t. Even most Republicans (58%) said he shouldn’t.

    Any changes to the percentage of Republicans who think he didn’t win in 2020 (even if that is a false belief) would likely be minimal, despite any conviction.

    WOLF: I’ve seen you argue that Trump would be very competitive in a general election matchup with Biden. But I wonder how the indictments have affected the outlook of independent voters?

    ENTEN: Independent voters like neither Joe Biden nor Donald Trump. They’ll be, at this point, making the choice between the lesser of two evils. The indictments didn’t help Trump amongst this group, but did they hurt?

    If you look at polls conducted by Quinnipiac, Marist and Fox in August, Trump was ahead of Biden by 1 point on average (well within the margin of error).

    If you look at the average of polls conducted by Quinnipiac (the only one of these pollsters in the field) before the first indictment, Trump was ahead of Biden by 1 point on average.

    So I don’t see any real impact (for now) on the metric that I feel is most important in answering your question.

    WOLF: Finally, regarding Joe Biden … there are stories all over the place about how voters think he’s too old, they aren’t excited about him, etc. What does the historical polling data suggest about a president in his position? What tea leaves are you reading about him?

    ENTEN: General election polling at this point has not been predictive. Otherwise, Walter Mondale and Ronald Reagan would have been neck and neck in the 1984 election, which Reagan won in a blowout.

    The reason Reagan ran away with the election is because he is one of a number of presidents who saw boosts in their approval ratings from now until the election (Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Reagan, etc.).

    But a president with an approval rating where Biden’s is right now on Election Day is not a president in a strong position. In fact, every president with his approval rating or worse has lost.

    But I’m honestly not sure any of those historical analogies matter because Trump is so unpopular. This is ultimately the great statistical puzzle of the 2024 election. Biden likely can only win going up against a candidate as unpopular as Trump. Trump likely can only win going up against a candidate as unpopular as Biden.

    So who wins that matchup? If you know the answer to that one, you should also tell me who wins this year’s Super Bowl.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Google’s antitrust showdown: What’s at stake for the internet search titan | CNN Business

    Google’s antitrust showdown: What’s at stake for the internet search titan | CNN Business

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Google will face off in court Tuesday against government officials who have accused the company of antitrust violations in its massive search business, kicking off a long-anticipated legal showdown that could reshape one of the internet’s most dominant platforms.

    The trial beginning this week in Washington before a federal judge marks the culmination of two ongoing lawsuits against Google that started during the Trump administration. Legal experts describe the actions as the country’s biggest monopolization case since the US government took on Microsoft in the 1990s.

    In separate complaints, the Justice Department and dozens of states accused Google in 2020 of abusing its dominance in online search by allegedly harming competition through deals with wireless carriers and smartphone makers that made Google Search the default or exclusive option on products used by millions of consumers. The complaints eventually consolidated into a single case.

    Google has maintained that it competes on the merits and that consumers prefer its tools because they are the best, not because it has moved to illegally restrict competition. Google’s search business provides more than half of the $283 billion in revenue and $76 billion in net income Google’s parent company, Alphabet, recorded in 2022. Search has fueled the company’s growth to a more than $1.7 trillion market capitalization.

    Now, the company is set to defend itself in a multiweek trial that could upend the way Google distributes its search engine to users. The case is expected to feature testimony from high-profile witnesses including former employees of Google and Samsung, along with executives from Apple, including senior vice president Eddy Cue. It is the first case to go to trial in a series of court challenges targeting Google’s far-reaching economic power, testing the willingness of courts to clamp down on large tech platforms.

    “This is a backwards-looking case at a time of unprecedented innovation,” said Google President of Global Affairs Kent Walker, “including breakthroughs in AI, new apps and new services, all of which are creating more competition and more options for people than ever before. People don’t use Google because they have to — they use it because they want to. It’s easy to switch your default search engine — we’re long past the era of dial-up internet and CD-ROMs.”

    The trial may also be a bellwether for the more assertive antitrust agenda of the Biden administration.

    In its initial complaint, the US government alleged in part that Google pays billions of dollars a year to device manufacturers including Apple, LG, Motorola and Samsung — and browser developers like Mozilla and Opera — to be their default search engine and in many cases to prohibit them from dealing with Google’s competitors.

    As a result, the complaint alleges, “Google effectively owns or controls search distribution channels accounting for roughly 80 percent of the general search queries in the United States.”

    The lawsuit also alleges that Google’s Android operating system deals with device makers are anticompetitive, because they require smartphone companies to pre-install other Google-owned apps, such as Gmail, Chrome or Maps.

    At the time the lawsuit was first filed, US antitrust officials did not rule out the possibility of a Google breakup, warning that Google’s behavior could threaten future innovation or the rise of a Google successor.

    Separately, a group of states, led by Colorado, made additional allegations against Google, claiming that the way Google structures its search results page harms competition by prioritizing the company’s own apps and services over web pages, links, reviews and content from other third-party sites.

    But the judge overseeing the case, Judge Amit Mehta in the US District Court for the District of Columbia, tossed out those claims in a ruling last month, narrowing the scope of allegations Google must defend and saying the states had not done enough to show a trial was necessary to determine whether Google’s search results rankings were anticompetitive.

    Despite that ruling, the trial represents the US government’s furthest progress in challenging Google to date. Mehta has said Google’s pole position among search engines on browsers and smartphones “is a hotly disputed issue” and that the trial will determine “whether, as a matter of actual market reality, Google’s position as the default search engine across multiple browsers is a form of exclusionary Conduct.”

    In January, meanwhile, the Biden administration launched another antitrust suit against Google in opposition to the company’s advertising technology business, accusing it of maintaining an illegal monopoly. That case remains in its early stages at the US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Elon Musk should be forced to testify on X’s ‘chaotic environment,’ US regulator tells court | CNN Business

    Elon Musk should be forced to testify on X’s ‘chaotic environment,’ US regulator tells court | CNN Business

    [ad_1]


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Elon Musk should be forced to testify in an expansive US government probe of X, the company formerly known as Twitter, the US government said.

    The government said mass layoffs and other decisions Musk made raised questions about X’s ability to comply with the law and to protect users’ privacy.

    The US government’s attempt to compel Musk’s testimony is the latest turn in an investigation that predates Musk’s acquisition of X that has intensified due to Musk’s own actions, according to a court filing by the Justice Department on behalf of the Federal Trade Commission.

    The court filing dated Monday cites depositions with multiple former X executives, including its former chief information security officer and former chief privacy officer, who testified that a barrage of layoffs and resignations following Musk’s $44 billion takeover may have hindered X from meeting its security obligations under a 2011 FTC consent agreement.

    Twitter and its outside attorney didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

    According to testimony cited in the filing, there were so few employees left after the departures that anywhere from 37% to 50% of the company’s security program lacked effective management and oversight, with no one available to take responsibility for those controls. Other planned upgrades to the company’s security program were “impaired,” the filing said, citing a deposition by the former chief information security officer, Lea Kissner.

    In another example, Musk personally tried to rush the rollout of Twitter Blue, the company’s paid subscription service, the filing said. That forced the company’s security team to bypass the required security and privacy checks that were a part of Twitter’s own policies and that had been mandated in the FTC order, according to the testimony of Damien Kieran, the former chief privacy officer.

    The filing also alleges that Musk’s move to grant several journalists access to internal company records — access that would culminate in the so-called Twitter Files claiming to show evidence of politically motivated censorship — initially involved a plan that could potentially have led to the exposure of private user data in violation of the FTC order.

    According to the filing, Musk’s plan originally called for providing access through a dedicated company laptop with “elevated privileges beyond just what a[n] average employee might have.”

    “Longtime information security employees intervened and implemented safeguards to mitigate the risks,” the filing said, but even then, the former employees testified, the process raised doubts about Musk’s commitment to privacy and security.

    X has moved to block Musk from being forced to testify and has asked a federal court to invalidate the entire FTC order requiring it to safeguard user privacy, accusing the FTC of asking too many questions in its probe.

    But in its filing, the US government said its interest in Musk’s testimony is well-justified based on the appearance of a “chaotic environment” at X driven by “sudden, radical changes at the company” following Musk’s acquisition.

    “The FTC had every reason to seek information about whether these developments signaled a lapse in X Corp.’s compliance” with the 2011 order, the filing said. Confirmed violations of the FTC order could lead to billions of dollars in fines for X, as well as potential legal ramifications for individual executives such as Musk if they are deemed personally responsible for them.

    The FTC investigation traces back to bombshell allegations — raised by Twitter’s former security chief Peiter “Mudge” Zatko and predating Musk’s acquisition — that for years Twitter has failed to live up to its legally binding commitments to the FTC to protect user privacy and security. Those allegations were first reported last year by CNN and The Washington Post.

    The investigation has proven politically charged as Musk — and his allies including Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee — have responded to the probe by publicly accusing the FTC of harassment and overreach.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Former IRS contractor accused of stealing Trump’s tax returns pleads guilty | CNN Politics

    Former IRS contractor accused of stealing Trump’s tax returns pleads guilty | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The former IRS contractor accused of leaking former President Donald Trump’s tax returns and stealing tax information on thousands of the wealthiest people in the US pleaded guilty in federal court on Thursday.

    Prosecutors say Charles Littlejohn of Washington, DC, sent Trump’s tax returns and other data to two media outlets that “published numerous articles describing the tax information they obtained from the Defendant.”

    Littlejohn pleaded guilty to the one count of disclosing tax information, which he was charged with in late September.

    The contractor’s crime affected so many individuals that prosecutors plan to create a public website to notify the victims of any developments in the case.

    During the plea hearing, an attorney for Trump gave a victim impact statement, calling the crime “an egregious breach.”

    Trump’s attorney, Alina Habba, said that Trump’s returns were “kept in a vault at the IRS” and suggested that the leak may have cost Trump votes in the 2020 election.

    Habba said Trump was opposed to the plea deal and called for the maximum sentence of five years in prison for Littlejohn.

    Judge Ana Reyes, the federal judge overseeing the case, said she agreed “completely that anyone taking the law into their own hands is unacceptable.”

    “I cannot overstate how troubled I am by what occurred,” Reyes said. “Make no mistake, this was not acceptable.”

    A sentencing hearing has been scheduled for January 29.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Who are the Trump co-conspirators in the 2020 election interference indictment? | CNN Politics

    Who are the Trump co-conspirators in the 2020 election interference indictment? | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The historic indictment against Donald Trump in the special counsel’s probe into January 6, 2021, and efforts to overturn the 2020 election says that he “enlisted co-conspirators to assist him in his criminal efforts.”

    The charging documents repeatedly reference six of these co-conspirators, but as is common practice, their identities are withheld because they have not been charged with any crimes.

    CNN, however, can identify five of the six co-conspirators based on quotes in the indictment and other context.

    They include:

    Among other things, the indictment quotes from a voicemail that Co-Conspirator 1 left “for a United States Senator” on January 6, 2021. The quotes in the indictment match quotes from Giuliani’s call intended for GOP Sen. Tommy Tuberville, as reported by CNN and other outlets.

    Ted Goodman, a political adviser to Giuliani, said in a statement that “every fact Mayor Rudy Giuliani possesses about this case establishes the good faith basis President Donald Trump had for the actions he took during the two-month period charged in the indictment,” adding that the indictment “eviscerates the First Amendment.”

    Among other things, the indictment says Co-Conspirator 2 “circulated a two-page memorandum” with a plan for Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the 2020 election while presiding over the Electoral College certification on January 6, 2021. The indictment quotes from the memo, and those quotes match a two-page memo that Eastman wrote, as reported and published by CNN.

    Charles Burnham, an attorney for Eastman, said the indictment “relies on a misleading presentation of the record,” and that his client would decline a plea deal if offered one.

    “The fact is, if Dr. Eastman is indicted, he will go to trial. If convicted, he will appeal. The Eastman legal team is confident of its legal position in this matter,” Burnham said in a statement.

    The indictment says Co-Conspirator 3 “filed a lawsuit against the Governor of Georgia” on November 25, 2020, alleging “massive election fraud” and that the lawsuit was “dismissed” on December 7, 2020. These dates and quotations match the federal lawsuit that Powell filed against Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp.

    An attorney for Powell declined to comment.

    The indictment identifies Co-Conspirator 4 as “a Justice Department official.” The indictment also quotes an email that a top Justice Department official sent to Clark, rebutting Clark’s attempts to use the department to overturn the election. The quotes in that email directly match quotes in an email sent to Clark, according to a Senate report about how Trump tried to weaponize the Justice Department in 2020.

    CNN has reached out to an attorney for Clark.

    Among other things, the indictment references an “email memorandum” that Co-Conspirator 5 “sent” to Giuliani on December 13, 2020, about the fake electors plot. The email sender, recipient, date, and content are a direct match for an email that Chesebro sent to Giuliani, according to a copy of the email made public by the House select committee that investigated January 6.

    CNN has reached out to an attorney for Chesebro.

    The indictment says they are “a political consultant who helped implement a plan to submit fraudulent slates of presidential electors to obstruct the certification proceeding.” The indictment also further ties this person to the fake elector slate in Pennsylvania.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Former Georgia lieutenant governor subpoenaed to testify before Fulton County grand jury in 2020 election probe | CNN Politics

    Former Georgia lieutenant governor subpoenaed to testify before Fulton County grand jury in 2020 election probe | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Former Georgia Republican Lt. Gov. Geoff Duncan received subpoenas to testify before a Fulton County grand jury this month, a source with direct knowledge of the 2020 election interference investigation in the state told CNN.

    Duncan has been a sharp critic of Donald Trump’s efforts to upend Georgia’s election results. He recently told CNN that he was “embarrassed” when Rudy Giuliani, a former attorney for Trump, and other allies of the former president appeared before Georgia state lawmakers. While Duncan was president of the Georgia state Senate at the time, he told CNN he did not “sanction” those meetings, and that they were not “official hearings.”

    In an interview Monday with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on “The Situation Room,” Duncan committed to testifying in front of the grand jury, saying he’ll “be there to answer the facts as I know them and to continue this process of trying to discover what actually happened during that post-election period of time.”

    “We can never repeat that in this country. Certainly I never want to see that happen in my home state of Georgia, a lot of good peoples’ lives were uprooted, a lot of peoples’ reputations have been soiled,” Duncan, a CNN political contributor and Republican, said.

    Duncan said that he would be “willing to testify and tell the truth in as many settings as I possibly can,” in response to a question about whether he’d be willing to testify in any other related trials.

    A spokesperson for the Fulton County district attorney’s office declined to comment.

    The former lieutenant governor is the third witness publicly known to receive a subpoena for grand jury testimony. CNN previously reported independent journalist George Chidi and former Georgia Democratic state Sen. Jen Jordan have also been subpoenaed.

    On December 3, 2020, while Duncan was president of the state Senate, Giuliani spread conspiracy theories about widespread irregularities and fraud in the state during a Georgia Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing about election integrity. Jordan was in attendance.

    At the hearing, Trump’s team presented a video of what they claimed was evidence of fraud from election night ballot tabulating in Fulton County, allegations that were investigated by the FBI, Department of Justice and state election officials – and proven to be erroneous.

    The recent subpoenas are the clearest indication Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis intends to seek indictments in her long-running criminal probe into efforts by Trump and his allies to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia.

    Willis told CNN affiliate WXIA at an event late last month that “the work is accomplished,” adding later, “We’ve been working for two and half years. We’re ready to go.”

    Sources expect Willis’ team to spend roughly two days presenting its case before one of the two grand juries meeting regularly in Fulton County with the power to issue indictments. Willis has said she will make her charging announcements before September 1.

    The subpoenas for grand jury testimony call on the witnesses to appear before the grand jury during the month of August and state that witnesses will get a 48-hour notice when they are required to appear. Multiple people who were subpoenaed told CNN they have not yet been notified of an appearance date.

    Duncan on Monday would not comment on the timing of his expected appearance in front of the grand jury: “I don’t want to infringe on any details of the investigation, so I’ll leave that offline and off of this commentary here. But I’m committed to telling the truth – I know a number of people are around this process.”

    Duncan, Jordan and Chidi were all part of the group of 75 witnesses who previously testified before the special grand jury Willis used last year to gather evidence in her investigation.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Youngkin pardons Virginia father who was arrested at 2021 school board meeting | CNN Politics

    Youngkin pardons Virginia father who was arrested at 2021 school board meeting | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Virginia Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin on Friday pardoned a Loudoun County father who was arrested at a school board meeting in 2021 while seeking answers about his daughter’s sexual assault on school property.

    Scott Smith was charged with obstruction of justice and disorderly conduct for his behavior at the meeting, which took place shortly after his 15-year-old daughter was assaulted in her school’s bathroom in Ashburn, Virginia, according to the New York Times. Smith was convicted of both charges in 2021. Smith’s conviction for resisting arrest was later dismissed, and he eventually received a suspended sentence of 10 days in jail, according to CNN affiliate WJLA.

    “Scott Smith is a dedicated parent who’s faced unwarranted charges in his pursuit to protect his daughter. Scott’s commitment to his child despite the immense obstacles is emblematic of the parental empowerment movement that started in Virginia,” Youngkin said in a statement announcing the pardon.

    “In Virginia, parents matter and my resolve to empower parents is unwavering. A parent’s fundamental right to be involved in their child’s education, upbringing, and care should never be undermined by bureaucracy, school divisions or the state. I am pleased to grant Scott Smith this pardon and help him and his family put this injustice behind them once and for all,” he added.

    Deputies ultimately arrested a male student in connection with the sexual assault against Smith’s daughter, according to the Times. He was found guilty in that case and later pleaded no contest to a separate sexual assault case at a different school, the newspaper reported.

    Smith’s arrest at the school board meeting helped fuel a national political conversation around school choice and parental rights. Conservative media in particular highlighted the sexual assault case in an effort to promote anti-transgender talking points.

    Youngkin leaned heavily on these issues during his 2021 gubernatorial campaign, vowing on election night, “We’re going to embrace our parents, not ignore them.”

    Smith, in an interview with WJLA following his pardon, said: “I think it’s pretty clear and convincing to the public that what happened to me that day should have never happened. I’m glad that this is finally over.”

    He added that the experience has led him to believe that “in today’s America, getting a fair and free trial is next to impossible.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Trump’s indictments — and mug shot — are deepening his supporters’ anger and revving up their support | CNN Politics

    Trump’s indictments — and mug shot — are deepening his supporters’ anger and revving up their support | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Phil Jensen wore a bright red T-shirt with Donald Trump’s mug shot and “NEVER SURRENDER!” printed on it to the former president’s rally in Rapid City, South Dakota, last week. The longtime state legislator loved the shirt so much, he planned on giving half a dozen to his friends and family.

    “He looks defiant,” Jensen said of the photo taken at an Atlanta jail after Trump was indicted over his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss in the state.

    “And I love it because he has every right to be,” the South Dakota Republican said. “He was railroaded.”

    In more than 40 interviews with CNN in Iowa, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Alabama, South Dakota and Texas, Trump supporters said the 91 criminal charges in four separate cases against him have only deepened their support of the former president. They repeated Trump’s unfounded claims that he was the subject of a politically motivated “witch hunt” and said they believed the charges showed the system was rigged against him – and, by extension, them.

    A majority of Americans think that the charges against Trump are valid and that he should be prosecuted, recent polls show, but Trump maintains a tight grip on the Republican Party and his front-runner status in the 2024 GOP presidential primary is undisputed.

    “What they’re doing to him is persecution,” said Corey Bonner of Texas. “They’re going after an old American president, they’ve been going after him since the beginning, they haven’t stopped, and they’re not going to stop. And this is where we have to stand up and fight.”

    At a summer gathering for Alabama Republicans, 81-year-old retired schoolteacher Carolyn McNeese echoed Trump’s attacks on the prosecutors who have charged him and said she thought they were “evil.”

    “They want him out because they’re scared of him,” McNeese said.

    Those interviewed said they believed that President Joe Biden’s son Hunter was the one who needed to be charged and that Republicans faced a different standard under the justice system. And some said that perhaps Trump did commit crimes, but it didn’t change their opinion of him because, as Texas resident Bobby Wilson put it, “We all have sinned; we all have some things that we’ve done.”

    “He’s probably guilty, but it doesn’t matter,” said Jace Kirschenman, an 18-year-old in South Dakota who works in construction.

    He said nothing could deter him from voting for Trump next year.

    “You show me a perfect person in this world, and I’ll show you a blue pig with wings,” said Corey Shawgo, a 34-year-old truck driver in Pennsylvania who attended Trump’s rally in Erie. “Everyone makes mistakes.”

    Like many other Trump supporters interviewed, Scott Akers of Alabama immediately pointed to Hunter Biden when asked about Trump’s mounting legal peril.

    “We have something finally start to come out about the connection between Hunter Biden’s shady dealings and his father and then, like two days later, there’s a federal indictment,” Akers said. “The timing of it is very ironic.”

    The president’s son has been the subject of investigations by House Republicans and the federal Justice Department. The House GOP probe has so far failed to surface any evidence showing Joe Biden profited from his son’s business dealings, but it has found that the younger Biden used his father’s names to help advance deals. Separately, Hunter Biden was indicted on Thursday by special counsel David Weiss in connection to a gun he purchased in 2018.

    Intertwined with their outrage over the indictments, some Trump supporters are raising the specter of heightened political violence if Trump were to be convicted.

    “This country’s a powder keg. You know, we’ve ‘bout had it,” said Frank Yurisic, 76, who attended Trump’s Pennsylvania rally.

    “I think there could very well possibly be violence,” Yurisic said. “If they march on Washington, I’ll be one of the ones there. I don’t think they realize how upset the people are in this country about what’s going on.”

    The predictions of possible violence made by some Trump supporters in interviews with CNN echo Trump’s warnings of what could happen were he to be convicted.

    Before Trump’s first indictment in March, he had warned about “potential death and destruction” if a Manhattan grand jury were to indict him on charges related to a hush money payment to an adult film star. When asked in an Iowa radio interview in July how he thought his supporters would react if he did ultimately end up behind bars, Trump said, “I think it’s a very dangerous thing to even talk about because we do have a tremendously passionate group of voters.”

    “There’ll be backlash, and it’ll probably be severe,” said Jim Vanoy, an 80-year-old Trump supporter who lives in Alabama. He said he thought there would be a “good degree of violence” if Trump is convicted.

    Rachel Kleinfeld, a senior fellow in the democracy, conflict and governance program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said the US has seen “vastly increased” political violence since Trump took office in 2017.

    “He unleashed some of the worst parts of the American id in normalizing violence as a way to solve political differences. And so we’re seeing neighbors killing neighbors, people killing business owners over political disputes all over the country,” she said.

    But Kleinfeld pointed to the lengthy prison sentences meted out to some participants in the deadly January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol as a potential deterrent to political violence. Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the far-right militia group Oath Keepers, was sentenced to 18 years in prison and Enrique Tarrio, the former head of the far-right Proud Boys, was sentenced to 22 years. Kleinfeld also noted the two-and-a-half-year prison sentence handed down to an Iowa man for threatening Arizona’s attorney general and a Phoenix-area election official.

    “What we’re seeing now is a summer of a lot of accountability, where people are starting to be held to account for violence, and that is the best possible thing for reducing future violence,” she said.

    Trump supporter Amanda Hamak-Leon and her boyfriend are seen at his Rapid City, South Dakota, rally on September 8, 2023.

    Trump continues to defend his supporters who were part of the January 6 mob and said in a recent interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson that there was “love and unity” among those who had gathered in Washington that day.

    His lies about the 2020 election, which fueled the riot at the Capitol, were repeated on the campaign trail by his supporters in interviews with CNN. Many said they felt confident in Trump’s chances in a rematch with Biden in 2024.

    “Unless they convict him of something, I don’t care,” said Mark Roling, 63, of Pennsylvania. “In fact, I kind of like it. Every time they indict him, he gets stronger.”

    Trump has widened his polling lead over the rest of the GOP field since his first criminal charges were announced this spring, and his campaign has reported fundraising boosts in the wake of his indictments. That has vexed many Democrats, independents and more moderate Republican voters, who question how his supporters aren’t turned off by the serious and numerous criminal charges against Trump and believe the indictments should disqualify him from a second term as president.

    “He’s making a psychic connection between his troubles with government and people’s troubles with government. And it’s working,” said Craig Shirley, who has written four books on former President Ronald Reagan and has been a Republican strategist for decades.

    “So many Americans have had bad experiences with government over the years,” Shirley said. “They’ve had bad experiences with the IRS. They’ve had bad experiences with police forces. They’ve had bad experiences with school boards. They’ve had bad experiences with any manifestation of some form of government, and that has made them more and more anti-establishment.”

    Trump has been intentional on the campaign trail about making his supporters feel like his indictments are personal to them. “I’m being indicted for you,” he says at every rally. “They’re not coming after me, they’re coming after you, and I’m just standing in their way.”

    “It’s very much like a family protecting one of their own,” Whit Ayres, a veteran GOP pollster, said of how Trump’s supporters have rallied around the former president.

    “He came down the escalator in 2015, saying, ‘I am doing this for you. I am your protector. I am the only one looking out for you. And an attack on me is an attack on you.’ And he has been beating that drum now for eight years, and it’s accepted as true by millions of his supporters,” Ayres said.

    The day after Trump was booked at the Fulton County jail in Atlanta, his campaign said it had the highest-grossing fundraising day of the entire campaign to date, raising $4.18 million. A few days later, the campaign said it had raked in nearly $3 million off mug shot merchandise alone.

    A vendor sells T-shirts featuring Trump's mug shot outside his Rapid City, South Dakota, rally on September 8, 2023.

    But the market for mug shot merchandise extends well beyond the official campaign store as private vendors see their sales skyrocket.

    “This is the new ‘Let’s Go Brandon,’” said Sam Smith, a private vendor at Trump’s Rapid City rally, referring to the right-wing slogan used to insult Joe Biden. Smith, who travels around the country to sell merchandise outside the former president’s events, said he made solid money for two years off “Let’s Go Brandon” products.

    Longtime Trump supporter Amanda Hamak-Leon bought matching mug shot T-shirts on Amazon that said “WANTED FOR PRESIDENT” for her and her boyfriend to wear to Trump’s rally in Rapid City.

    “It really ticked me off,” Hamak-Leon said of Trump’s indictments. “I just feel like now for six-plus years they’ve been going after him with anything that they can, taking shots in the dark. It just makes me like him more that he just keeps going and is not letting this stop him.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • US government and 17 states sue Amazon in landmark monopoly case | CNN Business

    US government and 17 states sue Amazon in landmark monopoly case | CNN Business

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The US government and 17 states are suing Amazon in a landmark monopoly case reflecting years of allegations that the e-commerce giant abused its economic dominance and harmed fair competition.

    The groundbreaking lawsuit by the Federal Trade Commission and 17 attorneys general marks the US government’s sharpest attack yet against Amazon, a company that started off selling books on the internet but has since become known as “the everything store,” expanding into selling a vast range of consumer products, creating a globe-spanning logistics network and becoming a powerhouse in other technologies such as cloud computing.

    The complaint alleges Amazon unfairly promotes its own platform and services at the expense of third-party sellers who rely on the company’s e-commerce marketplace for distribution.

    For example, according to the FTC, Amazon has harmed competition by requiring sellers on its platform to purchase Amazon’s in-house logistics services in order to secure the best seller benefits, referred to as “Prime” eligibility. It also claims the company anticompetitively forces sellers to list their products on Amazon at the lowest prices anywhere on the web, instead of allowing sellers to offer their products at competing marketplaces for a lower price.

    That practice is already the subject of a separate lawsuit targeting Amazon filed by California’s attorney general last year.

    Because of Amazon’s dominance in e-commerce, sellers have little option but to accept Amazon’s terms, the FTC alleges, resulting in higher prices for consumers and a worse consumer experience. Amazon also ranks its own products in marketplace search results higher than those sold by third parties, the FTC said.

    Amazon is “squarely focused on preventing anyone else from gaining that same critical mass of customers,” FTC Chair Lina Khan told reporters Tuesday. “This complaint reflects the cutting edge and best thinking on how competition occurs in digital markets and, similarly, the tactics that Amazon has used to suffocate rivals, deprive them of oxygen, and really leave a stunted landscape in its wake.”

    The states involved in the case are Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Nevada, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin.

    The complaint was filed in the US District Court for the Western District of Washington, and seeks a court order blocking Amazon from engaging in the allegedly anticompetitive behavior. Khan declined to say Tuesday whether the agency will be seeking a breakup of the company, saying the case is currently focused on proving Amazon’s liability under federal antitrust law.

    The suit makes Amazon the third tech giant after Google and Meta to be hit with sweeping US government allegations that the company spent years violating federal antitrust laws, reflecting policymakers’ growing worldwide hostility toward Big Tech that intensified after 2016. The litigation could take years to play out. But just as Amazon founder Jeff Bezos and his spectacular wealth have inspired critics to draw comparisons to America’s Gilded Age, so may the FTC lawsuit come to symbolize a modern repeat of the antitrust crackdown of the early 20th century.

    In a release, Khan accused Amazon of using “punitive and coercive tactics” to preserve an illegal monopoly.

    “Amazon is now exploiting its monopoly power to enrich itself while raising prices and degrading service for the tens of millions of American families who shop on its platform and the hundreds of thousands of businesses that rely on Amazon to reach them,” Khan said. “Today’s lawsuit seeks to hold Amazon to account for these monopolistic practices and restore the lost promise of free and fair competition.”

    “Today’s suit makes clear the FTC’s focus has radically departed from its mission of protecting consumers and competition. The practices the FTC is challenging have helped to spur competition and innovation across the retail industry, and have produced greater selection, lower prices, and faster delivery speeds for Amazon customers and greater opportunity for the many businesses that sell in Amazon’s store,”said David Zapolsky, Amazon’s Senior Vice President of Global Public policy and General Counsel. “If the FTC gets its way, the result would be fewer products to choose from, higher prices, slower deliveries for consumers, and reduced options for small businesses—the opposite of what antitrust law is designed to do. The lawsuit filed by the FTC today is wrong on the facts and the law, and we look forward to making that case in court.”

    For years, Amazon’s critics including US lawmakers, European regulators, third-party sellers, consumer advocacy groups and more have accused the company of everything from mistreating its workers to forcing its third-party sellers to accept anticompetitive terms. Amazon has unfairly used sellers’ own commercial data against them, opponents have said, so it can figure out what products Amazon should sell itself. And the fact that Amazon competes with sellers on the very same marketplace it controls represents a conflict of interest that should be considered illegal, many of Amazon’s critics have said.

    The lawsuit represents a watershed moment in Khan’s career. She is widely credited with kickstarting antitrust scrutiny of Amazon in the United States with a seminal law paper in 2017. She later helped lead a congressional investigation into the tech industry’s alleged competition abuses, detailing in a 450-page report how Amazon — as well as Apple, Google and Meta — enjoy “monopoly power” and that there is “significant evidence” to show that the companies’ anticompetitive conduct has hindered innovation, reduced consumer choice and weakened democracy.

    The investigation led to a raft of legislative proposals aimed at reining in the companies, but the most significant ones have stalled under a barrage of industry lobbying and decisions by congressional leaders not to bring the bills up for a final vote.

    Lawmakers’ inaction has left it to antitrust enforcers to police the tech industry’s alleged harms to competition. In 2021, President Joe Biden stunned many in Washington when he tapped Khan not only to serve on the FTC but to lead the agency, sending a signal that he supported tough antitrust oversight.

    Since then Khan has taken an aggressive enforcement posture, particularly toward the tech industry. Under her watch, the FTC has sued to block numerous tech acquisitions, most notably Microsoft’s $69 billion deal to acquire video game publisher Activision Blizzard. It has moved to restrict how companies may collect and use consumers’ personal information, and warned them of the risks of generative artificial intelligence.

    Throughout, the FTC has scrutinized Amazon — suing the company in June for allegedly tricking millions of consumers into signing up for Amazon Prime and reaching multimillion-dollar settlements in May with the company over alleged privacy violations linked to Amazon’s smart home devices.

    But the latest suit against Amazon may rank as the most significant of all, because it drives at the heart of Amazon’s e-commerce business and focuses on some of the most persistent criticisms of the company. In a sign of how threatening Amazon perceived Khan’s ascent to be, the company in 2021 called for her recusal from all cases involving the tech giant.

    Khan has resisted those calls. On Tuesday, the FTC said it held a unanimous 3-0 vote authorizing the lawsuit; Khan was among those voting to proceed.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Federal appeals court extends limits on Biden administration communications with social media companies to top US cybersecurity agency | CNN Business

    Federal appeals court extends limits on Biden administration communications with social media companies to top US cybersecurity agency | CNN Business

    [ad_1]


    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    A federal appeals court has expanded the scope of a ruling that limits the Biden administration’s communications with social media companies, saying it now also applies to a top US cybersecurity agency.

    The ruling last month from the conservative 5th Circuit US Court of Appeals severely limits the ability of the White House, the surgeon general, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FBI to communicate with social media companies about content related to Covid-19 and elections that the government views as misinformation.

    The preliminary injunction had been on pause and a recent procedural snafu over a request from the plaintiffs in the case to broaden its scope led the court on Tuesday to withdraw its earlier opinion and issue a new one that now includes the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency. That agency is charged with protecting non-military networks from hacking and other homeland security threats.

    Similar to the ruling last month, in which the appeals court said the federal government had “likely violated the First Amendment” when it leaned on platforms to moderate some content, the new ruling says CISA violates the Constitution.

    “CISA used its frequent interactions with social media platforms to push them to adopt more restrictive policies on censoring election-related speech,” the three-judge panel wrote.

    “The platforms’ censorship decisions were made under policies that CISA has pressured them into adopting and based on CISA’s determination of the veracity of the flagged information,” they continued. “Thus, CISA likely significantly encouraged the platforms’ content-moderation decisions and thereby violated the First Amendment.”

    The plaintiffs in the suit, which include Missouri and Louisiana’s attorneys general, as well as several individual plaintiffs, had also asked the court to expand the scope in other ways, including by making it apply to some State Department officials. But the court’s new ruling was only modified to add CISA as an enjoined entity.

    The judges said they were pausing their new injunction for 10 days, and the Biden administration has the option of asking the Supreme Court to issue a more lasting pause on the modified ruling.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • New Hampshire man pleads guilty to threatening Rep. Matt Gaetz after scrolling TikTok | CNN Politics

    New Hampshire man pleads guilty to threatening Rep. Matt Gaetz after scrolling TikTok | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    A New Hampshire college student on Thursday pleaded guilty to federal charges of threatening to kill a member of Congress after he became angry while drunkenly scrolling on TikTok.

    While authorities didn’t name the member of Congress, Rep. Matt Gaetz confirmed he was the target when he played the threatening voicemail at the heart of the case on his podcast earlier this year. CNN has reached out to the Florida Republican’s office for comment.

    The defendant, 24-year-old Allan Poller, faces up to five years in prison when he is sentenced in January.

    According to court documents, Poller, who is a student at Keene State College in New Hampshire, placed a call to the Washington, DC, office of an unnamed member of Congress just after midnight on March 29.

    No one in the office answered, prosecutors said, so Poller left a voicemail warning the member to stop “coming for the gays” and threatened to kill the member should they continue.

    “If you keep on coming for the gays, we’re gonna strike back and I guarantee you, you do not want to f**k with us,” Poller said, according to court documents. “We will kill you if that’s what it takes. I will take a bullet to your f**king head if you f**k with my rights anymore.”

    Poller later admitted to leaving the message in an interview with law enforcement, according to court documents, telling investigators that he had been drinking and become angry while watching videos on TikTok.

    Poller’s attorney Jesse Friedman said in a statement that his client “recognizes that hate in any form is wrong and hurtful. He accepts responsibility for his actions and did not intend for his acts to cause harm or a threat to anybody.”

    As part of his plea deal, Poller agreed that while he may not have intended to carry out the threat, he knew his voicemail would be viewed as such.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Two more Trump co-defendants plead guilty. What next? | CNN Politics

    Two more Trump co-defendants plead guilty. What next? | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]

    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s What Matters newsletter. To get it in your inbox, sign up for free here.



    CNN
     — 

    With the frightening Israel-Hamas war and a major spoke of the US government – the House of Representatives – unsolvably speakerless and in a state of paralysis, a pair of guilty pleas in a Georgia courtroom almost feels like Page 2 news.

    But these particular guilty pleas this week come from two of former President Donald Trump’s co-defendants, the second and third such admissions of guilt in the criminal case brought against him for trying to overturn Georgia’s 2020 presidential election result.

    • Sidney Powell, a public face of Trump’s attempts to challenge the election results in 2020 and 2021, pleaded guilty Thursday. The former Trump attorney will avoid jail time but agreed to testify as a witness and pleaded guilty to six misdemeanors for conspiracy to commit intentional interference, downgraded from felony charges she had faced.
    • Kenneth Chesebro, a less public face of the effort, was an attorney who helped engineer the fake electors plot. He pleaded guilty Friday to a single felony, conspiracy to commit filing false documents. He’s also likely to avoid jail time.
    • Scott Hall, a bail bondsman, pleaded guilty last month after being accused of conspiring to unlawfully access voter data and ballot-counting machines at the Coffee County election office on January 7, 2021.

    That leaves Trump and 15 other co-defendants awaiting trial in the case. Trial dates have not been set, and Trump has pleaded not guilty.

    Along with the three other upcoming criminal trials in New York, Washington, DC, and Florida and the ongoing civil trial in New York, the Georgia proceedings are part of a complicated web of legal problems percolating beneath the 2024 election.

    Chesebro admitted to entering into a conspiracy specifically with Trump to create a slate of fake electors in Georgia, along with two other attorneys, Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman.

    CNN legal analyst and former federal prosecutor Elliot Williams noted that the Georgia case, brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, has had its detractors, because it included 18 co-defendants along with Trump, which could make it seem politically motivated.

    But guilty pleas, Williams said, are now evidence that crimes were committed as Trump tried to make Joe Biden’s 2020 victory disappear.

    “This ought to pour cold water on the notion that this was just a partisan witch hunt to target the president and his allies,” Williams told Jim Sciutto on CNN Max.

    CNN’s report on his guilty plea notes that “Chesebro acknowledged in the plea that he ‘created and distributed false Electoral College documents’ to Trump operatives in Georgia and other states, and that he worked ‘in coordination with’ the Trump campaign.”

    All but one charge against Chesebro was dropped, and he has agreed to testify at trial.

    Just because Powell’s plea agreement did not mention Trump does not mean she might not be asked about him under oath, as CNN’s Marshall Cohen notes:

    Most notably, Powell attended a White House meeting on December 18, 2020, where some of Trump’s most extreme supporters encouraged him to name her as a special counsel to investigate supposed voter fraud, to consider declaring martial law and to sign executive orders that would direct the military to seize voting machines.

    Cohen adds that whatever Powell tells Georgia prosecutors could be used in the federal election subversion case brought by special counsel Jack Smith.

    One gag order was issued by Judge Tanya Chutkan, who is overseeing the federal 2020 election subversion case in Washington, DC. Trump is appealing, arguing she “took away my right to speak,” and on Friday Chutkan put a temporary freeze on the order.

    Chutkan has been insistent that the federal case get underway on schedule, in March, at the pinnacle of primary season.

    Trump made those comments about his freedom of speech as he entered a courtroom in New York, where he faces a civil fraud trial brought by the state attorney general. He is also under a gag order in that case, and that judge, Arthur Engoron, fined Trump $5,000 on Friday for violating the gag order after a social media post targeting a court employee was left up on Trump’s campaign website.

    Engoron said future violations could even ultimately lead him to imprison Trump.

    The court developments are an important reminder that as Trump cruises toward the Republican presidential nomination, at least according to public opinion polls, he is also in very real legal peril – something Trump acknowledged, before the gag-order-related threat from Engoron in New York, when the former president talked about the prospect of prison during an event in Clive, Iowa.

    “What they don’t understand is that I am willing to go to jail if that’s what it takes for our country to win and become a democracy again,” Trump said at the rally.

    There is some bizarre irony in the comments since he’s charged in connection with trying to subvert an election, one of the fundamental pillars of democracy.

    Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who is among those challenging Trump for the Republican presidential nomination, said on CNN that he doesn’t believe Trump is willing to go to jail.

    “The last place he wants to spend five minutes is in jail,” Christie said. He complained that Trump has failed to appear at Republican presidential debates.

    “Donald Trump doesn’t want any legitimate debate or discussion about his conduct,” Christie said.

    Republicans like Christie are running out of time and opportunity to challenge Trump. Another debate is scheduled for November 8 in Miami, but Christie has not yet qualified. NBC is sponsoring the debate, along with the right-wing outlets Salem Radio Network and Rumble.

    Oliver Darcy, CNN’s senior media reporter, argues the arrangement creates strange bedfellows.

    “It’s no surprise that the GOP, which veered sharply to the right during Donald Trump’s presidency, would select Salem and Rumble as partners,” Darcy writes, “but it is striking that NBC News would agree to link arms with such organizations.”

    Anti-Trump Republicans want some of the candidates challenging him to drop out of the race so that the opposition can coalesce around an individual alternative. The debate stage November 8 is expected to be much smaller, perhaps with only a few people.

    But don’t expect the former president to show. Trump is planning a rally nearby to draw attention away from his rivals.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • Jeff Sessions Fast Facts | CNN Politics

    Jeff Sessions Fast Facts | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    Here’s a look at the life of Jeff Sessions, former US attorney general and former Republican senator of Alabama.

    Birth date: December 24, 1946

    Birth place: Selma, Alabama

    Birth name: Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III

    Father: Jefferson Beauregard Sessions Jr., business owner

    Mother: Abbie (Powe) Sessions

    Marriage: Mary Blackshear Sessions (1969-present)

    Children: Mary Abigail, Ruth and Samuel

    Education: Huntingdon College, B.A., 1969; University of Alabama, J.D., 1973

    Military service: US Army Reserve, 1973-1986, Captain

    Religion: Methodist

    Is an Eagle Scout.

    Served on the Senate Budget, Judiciary, Armed Services, and Environment and Public Works Committees.

    Voted against both of President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominees, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.

    Supported building fencing along the US border, saying in 2006 that “good fences make good neighbors.”

    Was an opponent of the 2013 “Gang of Eight” immigration reform bill.

    1973-1975 – Practices law in Alabama.

    1975-1977 – Assistant US Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama.

    1981-1993 – US Attorney for the Southern District of Alabama.

    1986 – President Ronald Reagan nominates Sessions to become a federal judge. The Senate Judiciary Committee opposes the nomination following testimony that Sessions made racist remarks and called the NAACP and ACLU “un-American.”

    1995-1997- Alabama Attorney General. During this time, an Alabama judge accuses Sessions of prosecutorial misconduct related to the handling of evidence in a case but ultimately, Sessions is not disciplined for ethics violations.

    1996 – Elected to the US Senate. Reelected in 2002, 2008 and 2014.

    1997–February 2017 – Republican senator representing Alabama.

    February 2, 2009 – Votes in favor of the confirmation of Eric Holder as attorney general.

    April 23, 2015 – Votes against the confirmation of Loretta Lynch as attorney general.

    February 28, 2016 – Becomes the first sitting US senator to endorse Donald Trump’s presidential bid.

    November 18, 2016 – President-elect Trump announces he intends to nominate Sessions to be the next attorney general.

    January 3, 2017 – An NAACP sit-in to protest the nomination of Sessions as US attorney general ends when six people are arrested at Sessions’ Mobile, Alabama, office.

    February 8, 2017 – After 30 hours of debate, the US Senate confirms Sessions as attorney general by a 52-47 vote.

    March 1, 2017 – The Washington Post reports that Sessions failed to disclose pre-election meetings with the top Russian diplomat in Washington. Sessions did not mention either meeting during his confirmation hearings when he said he knew of no contacts between Trump surrogates and Russians.

    March 2, 2017 – Sessions recuses himself from any involvement in a Justice Department probe into links between the Trump campaign and Moscow.

    March 10, 2017 – The DOJ abruptly announces the firing of 46 US attorneys, including Preet Bharara of New York. Bharara said that during the transition, Trump asked him to stay on during a meeting at Trump Tower.

    April 3, 2017 – The Department of Justice releases a memorandum ordering a review of consent decrees and other police reforms overseen by the federal government in response to complaints of civil rights abuses and public safety issues. During his confirmation hearing, Sessions expressed skepticism about the effectiveness of Justice Department interventions in local police matters.

    July 21, 2017 – The Washington Post reports that Sessions discussed policy-related matters with Russian ambassador, Sergey Kislyak before the 2016 election, according to intelligence intercepts. Sessions had previously claimed that he did not talk about the campaign or relations with Russia during his meetings with Kislyak.

    October 4, 2017 – In a memo to all federal prosecutors, Sessions says that a 1964 federal civil rights law does not protect transgender workers from employment discrimination and the department will take this new position in all “pending and future matters.”

    November 14, 2017 – During a House judiciary committee hearing, Sessions says he did not lie under oath in earlier hearings regarding communications with Russians during the 2016 presidential campaign, and denies participating in any collusion with Russia. Sessions also says the DOJ will consider investigations into Hillary Clinton and alleged ties between the Clinton Foundation and the sale of Uranium One.

    January 4, 2018 – Sessions announces that the DOJ is rescinding an Obama-era policy of non-interference with states that have legalized recreational marijuana. The reversal frees up federal prosecutors to pursue cases in states where recreational marijuana is legal.

    March 21, 2018 – Sessions issues a statement encouraging federal prosecutors to seek the death penalty for certain drug-related crimes, as mandated by law. Seeking capital punishment in drug cases is part of the Trump administration’s efforts to combat opioid abuse.

    May 7, 2018 – Sessions announces a “zero tolerance” policy for illegal border crossings, warning that parents could be separated from children if they try to cross to the United States from Mexico. “If you cross the border unlawfully, even a first offense, we’re going to prosecute you. If you’re smuggling a child, we’re going to prosecute you, and that child will be separated from you, probably, as required by law. If you don’t want your child to be separated, then don’t bring them across the border illegally.” On June 20, Trump signs an executive order that will keep far more families together at the border.

    May 30, 2018 – Trump again expresses regret for choosing Sessions to lead the Justice Department. In a tweet, he quotes a remark from Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) who said that the president could have picked someone else as attorney general. “I wish I did!,” Trump tweets. He had first said that he was rethinking his choice of Sessions as attorney general during a July 2017 interview with the New York Times.

    June 2018 – More than 600 members of the United Methodist Church issue a formal complaint against Sessions, arguing that the US government’s “zero tolerance” policy on immigration, which was separating migrant parents from their children at the US-Mexico border, violates church rules and may constitute child abuse. On August 8, church officials confirm that the charges filed against Sessions have been dropped.

    August 23, 2018 – In response to Trump saying during a Fox News interview that Sessions “never took control” of the Justice Department, Sessions issues a rare statement, saying, “I took control of the Department of Justice the day I was sworn in…While I am Attorney General, the actions of the Department of Justice will not be improperly influenced by political considerations…”

    November 7, 2018 – President Trump asks Sessions to resign, effectively firing him. “At your request I am submitting my resignation,” Sessions writes in a letter delivered to White House chief of staff John Kelly.

    November 7, 2019 – Announces he is running for his former Alabama Senate seat.

    July 14, 2020 – Sessions loses the Alabama Senate GOP primary runoff to former Auburn University football coach Tommy Tuberville.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • DC grand jury that handed up 2020 election indictment against Trump meets again | CNN Politics

    DC grand jury that handed up 2020 election indictment against Trump meets again | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    A federal grand jury reconvened on Tuesday for the first time since handing up an indictment last week against former President Donald Trump related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.

    CNN spotted grand jury members at the federal courthouse in Washington, an indication that the investigation into election interference is not over.

    The grand jury has been hearing evidence in special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into the aftermath of the election leading up to the January 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol for nearly a year. In the Trump indictment, prosecutors refer to six unnamed co-conspirators, raising questions about whether they also could face charges in the case.

    One of the co-conspirators identified by CNN is ex-Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani. On Monday, Bernie Kerik, a longtime Giuliani associate who coordinated with him after the 2020 election, met with investigators at the special counsel’s office. Kerik spoke with investigators about Giuliani’s efforts to try to uncover election fraud in 2020, according to his attorney Tim Parlatore.

    Prosecutors allege in the indictment that the co-conspirator identified as Giuliani “was willing to spread knowingly false claims” about supposed election fraud.

    A political adviser to Giuliani, Ted Goodman, previously told CNN that they were acting in good faith and that the indictment “eviscerates” the First Amendment.

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • What judicial ethics rules say about Clarence Thomas’ lifestyle bankrolled by his friends | CNN Politics

    What judicial ethics rules say about Clarence Thomas’ lifestyle bankrolled by his friends | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    It’s undeniable that Justice Clarence Thomas’ friendships with billionaires willing to foot his bill on their vacations together have given the conservative jurist a lifestyle most Americans could only dream of.

    But determining whether Thomas violated ethics rules and laws by failing to disclose that hospitality is tricky.

    The law in question is the Ethics in Government Act, and how it should be applied to the extravagant travel that Thomas and other justices have been treated to has been a subject of debate.

    The debate centers on what counts as “personal hospitality” – i.e., accommodations and entertainment that judges are treated to personally by their friends – which does not have to be reported on annual financial disclosures under certain contexts.

    The Supreme Court’s critics note that, even if Thomas was not technically in violation of the rules, his pattern of accepting – and not reporting – lavish experiences such as skybox tickets to major sporting events and far-flung trips on mega-yachts shows that the high court cannot be trusted to police itself under the current standards. Some argue that more stringent ethical reforms – perhaps in the form of legislation – are needed.

    Further complicating the picture is that the regulations laying out when personal hospitality need not be reported have recently been tightened. Thomas’ defenders have pointed to those changes, announced earlier this year, to argue that the old regime did not require the justice to report the types of hospitality now under scrutiny. Thomas himself – in a rare statement released in April, when ProPublica published its first investigation into the extravagant travel perks he has received – noted that reworked ethical guidance and vowed to follow it going forward.

    But assessing whether the gifts and hospitality described in the latest ProPublica report – which puts the tally at 38 destination vacations, 26 private jet flights, eight helicopter trips and a dozen VIP tickets to sporting events – would require disclosure, either then or under the tightened rules, is a complicated question. It sometimes depends on details about how the high-end trips were financed that were not fully fleshed out by the report.

    “The question is: Who is absorbing the cost?” said Stephen Gillers, a New York University School of Law professor who has written extensively about legal ethics and rules.

    Thomas is not the only justice who has engaged in such jet-setting. When Justice Samuel Alito was the subject of a ProPublica report detailing a 2008 private flight he took to Alaska on a plane owned by a GOP megadonor, he argued in a preemptive essay published by Wall Street Journal’s opinion section that he was not required to disclose it under ethics rules in place at the time. Alito claimed that plane trip fit the definition of “facility” in the requirements’ exemptions for personal hospitality extended to judges “on property or facilities owned by (a) person”

    Ethics experts have pushed back on the idea that a private flight could be interpreted to fall under the term “facility.” The new guidance announced in March makes clear that going forward, private plane trips cannot be excluded from the reporting requirements because “substitutes for commercial transportation” are not part of the exemptions.

    ProPublica’s latest report, published Thursday, surfaces several helicopter trips that Thomas took apparently at the expense of his billionaire benefactors. Even under the new guidance, there could be some argument that certain helicopter trips may not require disclosure, according to Gillers, who gave the example of a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon.

    Since such a ride would not be a replacement of a commercial flight, but instead a form of entertainment offered by a friend, disclosure could potentially be avoided. But another key question, under the new guidance, is whether the helicopter ride was being paid for personally by the friend of the judge.

    The new guidance states that accommodations offered to a judge that are not paid for out of the personal pocketbook of an individual – but through a third-party entity, which could include the friend’s company or another business – would require disclosure. If the person footing the cost is seeking a tax deduction for the expense of the accommodation or gift, that would also trigger a judge’s reporting requirement.

    Justice Roberts wrote ‘condescending’ letter to Senate when asked to testify about ethics

    That means if the helicopter rides described in the ProPublica report – which Thomas occasionally enjoyed in the mid-2000s because of his friendship with the late corporate titan Wayne Huizenga – were on a helicopter owned by Huizenga’s business, Thomas would have to disclose them under the new rules. Even if Huizenga owned the helicopter personally, if he put the cost of the rides toward a tax exemption, that would also mean Thomas’ helicopter jaunts would fall outside of the exemptions.

    Thomas’ friendships with oil baron Paul “Tony” Novelly and real estate mogul Harlan Crow have led to the billionaires hosting him on their mega-yachts. Those trips have included ventures with Novelly in the Bahamas and island-hopping with Crow in Indonesia. Since Thomas presumably was sleeping on the yachts, he can argue they’re covered by the disclosure exception for accommodations personally offered by friends.

    “Thomas could say that, just as a weekend at a country home at the invitation of a friend is personal hospitality, a week on my friend’s yacht is also personal hospitality. It’s just that one is on the land and one is on the water,” Gillers said.

    Another area of scrutiny in the new ProPublica report is tickets to major sporting events – often for skybox seats – that Thomas received from his wealthy friends. Government ethics experts quoted in the story raised the disclosure requirement for gifts valued at more than $415 as potentially problematic for Thomas.

    However, according to Gabe Roth, who heads the organization Fix the Court, the ethics questions over the tickets hinge more on the entertainment exemption for judges when they are receiving personal hospitality.

    “You could make the argument that sporting tickets count as entertainment,” said Roth, whose group advocates for ethics reform and more transparency in the judiciary.

    Thomas is not the only justice who has failed to report sporting event tickets on their disclosures. Justice Elena Kagan attended a University of Wisconsin football game – sitting in the Chancellor’s Box – in 2017 that went unreported on her disclosure for that year, according to a Fix the Court review.

    Still, ProPublica points to the example of 60 lower court judges who reported sporting event tickets on their annual forms between 2003 and 2019.

    It is a particularly complicated endeavor to decipher Thomas’ reporting obligations for the access he reportedly got, via his friendship with Huizenga, to an exclusive Florida golf course. The report describes a “standing invitation” Thomas had to the members-only course, the Floridian, but ProPublica said it was not clear whether Thomas was granted a full-fledged membership or whether he was just able to visit the course as a guest of Huizenga.

    However, there are signs pointing toward disclosure for judges who do receive gifted golf club memberships. In his filing for 2008, Chief Justice John Roberts reported honorary memberships to two golf courses – valued in the thousands of dollars – that he was gifted, while even noting in the disclosure forms that he didn’t use the memberships.

    “If that’s John Roberts’ interpretation of the federal disclosure law, I am going to side with him on this,” Roth said.

    The latest investigation into Thomas’ conduct also hit on an issue that has emerged around several of the justices: whether their activity with certain charities and other organizations violates ethical standards limiting judges’ participation in fundraising.

    ProPublica, piggybacking off recent reporting by The New York Times, dug into Thomas’ involvement with the Horatio Alger Association, which offers scholarships and mentorships to students, and which connected Thomas to some of the billionaire benefactors highlighted in the report.

    Thomas, according to The Times and ProPublica, facilitated events for the organization that were hosted at the Supreme Court, with the latest investigation reporting that access to one such event cost $1,500 or more in contributions per person.

    Under a set of ethics rules for the judiciary that are separate from the financial disclosure requirements, judges are barred from allowing the “prestige” of their office to be used for the purpose of fundraising.

    “You can attend an event of an organization, a non-profit that serves as a fundraiser,” Gillers said. “But the justice or judge cannot be identified as an attraction for people to come and donate money.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link

  • FBI working with sheriff’s office after threats to Fulton County officials | CNN Politics

    FBI working with sheriff’s office after threats to Fulton County officials | CNN Politics

    [ad_1]



    CNN
     — 

    The FBI is aware that some Fulton County officials have received threats of violence, the bureau’s Atlanta office said in a statement Thursday.

    The threats come days after a local grand jury voted to indict former President Donald Trump and others stemming from their efforts to overturn his 2020 electoral defeat in Georgia.

    The agency did not identify any specific targets, but said, “It is our policy not to discuss details of ongoing investigations. However, each and every potential threat brought to our attention is taken seriously. Individuals found responsible for making threats in violation of state and/or federal laws will be prosecuted.”

    According to the statement, the FBI Atlanta field office is working with the Fulton County sheriff’s office on the investigation.

    The statement comes amid concerns over the safety of the officials and jury members connected to Monday’s indictment and reports that the names, photographs, social media profiles and even the home addresses purportedly belonging to members of the grand jury were circulating on social media. CNN could not independently verify if the photographs, social media accounts and the homes addresses being posted actually belonged to the grand jurors.

    The Fulton County sheriff’s office said in a statement Thursday afternoon that it was “aware that personal information of members of the Fulton County Grand Jury is being shared on various platforms” and that investigators are trying to “track down the origin of threats” against the grand jurors.

    “We take this matter very seriously and are coordinating with our law enforcement partners to respond quickly to any credible threat and to ensure the safety of those individuals who carried out their civic duty,” the statement said.

    As CNN has reported, Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis was recently assigned additional security protection near her Georgia residence, according to a source with direct knowledge of Atlanta law enforcement movements.

    Willis, who is investigating Trump and his associates for interfering with Georgia’s 2020 election results, has recently urged local officials to stay vigilant about possible security threats. In an email less last month to county officials, the district attorney shared a racist and sexualized message she received and said similar obscene messages had been left via voicemail.

    Trump once again attacked Willis earlier this month at a New Hampshire campaign event, calling the Black district attorney a “racist,” while defending his actions in Georgia around the 2020 election.

    Willis has previously said security concerns have been escalated by Trump’s rhetoric.

    In early 2022, she asked the FBI for help in providing security for buildings and staff one day after Trump called prosecutors investigating him “racists.” The former president asked his supporters to hold “the biggest protests we have ever had” in cities like Atlanta if the prosecutors “do anything wrong or illegal.”

    [ad_2]

    Source link