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  • Venezuela and Chevron sign oil contract in Caracas | CNN

    Venezuela and Chevron sign oil contract in Caracas | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The Venezuelan government and American oil company Chevron have signed a contract in Caracas on Friday to resume operations in Venezuela, according to the country’s state broadcaster VTV.

    “This contract aims to continue with the productive and development activities in this energy sector, framed within our Constitution and the Venezuelan laws that govern oil activity in the country,” said Venezuelan oil minister Tareck El Aissami, who was slapped with United States sanctions in 2017.

    He attended the signing ceremony along with representatives from Venezuelan state-owned oil and natural gas company PDVSA and Chevron.

    April 2023 will mark Chevron’s 100th anniversary in Venezuela, El Aissami said at the event.

    The move comes after the United States granted Chevron limited authorization to resume pumping oil from Venezuela last week, following an announcement that the Venezuelan government and the opposition group had reached an agreement on humanitarian relief and will continue to negotiate for a solution to the country’s chronic economic and political crisis.

    The US has been looking for ways to allow Venezuela to begin producing more oil and selling it on the international market, thereby reducing the world’s energy dependence on Russia, US officials told CNN in May.

    A 6-month license was granted to Venezuela by the US Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) last week, and the US can revoke it at any time. Additionally, any profits earned will go to repaying debt to Chevron and not to the Maduro regime, according to a senior official.

    In 2017, OFAC said El Aissami had played a “significant role in international narcotics trafficking,” according to a news release.

    The Treasury Department said he “facilitated shipments of narcotics from Venezuela to include control over planes that leave from a Venezuelan air base, (and) narcotics shipments of over 1,000 kilograms from Venezuela on multiple occasions, including those with the final destinations of Mexico and the United States.”

    In addition, the department said El Aissami is linked to coordinating drug shipments to Los Zetas, a violent Mexican drug cartel, and provided protection to a Colombian drug lord.

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  • Lionel Messi and Argentina face Australia in next step towards World Cup glory | CNN

    Lionel Messi and Argentina face Australia in next step towards World Cup glory | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The World Cup has hardly been straightforward for Lionel Messi and Argentina thus far, but they are strong favorites ahead of their round of 16 game against Australia.

    The Socceroos were a surprise package in the group stages, qualifying for the knockout rounds in Qatar courtesy of 1-0 victories against Tunisia and Denmark.

    Argentina, meanwhile, bounced back from a shock opening defeat against Saudi Arabia with 2-0 wins against Mexico and Poland.

    Despite having a penalty saved against Poland, Messi has played a crucial role in Argentina’s tournament, scoring twice – including a superb strike against Mexico – and providing one assist.

    Defeat Australia – which Argentina has done in all but two of the sides’ previous meetings – and the Netherlands or the United States await in the quarterfinals.

    But this World Cup has already thrown up several upsets, as Saudi Arabia demonstrated in its opening game against Argentina. As a result, manager Lionel Scaloni is taking nothing for granted.

    “Australia is a good team,” he told reporters on Friday. “This is football, you have to leave theoretical favoritism to the side and play.

    “We should adapt ourselves, defensively sometimes we change. Australia has its set ways in attack and it won’t change those.

    “We will leave our last drop of sweat on the field in this World Cup, we’re going to compete.”

    As for Australia, the challenge of trying to keep a third consecutive clean sheet at the tournament will be a tall order with Messi on the pitch.

    “It’s going to be a difficult game, obviously, playing against probably the best footballer ever to grace the game,” defender Milos Degenek said on Friday. “Apart from that, it’s 11 against 11. There are not 11 Messis, there’s one. We know their squad is full of stars.”

    A demanding schedule means the teams have had just two days to prepare for Saturday’s game at the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium in Al Rayyan – something Degenek alluded to in his press conference.

    “It’s something that FIFA need to consider, that we’re not robots, that we are humans, that we do need to recover, and we can’t just play day after day,” he said. “We need a break as well.”

    FIFA did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment regarding the tournament scheduling for Australia and Argentina.

    In Saturday’s other game, the Netherlands and the US face each other at the Khalifa International Stadium.

    Netherlands vs USA: 10 a.m. Eastern Time

    Argentina vs Australia: 2 p.m. ET

    US: Fox Sports

    UK: BBC or ITV

    Australia: SBS

    Brazil: SportTV

    Germany: ARD, ZDF, Deutsche Telekom

    Canada: Bell Media

    South Africa: SABC

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  • Suspect in 2017 killing of two Indiana teen girls ‘has nothing to hide,’ attorneys say | CNN

    Suspect in 2017 killing of two Indiana teen girls ‘has nothing to hide,’ attorneys say | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Attorneys for the suspect in the 2017 killing of two teenage girls in Delphi, Indiana, said in a statement Friday that their client “has nothing to hide. ”

    Richard Allen, who was arrested last month in connection with the killings, will make “a vigorous legal and factual challenge” to the prosecution claim that a .40 caliber unspent round found near the bodies of the two teens tied him to the crime, attorneys Brad Rozzi and Andrew Baldwin said in the statement.

    The statement comes days after the unsealing of a probable cause affidavit on Tuesday that shed light on how investigators narrowed in on Allen and arrested him more than five years since the slayings of Abigail Williams, 13, and Liberty German, 14.

    Allen is charged with two counts of murder and has pleaded not guilty.

    The two girls went for a hike along Delphi Historic Trails but never showed up at a previously arranged time to meet Libby’s dad, according to police. Their bodies were found the next day in a wooded area near the trail, about a half mile from the Monon High Bridge where they’d been dropped off, according to authorities.

    A grainy video of a man walking and a garbled voice recording were among the scant clues authorities publicized over the years.

    “Rick has nothing to hide,” the statement from the attorneys said. “We feel it appropriate, necessary, and within the bounds of our rules of professional conduct to make a few comments concerning the probable cause affidavit and Rick’s innocence.”

    Investigators believe the evidence they gathered shows that Allen is the man seen on a video from Liberty’s phone who forced the girls down a hill and that he led them to the location where they were killed, according to the affidavit.

    That evidence includes interviews with witnesses who were in the area the teens were hiking on a day off from school on February 13, 2017, as well as the video from Libby’s phone. The video shows a man in a dark jacket and jeans walking behind the girls and then telling them, “Guys, down the hill,” according to the affidavit.

    Allen’s lawyers said their client “contacted the police and voluntarily discussed being on the trail that day,” according to the statement. “Like many people in Delphi, Rick wanted to help any way he could.”

    The two girls were dropped off in the area just before 1:50 p.m. that day, the affidavit said. The video showed they encountered the man at the Monon High Bridge at 2:13 p.m.

    A witness told investigators she had seen a man heading away from that bridge later “wearing a blue colored jacket and blue jeans and was muddy and bloody,” and appeared to have gotten in a fight, the affidavit said. The man was traveling on a road adjacent to the crime scene, and investigators were able to determine that took place shortly before 4 p.m.

    Allen remembers “seeing three younger girls on the trail that day” but “his contact with the girls was brief and of little significance,” his attorneys said.

    “The probable cause affidavit seems to suggest that a single magic bullet is proof of Rick’s guilt,” Rozzi and Baldwin said. “We anticipate a vigorous legal and factual challenge to any claims by the prosecution as to the reliability of its conclusions concerning the single magic bullet.”

    Another witness told investigators she noticed an oddly parked vehicle at an old Child Protective Services building. A tip to investigators had also referenced a vehicle parked at the building that “appeared as though it was backed in as to conceal the license plate.” Investigators believe the description of the vehicle matched one of two vehicles that Allen owned in 2017, the affidavit said.

    When Allen spoke with an officer in 2017, he admitted he was on the trail for roughly two hours, the affidavit said. In a subsequent interview in October 2022, Allen told authorities he had gone out there to “watch fish,” that he was wearing jeans and a black or blue jacket and also said he owns firearms which were at his home, according to the affidavit.

    “On October 13th, 2022, Investigators executed a search warrant of Richard Allen’s residence,” the affidavit said. “Among other items, officers located jackets, boots, knives and firearms, including a Sig Sauer, Model P226, .40 caliber pistol with serial number U 625 627.”

    According to the document, investigators found a .40 caliber unspent round less than two feet away from one of the bodies, and between the two victims.

    Lab results confirmed the unspent round had been cycled through Allen’s Sig Sauer, the affidavit said. When Allen was questioned about that result, he denied knowing their victims or having any involvement in their killings, according to the affidavit.

    The affidavit does not make any reference to any other participants in the girls’ killings, despite Carroll County Prosecutor Nick McLeland recently saying in court that he had “good reason to believe that Richard Allen is not the only actor in this heinous crime.”

    Allen’s lawyers said they pushed to have the affidavit unsealed.

    “We were hoping that we would receive tips that would assist us in proving up his innocence,” the statement said. “Although it is the burden of the prosecutor to prove Rick’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, the defense team looks forward to conducting its own investigation concerning Rick’s innocence.”

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  • Black Creeks expelled from tribe finally get their day in court, 43 years later | CNN

    Black Creeks expelled from tribe finally get their day in court, 43 years later | CNN

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    A version of this story appeared in CNN’s Race Deconstructed newsletter. To get it in your inbox every week, sign up for free here.

    Thursday could mark a turning point in Native American history. A hearing is scheduled about Black claims to Native citizenship. More specifically, the hearing will address the long-running demands of the descendants of Black people who were enslaved by the Muscogee (Creek) Nation that they be granted tribal citizenship and corresponding rights.

    Following the Civil War, the Muscogee (Creek) Nation was required to accept as citizens the people of African descent it had once enslaved. But a 1979 change to the tribe’s constitution defined citizenship “by blood.” As a result, Black Creeks and their descendants, known as Freedmen, were effectively expelled.

    Damario Solomon-Simmons, a civil rights attorney representing the two plaintiffs in the lawsuit, said he feels confident that the Muscogee (Creek) Nation District Court will decide in his favor.

    A descendant of Black Creeks, Solomon-Simmons has been involved in the citizenship battle for years. In 2018, he filed a federal lawsuit, but it was dismissed. (His grandmother was a plaintiff, but she died in 2019.)

    Solomon-Simmons filed a petition in March 2020, and says that the tribe’s 1979 decision was “completely racist” and “erroneous.”

    “It’s 100 percent anti-Black discrimination,” he told CNN. “They’re telling you that if you’re Black and/or (had) enslaved (ancestors), you can’t be a member of our nation.”

    Solomon-Simmons said the constitution not only strips Black Creeks of their citizenship – it also prevents them from securing the benefits given to tribal members: health care, education, housing, scholarships, cash assistance and more.

    Officials from the Muscogee (Creek) Nation insist the tribe’s citizenship requirements have nothing to do with race.

    Spokesman Jason Salsman told CNN in an email that the nation’s citizenship is diverse, and includes Black Americans, Spanish people, Mexicans and Asians.

    But he noted that the tribe has a “traumatic history” with people who aren’t Creek by blood and that this is a “challenging issue” for many citizens.

    “I can’t speak for the leaders of 43 years ago when this decision took place,” Salsman said. “But it should hardly be surprising that a nation like ours that has endured attempts at extermination, removal and other unjust federal policies enforced by outsiders would seek a constitution that requires Creek Indian ancestry and blood lineage among its citizens and leaders.”

    He added, “The matter before the Court is not a question of race but rather to determine whether our government is obligated by treaty to enroll individuals as citizens who are not Creek Indians.”

    David Hill, the principal chief of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, underscored in an April 2021 letter the knottiness of this history, and the significance of confronting it.

    “The question of the enrollment status of the descendants of Creek Freedmen is an extremely complex one,” he wrote, “born in an era when African Americans and Native Americans alike faced traumatic injustices at the hands of the US government. … As good leaders, it is important for us to listen, acknowledge and openly engage with our communities and our citizens. When these issues arise, they are opportunities that allow us to reconsider if our policies are still reflective of who we are as a Nation.”

    Black Creeks have reason to be hopeful about their cause, which isn’t unique. Just last year, the Cherokee Nation jettisoned from its constitution language that defined citizenship purely by blood.

    “The Cherokee Nation’s actions have brought this longstanding issue to a close and have importantly fulfilled their obligations to the Cherokee Freedmen,” Deb Haaland, the first Native American Cabinet secretary, said in a May 2021 statement. “We encourage other Tribes to take similar steps to meet their moral and legal obligations to the Freedmen.”

    Here’s a closer look at the citizenship struggles dividing the Muscogee (Creek) Nation:

    To understand some of the challenges beleaguering Black Creeks’ in our present day, let’s rewind to the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

    During this period, the US government actively sought to “civilize” independent, self-governing tribal nations – Muscogee (Creek), Chickasaw, Choctaw, Seminole and Cherokee – by forcing on them the privatization of land and the use of enslaved people for labor.

    Many of these nations, especially the Muscogee (Creek) Nation, didn’t practice slavery in the way people tend to picture the institution.

    “It wasn’t chattel slavery, where people would lose their humanity and become property,” Caleb Gayle, a professor of practice at Northeastern University and the author of the 2022 book, “We Refuse to Forget: A True Story of Black Creeks, American Identity and Power,” told CNN. “It was, instead, a practice called kinship slavery. People were still peers. Slave identity wasn’t passed down from generation to generation. People broke bread and were seen as equals.”

    He added that a certain level of nuance is necessary when discussing slavery within the context of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation.

    “There’s been interaction between Black people and Native American nations for a very long time,” Gayle said. “That connection was further fortified through the project of civilization that the US government enforced again and again.”

    In 1866, in the aftermath of the Civil War, peace treaties granted not only emancipation but also tribal citizenship to Black people who had been enslaved by Native American nations.

    With the passage of the Dawes Act in 1887, the US government sought to identify who would be on which citizenship roll. Some ended up on the “by blood” roll; others, on the Freedmen roll.

    In 1979, when the Muscogee (Creek) Nation altered its constitution, those on the Freedmen roll were no longer able to keep the citizenship status they’d had for decades.

    “Even if your ancestors had never been slaves, even if they’d been adopted into the nation, even if they never had the stain of slavery on them, if you were on the Freedmen roll – often because your ancestors looked a certain way – the constitutional change kind of nullified your claim to the citizenship you once had,” Gayle said.

    Rhonda Grayson is intimately familiar with this history and its effects. She’s one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, and said that her ancestors were enslaved by the Muscogee (Creek) Nation.

    She’s among the hundreds of Black Creek descendants who’ve unsuccessfully applied for citizenship since 1979. She applied in 2019, she recalled, but was denied; her appeal also was denied.

    Grayson explained that she wants the Muscogee (Creek) Nation to issue an apology to Black Creeks for discarding them.

    “My motivation is redemption for my ancestors. They suffered just like any other Native American. They worked and built the Creek Nation to what it is today,” she said. “We’re fighting for our tribal rights. We’re entitled to them.”

    The disputes ricocheting throughout the Muscogee (Creek) Nation offer us an opportunity to reconfigure the way we think about identity.

    In fact, we may already be starting to see this change.

    In February 2021, the Cherokee Nation Supreme Court ruled that the nation had to remove “by blood” from its constitution. The decision meant that the descendants of Black people once enslaved by the Cherokee Nation would have the right to tribal citizenship.

    “Freedmen rights are inherent,” as Cherokee Nation Supreme Court Justice Shawna S. Baker wrote in the opinion. “They extend to descendants of Freedmen as a birthright springing from their ancestors’ oppression and displacement as people of color recorded and memorialized in Article 9 of the 1866 Treaty.”

    For many, especially Black Creeks, this development extends hope that they might achieve a similar outcome.

    Crucially, as citizenship conversations continue, we must maintain precision and sensitivity, Gayle urged.

    “It’s important to keep the focus squarely on the culprit that brought us to this point today. And that’s the US government. Its subtle and overt expansion of White supremacy is to blame here. These are two incredibly aggrieved, hyper-marginalized groups,” he said.

    In this light, Gayle added, “it’s impossible not to feel where the Muscogee (Creek) Nation is coming from when folks say, ‘We’re tired of being told who we are and being forced to modify and to accommodate.’ And it’s impossible not to feel where Black Creeks are coming from when they say, ‘Yes, we understand that – but we have a shared history that’s so potent and powerful as well.’”

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  • Shanquella Robinson’s death is being investigated as a femicide. Here is what it means | CNN

    Shanquella Robinson’s death is being investigated as a femicide. Here is what it means | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The killing of Shanquella Robinson is being investigated as a femicide, an unfamiliar term for many in the United States as this gender-motivated crime has not been defined by US legislation despite being a global issue.

    Robinson, a 25-year-old student at Winston-Salem State University in North Carolina died in October while staying in a luxury rental property in the Mexican state of Baja California Sur.

    Prosecutors in Mexico are seeking to extradite one of Robinson’s friends as a suspect in the case. Daniel de la Rosa, the attorney general for Baja California Sur told local media last week that an arrest warrant was issued for the crime of femicide, or the killing of a woman because of her gender, in connection with Robinson’s case.

    No one has been charged in the case, and authorities have not released the names of Robinson’s friends.

    Unlike Mexico and other Latin American countries, the US does not have a law recognizing femicide as a different crime than homicide, which several experts say does not mean that killings targeting women are not happening in the US at alarming rates.

    “Femicides happen all the time in the US, and many famous murder cases that we all have in our consciousness are actually femicide, but we don’t put that label on them,” said Dabney P. Evans, director of Emory University’s Center for Humanitarian Emergencies, who studies violence against women.

    As the investigation into Robinson’s death continues, here’s what you need to know about what is considered femicide in Mexico, why gender-based violence is a big problem globally, and why scholars say that writing femicide into US law could help women.

    Femicide is the most extreme form of gender-based violence (GBV) and is defined as the “intentional murder of women because they are women.” 

    Femicides fall into two categories: intimate and non-intimate femicide. The former refers to the killing of women by current or ex-partners, while the latter is the killing of women by people with whom they had no intimate relationship.

    In most countries, femicide is not different from homicide in criminal law, but Mexico is among at least 16 countries that have included femicide as a specific crime.

    Under federal law in Mexico, people can face up to 60 years in prison if convicted. The difference between homicide, or unlawful killing, and femicide, varies from state to state in Mexico.

    There could be a history of violence – sexual or not – and threats, or “if the victim was in community, for example, and if she was killed and her body was in public,” said Beatriz García Nice, who leads the Wilson Center’s initiative on gender-based violence.

    A video circulating online in recent weeks appears to show a physical altercation inside a room between Robinson and another person. Her father, Bernard Robinson, told CNN his daughter is seen in that video being thrown to the floor and beaten on the head.

    It’s not clear when the video was taken or if it depicts the moment Robinson suffered the injury that led to her death.

    While there is legislation against femicide in Mexico, “the main problem is the execution,” García Nice said. The number of gender-based violence cases are underreported in national statistics and the law is “under executed” in the judicial system, she said.

    García Nice says nearly 95% of femicide cases in Mexico go unpunished. “If you commit a crime of femicide, there’s really not that much of a chance for you to get convicted for it. And that’s one of the reasons why we see that rates are still very, very high.”

    Alejandra Marquez, an assistant professor of Spanish with a focus on gender and sexuality in Latin America and the Caribbean at Michigan State University, said the “feminicidos” crisis in Mexico started several decades ago and first gained national attention in the 1990s when hundreds of women were killed in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez.

    “There used to be this idea, especially in central Mexico, where it was like ‘women are getting killed over there at the border,’ but because it’s expanded all over the country, it’s sort of become this phenomenon that can no longer be ignored,” Marquez told CNN.

    “When you’re in Mexico, it’s part of day-to-day conversation,” Marquez added.

    The disproportionate killings of Black women, the crisis of missing or murdered Indigenous people and the 2021 deadly shootings of women at Atlanta-area spas are some examples of cases that could potentially be labeled as femicides, experts say.

    “As a society, we need to recognize that these are not one-off deaths. These are in fact, connected to patterns of masculine violence, and we need to think more closely about preventing that kind of violence,” said Evans, the scholar at Emory University.

    An analysis of homicide data by the Violence Policy Center shows 2,059 women in the US were killed by men in 2020 and 89% knew their offenders.

    For Evans, having femicide legislation in the US would not solve the issues of toxic masculinity, patriarchy, and misogyny that lead to gender-based violence but the terminology could “allows us to talk about this phenomenon” and prevent it from happening.

    There are existing laws that address gender-based violence in the US and mechanisms to track domestic violence but they are flawed.

    The federal hate crime law covers violent or property crimes at least partially motivated by bias against race, religion, disability, sexual orientation, ethnicity, gender or gender identity. At the state level, the definition of a hate crime varies and several states do not cover bias based on gender.

    Earlier this year, federal lawmakers reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act. The legislation is aimed at protecting and supporting survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking – all documented precursors in femicide cases.

    During a March ceremony celebrating the act’s passage, President Joe Biden said more needs to be done to address the issue.

    “No one, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, should experience abuse. Period. And if they do, they should have the services and support they need to get through it. And we’re not going to rest.”

    An estimated 81,100 women and girls around the world were killed intentionally last year with about 56% of them by intimate partners or family members, a UN report published last week shows.

    It’s hard to describe the full scope of gender-based violence, the report says, because roughly 4 in 10 killings reported by authorities have “no contextual information to allow them to be identified and counted as gender-related killings.”

    “These rates are alarmingly high, as we can see; however, that’s the tip of the iceberg,” Kalliopi Mingeirou, the chief of Ending Violence against Women Section at UN Women, one of the entities that compiled the report.

    Mingeirou said when a femicide isn’t classified legally for what it is, police cannot investigate properly. Other challenges in stopping and preventing femicides include the lack of resources and training for authorities expected to implement laws.

    “What women and girls deserve around the world is to have a world that respects their choices, that respects their rights,” Mingeirou said. “We need to have equal rights. We have a primary right to be free from violence because if we are free from violence and harassment, we can achieve, and we can thrive in this world.”

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  • Big moments for women at the men’s World Cup | CNN Politics

    Big moments for women at the men’s World Cup | CNN Politics

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



    CNN
     — 

    An unexpected result of the US Men’s National Team reaching the knockout round of 16 at the FIFA World Cup in Qatar is that the US Women’s National Team will get its largest collective payday, equally splitting $13 million in winnings with the men.

    It’s a big deal for American women who have long sought pay equity, and it amplifies the extreme sliding scale of women’s rights around the globe.

    Consider that this payday for US women was won when the US men’s team defeated Iran, a country where authorities are brutally tamping down protests by women who want basic human rights.

    The US Women’s National Team excels at soccer and fought hard for years for equal pay.

    The earnings they’ll split with the American men could grow if the men continue to advance in the World Cup.

    It’s the result of an unprecedented equal pay agreement finalized earlier this year. Read more about the prize money.

    FIFA pays bigger awards to the men’s tournament, which draws in more revenue to the international soccer governing body, than to the women’s. The agreement between the US men and women is unique.

    “To everyone it should indicate how big the disparity is that FIFA has made between their value of women’s soccer and men’s soccer, and this is the only way that equity could be achieved, if all parties agreed – and they did,” said Briana Scurry, a former US goalkeeper, appearing on CNN Wednesday.

    Not only did the US Men’s National Team advance to earn the payday, but they also agreed to this unprecedented pot-splitting with the top American women earlier this year.

    “These are Title IX males,” said Christine Brennan, the sports columnist and CNN analyst, referring to the US men’s team during an appearance on “CNN Tonight” on Tuesday. She was referring to the landmark 1972 law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in education programs or activities receiving federal funds. It has revolutionized women’s sports in the US and, Brennan argued, influenced male athletes too.

    “They weren’t raised like their dads or their grandfathers. And they have a much different outlook, not only about women’s equality in terms of pay, but these are the same men who’ve been talking about standing with the Iranian protesters,” Brennan said.

    She praised the US Soccer Federation and the Men’s National Team, who have distinguished themselves not only by advancing, but “even more so in terms of our culture and the stands they have taken.”

    Iranian women, as you’ll know from following coverage of protests in that country and at the World Cup, are fighting for basic rights.

    CNN reported on celebrations in Iran at the national team’s loss to the US. From that report:

    “I am happy, this is the government losing to the people,” one witness to celebrations in a city in the Kurdish region, who CNN is not naming for security concerns, told CNN on Wednesday.

    The Norway-based Iranian rights group Hengaw posted several videos of similar scenes. “People in Paveh are celebrating Iran’s national team lose over America in World Cup in Qatar, they are chanting ‘Down with Jash (traitors),” Hengaw said in a post.

    Meanwhile, back in Doha, Qatar, another landmark moment for women in the world’s most popular sport will come Thursday, when the first all-women refereeing team in men’s World Cup history debuts in a pivotal match between Germany and Costa Rica.

    Stéphanie Frappart, the French lead official, has already overseen matches at the top levels of European club soccer, so, “I know how to deal with it,” she said in a statement released by FIFA. This match, with a potential audience of billions, will show a woman in charge.

    If the US men and women are on the road to some sort of parity – the men still make much, much more from their clubs – there are some women in the Middle East who are just gaining access to the pitch.

    Saudi Arabia’s men’s team put in a solid show at this World Cup with their defeat of storied Argentina in the opening round. But the Saudis failed to advance past the group stage after losing to Mexico Wednesday.

    Meanwhile, women in Saudi Arabia were only allowed inside soccer stadiums in 2018, much less play.

    As Saudi Arabia weighs a joint bid to co-host the 2030 men’s World Cup, the kingdom is also in the beginning stages of building a national women’s team. It’ll surely be many years before the Saudi women can be competitive on the world stage, but simply being able to play is certainly progress.

    CNN’s Becky Anderson, who is reporting from Doha during this World Cup, talked to the German women’s team legend Monika Staab, who is coaching the nascent Saudi women’s team. She said the kingdom is developing its women through three development academies and wants to host an international tournament in 2026.

    Staab said the all-women referee team in Thursday’s match in Qatar will be a powerful symbol for Muslim women watching.

    “The women can do like the men,” Staab said on CNN International Wednesday night. “I think that is a big sign for the whole world. We in Saudi Arabia, we play football. That has a great impact on every Muslim girl who wants to play,” Staab said.

    In the US, women’s soccer has at times been a bigger draw than the men’s game.

    About 14 million American viewers watched the women’s World Cup final, featuring the winning US team, in 2019. That was more than watched the men’s World Cup final between France and Croatia in 2018, but far below the 20 million who watched the US take on England in the group stage last Saturday across Fox and Telemundo.

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  • Inside the long and winding road to Trump’s historic indictment | CNN Politics

    Inside the long and winding road to Trump’s historic indictment | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The New York grand jury hearing the case against Donald Trump was set to break for several weeks. The former president’s lawyers believed on Wednesday afternoon they had at least a small reprieve from a possible indictment. Trump praised the perceived delay.

    Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg had other plans.

    Thursday afternoon, Bragg asked the grand jury to return an historic indictment against Trump, the first time that a current or former US president has been indicted. The surprise move was the final twist in an investigation that’s taken a long and winding road to the history-making charges that were returned this week.

    An indictment had been anticipated early last week – including by Trump himself, who promoted a theory he would be “arrested” – as law enforcement agencies prepared for the logistics of arraigning a former president. But after the testimony of Robert Costello – a lawyer who appeared on Trump’s behalf seeking to undercut the credibility of Trump’s former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen – Bragg appeared to hit the pause button.

    Costello’s testimony caused the district attorney’s office to reassess whether Costello should be the last witness the grand jury heard before prosecutors asked them to vote on an indictment, multiple sources told CNN.

    So they waited. The next day the grand jury was scheduled to meet, jurors were told not to come in. Bragg and his top prosecutors huddled the rest of the week and over the weekend to determine a strategy that would effectively counter Costello’s testimony in the grand jury.

    They called two additional witnesses. David Pecker, the former head of the company that publishes the National Enquirer, appeared on Monday. The other witness, who has still not been identified, testified on Thursday for 35 minutes in front of the grand jury – just before prosecutors asked them to vote on the indictment of more than 30 counts, the sources said.

    Trump and his attorneys, thinking Bragg might be reconsidering a potential indictment, were all caught off-guard, sources said. Some of Trump’s advisers had even left Palm Beach on Wednesday following news reports that the grand jury was taking a break, the sources added.

    After the indictment, Trump ate dinner with his wife, Melania, Thursday evening and smiled while he greeted guests at his Mar-a-Lago club, according to a source familiar with the event.

    The Manhattan district attorney’s investigation into Trump has been ongoing for years, dating back to Bragg’s predecessor, Cy Vance. Its focus shifted by mid-2020 to the accuracy of the Trump Org.’s financial statements. At the time, prosecutors debated legal theories around the hush money payments and thought they were a long shot. At several points, the wide-ranging investigation seemed to have been winding down – to the point that prosecutors resigned in protest last year. One even wrote a book critical of Bragg for not pursuing charges against Trump released just last month.

    The specific charges against Trump still remain under seal and are expected to be unveiled Tuesday when Trump is set to be arraigned.

    There are questions swirling even among Trump critics over whether the Manhattan district attorney’s case is the strongest against the former president amid additional investigations in Washington, DC, and Georgia over both his efforts to overturn the 2020 election and his handling of classified documents at his Florida resort.

    Trump could still face charges in those probes, too, which are separate from the New York indictment.

    But it’s the Manhattan indictment, dating back to a payment made before the 2016 presidential election, that now sees Trump facing down criminal charges for the first time as he runs again for the White House in 2024.

    It was just weeks before the 2016 election when Cohen, Trump’s then-lawyer, paid adult film actress Stormy Daniels $130,000 to keep silent about an alleged affair with Trump. (Trump has denied the affair.) Cohen was later reimbursed $420,000 by the Trump Organization to cover the original payment and tax liabilities and to reward him with a bonus.

    That payment and reimbursement are keys at issue in the investigation.

    Cohen also helped arrange a $150,000 payment from the publisher of the National Enquirer to Karen McDougal to kill her story claiming a 10-month affair with Trump. Trump also denies an affair with McDougal. During the grand jury proceedings, the district attorney’s office has asked questions about the “catch and kill” deal with McDougal.

    When Cohen was charged by federal prosecutors in New York in 2018 and pleaded guilty, he said he was acting at the direction of Trump when he made the payment.

    At the time, federal prosecutors had determined they could not seek to indict Trump in the scheme because of US Justice Department regulations against charging a sitting president. In 2021, after Trump left the White House, prosecutors in the Southern District of New York decided not to pursue a case against Trump, according to a recent book from CNN senior legal analyst Elie Honig.

    But then-Manhattan District Attorney Vance’s team had already picked up the investigation into the hush money payments and begun looking at potential state law violations. By summer 2019, they sent subpoenas to the Trump Org., other witnesses, and met with Cohen, who was serving a three-year prison sentence.

    Vance’s investigation broadened to the Trump Org.’s finances. New York prosecutors went to the Supreme Court twice to enforce a subpoena for Trump’s tax records from his long-time accounting firm Mazars USA. The Trump Org. and its long-time chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg were indicted on tax fraud and other charges in June 2021 for allegedly running an off-the-books compensation scheme for more than a decade.

    Weisselberg pleaded guilty to the charges last year and is currently serving a five-month sentence at Rikers Island. Prosecutors had hoped to flip Weisselberg to cooperate against Trump, but he would not tie Trump to any wrongdoing.

    Disagreements about the pace of the investigation had caused at least three career prosecutors to move off the investigation. They were concerned that the investigation was moving too quickly, without clear evidence to support possible charges, CNN and others reported last year.

    Vance authorized the attorneys on the team to present evidence to the grand jury near the end of 2021, but he did not seek an indictment. Those close to Vance say he wanted to leave the decision to Bragg, the newly elected district attorney.

    Bragg, a Democrat, took office in January 2022. Less than two months into his tenure, two top prosecutors who had worked on the Trump case under Vance abruptly resigned amid a disagreement in the office over the strength of the case against Trump.

    On February 22, 2022, Bragg informed the prosecution team that he was not prepared to authorize charges against Trump, CNN reported. The prosecutors, Carey Dunne and Mark Pomerantz, resigned the next day.

    In his resignation letter, Pomerantz said he believed Trump was guilty of numerous felonies and said that Bragg’s decision to not move forward with an indictment at the time was “wrong” and a “grave failure of justice.”

    “I and others believe that your decision not to authorize prosecution now will doom any future prospects that Mr. Trump will be prosecuted for the criminal conduct we have been investigating,” Pomerantz wrote in the letter, which was reviewed by CNN.

    At that point, the investigation was focused on Trump’s financial statements and whether he knowingly misled lenders, insurers, and others by providing them false or misleading information about the value of his properties.

    Prosecutors were building a wide-ranging falsified business records case to include years of financial statements and the hush money payments, people with direct knowledge of the investigation told CNN. But at the time, those prosecutors believed there was a good chance a felony charge related to the hush money payment would be dismissed by a judge because it was a novel legal theory.

    Dunne and Pomerantz pushed to seek an indictment of Trump tied to the sweeping falsified business records case, but others, including some career prosecutors, were skeptical that they could win a conviction at trial, in part because of the difficulty in proving Trump’s criminal intent.

    Despite the resignations of the prosecutors on the Trump case, Bragg’s office reiterated at the time that the investigation was ongoing.

    “Investigations are not linear so we are following the leads in front of us. That’s what we’re doing,” Bragg told CNN in April 2022. “The investigation is very much ongoing.”

    At the same time that Bragg’s criminal investigation into Trump lingered last year, another prosecution against the Trump Org. moved forward. In December, two Trump Org. entities were convicted at trial on 17 counts and were ordered to pay $1.6 million, the maximum penalty, the following month.

    Trump was not personally charged in that case. But it appeared to embolden Bragg’s team to sharpen their focus back to Trump and the hush money payment.

    Cohen was brought back in to meet with Manhattan prosecutors. Cohen had previously met with prosecutors in the district attorney’s office 13 times over the course of the investigation. But the January meeting was the first in more than a year – and a clear sign of the direction prosecutors were taking.

    As investigators inched closer to a charging decision, Bragg was faced with more public pressure to indict Trump: Pomerantz, the prosecutor who had resigned a year prior, released a book about the investigation that argued Trump should be charged and criticized Bragg for failing to do so.

    “Every single member of the prosecution team thought that his guilt was established,” Pomerantz said in a February interview on “CNN This Morning.”

    Asked about Bragg’s hesitance, Pomerantz said: “I can’t speak in detail about what went through his mind. I can surmise from what happened at the time and statements that he’s made since that he had misgivings about the strength of the case.”

    Bragg responded in a statement saying that more work was needed on the case. “Mr. Pomerantz’s plane wasn’t ready for takeoff,” Bragg said.

    Prosecutors continued bringing in witnesses, including Pecker, the former head of American Media Inc., which publishes the National Enquirer. In February, Trump Org. controller Jeffrey McConney testified before the grand jury. Members of Trump’s 2016 campaign, including Kellyanne Conway and Hope Hicks, also appeared. In March, Daniels met with prosecutors, her attorney said.

    And Cohen, after his numerous meetings with prosecutors, finally testified before the grand jury in March.

    The second week of March, prosecutors gave the clearest sign to date that the investigation was nearing its conclusion – they invited Trump to appear before the grand jury.

    Potential defendants in New York are required by law to be notified and invited to appear before a grand jury weighing charges.

    Behind the scenes, Trump attorney Susan Necheles told CNN she met with New York prosecutors to argue why Trump shouldn’t be indicted and that prosecutors didn’t articulate the specific charges they are considering.

    Trump, meanwhile, took to his social media to predict his impending indictment. In a post attacking Bragg on March 18, Trump said the “leading Republican candidate and former president of the United States will be arrested on Tuesday of next week.”

    “Protest, take our nation back,” Trump added, echoing the calls he made while he tried to overturn the 2020 election.

    Trump’s prediction would turn out to be premature.

    Trump’s call for protests after a potential indictment led to meetings between senior staff members from the district attorney’s office, the New York Police Department and the New York State Court Officers – who provide security at the criminal court building in lower Manhattan.

    Trump’s lawyers also made a last-ditch effort to fend off an indictment. At the behest of Trump’s team, Costello, who advised Cohen in 2018, provided emails and testified to the grand jury on Monday, March 20, alleging that Cohen had said in 2018 that he had decided on his own to make the payment to Daniels.

    Costello’s testimony appeared to delay a possible indictment – for a brief time at least.

    During the void, Trump continued to launch verbal insults against Bragg, calling him a “degenerate psychopath.” And four Republican chairmen of the most powerful House committees wrote to Bragg asking him to testify, which Bragg’s office said was unprecedented interference in a local investigation. An envelope containing a suspicious white powder and a death threat to Bragg was to delivered to the building where the grand jury meets – the powder was deemed nonhazardous.

    The grand jury would not meet again until Monday, March 27, when Pecker was ushered back to the grand jury in a government vehicle with tinted windows in a failed effort to evade detection by the media camped outside of the building where the grand jury meets.

    Pecker, a longtime friend of Trump’s who had a history of orchestrating so-called “catch and kill” deals while at the National Enquirer, was involved with the Daniels’ deal from the beginning.

    Two days after Pecker’s testimony, there were multiple reports that the grand jury was going into a pre-planned break in April. The grand jury was set to meet Thursday but it was not expected to hear the Trump case.

    Instead, the grand jury heard from one last witness in the Trump case on Thursday, whose identity is still unknown. And then the grand jury shook up the American political system by voting to indict a former president and 2024 candidate for the White House.

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  • Arkansas governor signs sweeping bill imposing a minimum age limit for social media usage | CNN Business

    Arkansas governor signs sweeping bill imposing a minimum age limit for social media usage | CNN Business

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders has signed a sweeping bill imposing a minimum age limit for social media usage, in the latest example of states taking more aggressive steps intended to protect teens online.

    But even as Sanders signed the bill into law on Wednesday afternoon, the legislation appeared to contain vast loopholes and exemptions benefiting companies that lobbied on the bill and raising questions about how much of the industry it truly covers.

    The legislation, known as the Social Media Safety Act and taking effect in September, is aimed at giving parents more control over their kids’ social media usage, according to lawmakers. It defines social media companies as any online forum that lets users create public profiles and interact with each other through digital content.

    It requires companies that operate those services to verify the ages of all new users and, if the users are under 18 years old, to obtain a parent’s consent before allowing them to create an account. To perform the age checks, the law relies on third-party companies to verify users’ personal information, such as a driver’s license or photo ID.

    “While social media can be a great tool and a wonderful resource, it can have a massive negative impact on our kids,” Sanders said at a press conference before signing the bill.

    Utah finalized a similar law last month, raising concerns among some users and advocacy groups that the legislation could make user data less secure, internet access less private and infringe upon younger users’ basic rights.

    The push by states to legislate on social media comes after years of mounting scrutiny of the industry and claims that it has harmed users’ well-being and mental health, particularly among teens.

    Despite its seemingly universal scope, however, the new law, also known as SB396, includes numerous carveouts for certain types of digital services and, in some cases, individual companies. And although its sponsors have said the law is specifically meant to apply to certain platforms, including TikTok, parts of the legislative language appear to result in the exact opposite effect.

    In the final days of negotiation over the bill, Arkansas lawmakers approved an amendment that created several categorical exemptions from the age verification requirements. Media companies that “exclusively” offer subscription content; social media platforms that permit users to “generate short video clips of dancing, voice overs, or other acts of entertainment”; and companies that “exclusively offer” video gaming-focused social networking features were exempted.

    Another amendment carved out companies that sell cloud storage services, business cybersecurity services or educational technology and that simultaneously derive less than 25% of their total revenue from running a social media platform.

    Sen. Tyler Dees, a lead co-sponsor of the legislation, explained in remarks on the Arkansas senate floor on April 6 that the exemptions and tweaks to the bill, some of which he said were made in consultation with Apple, Meta and Google, were intended to shield non-social media services from the bill’s age requirements and to focus attention on new accounts created by children, not existing adult accounts.

    “There’s other services that Google offers … like cloud storage, et cetera,” Dees said. “So that’s really the intent of carving out — like LinkedIn, that is a social – I’m sorry, that is a business networking site, and so that’s the intent of those bills.”

    Microsoft-owned LinkedIn is apparently exempt from SB396 under a provision that carves out companies that provide “career development opportunities, including professional networking, job skills, learning certifications, and job posting and application services.”

    Other lawmakers have questioned whether the legislation — which has now become law — exempts a giant of the social media industry: YouTube, whose auto-play features and algorithmic recommendation engine have been accused of promoting extremism and radicalizing viewers.

    The confusion over YouTube appears to stem from the carveout for businesses that offer cloud storage and that make less than 25% of their revenue from social media.

    What is unclear is whether YouTube is subject to SB396 because it is a distinct company within Google whose revenue comes almost entirely from operating a social media platform, or whether it is not covered because YouTube is a part of Google and Google is exempt because it derives only a small share of its revenues from YouTube.

    In response to questions by CNN, Dees said SB396 targets platforms including Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, but omitted any mention of Google and declined to answer whether YouTube specifically would be covered by the law.

    “The purpose of this bill was to empower parents and protect kids from social media platforms, like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and Snapchat,” Dees said in a statement. “We worked with stakeholders to ensure that email, text messaging, video streaming, and networking websites were not covered by the bill.”

    In remarks at Wednesday’s bill signing, Sanders told reporters that Google and Amazon are exempted from the law, implying that YouTube will not be subject to the age verification requirements imposed on other major social media sites.

    Meanwhile, Dees’ statement appeared to contradict the language in SB396 that purports to exempt any company that “allows a user to generate short video clips of dancing, voice overs, or other acts of entertainment in which the primary purpose is not educational or informative” — content that can be commonly found on TikTok, Snapchat and the other social media platforms Deese named.

    According to Meta spokesperson, “We want teens to be safe online. We’ve developed more than 30 tools to support teens and families, including tools that let parents and teens work together to limit the amount of time teens spend on Instagram, and age-verification technology that helps teens have age-appropriate experiences.”

    Meta “automatically set teens’ accounts to private when they join Instagram, we’ve further restricted the options advertisers have to reach teens, as well as the information we use to show ads to teens… and we don’t allow content that promotes suicide, self-harm or eating disorders,” according to the spokesperson, who added: “We’ll continue to work closely with experts, policymakers and parents on these important issues.”

    Spokespeople for Snapchat, TikTok and YouTube didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

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  • Disney rocks DeSantis ahead of expected White House bid announcement | CNN Politics

    Disney rocks DeSantis ahead of expected White House bid announcement | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    “DeSantisland” was likely not the happiest place on Earth on Thursday.

    As Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis gears up for an expected jump into the 2024 presidential race next week, his powerful adversary, Disney, trampled his pre-launch buzz by scratching a $1 billion plan for an office campus that could have brought 2,000 jobs to the state.

    The move was the latest twist in a bitter feud between DeSantis and one of the most important corporations operating in the Sunshine State, rooted in a political collision over the Republican governor’s hardline conservative ideology that will become his pitch to GOP primary voters. And it raises the question of whether Floridians are paying a big price for his political ambitions.

    Disney’s power play showed that CEO Bob Iger wasn’t bluffing when he asked whether Florida wanted the firm to “invest more, employ more people, and pay more taxes” last week. The timing of the Thursday announcement seemed calculated to damage the governor ahead of the most important week of his political career to date, when he is expected to soft launch his White House bid and make the all-important sell to fundraising bundlers. Disney did not specifically blame DeSantis for the move, partly citing “changing business conditions.” But the message was clear.

    “When you are involved in a situation like this, it doesn’t happen very often that events like this are random or coincidental,” said Mark Johnston, a professor of marketing and ethics at the Crummer School of Business at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

    Disney’s latest swipe at DeSantis set off multiple political reverberations. It offered a huge opening for ex-President Donald Trump and other Republican primary candidates to argue DeSantis is blundering through an ill-conceived battle with the corporate giant and to accuse him of squandering jobs and business in pursuit of higher office.

    Trump’s campaign gleefully declared that DeSantis got “caught in the Mouse Trap,” after predicting weeks ago that the governor would lose his face-off with Mickey Mouse. (In that same statement, the campaign claimed the GOP front-runner, while in office, was known as the “job’s President.”)

    The fact that some of the new jobs in the Disney project were expected to be transferred from California also undercut a narrative central to the DeSantis platform that businesses and citizens are fleeing liberal areas for a dynamic state dubbed “DeSantisland” by his supporters and which he calls “the free state of Florida.”

    More fundamentally, the latest sign DeSantis was outmaneuvered by Disney threatens to highlight damaging perceptions Trump and other critics are seeking to sow about his candidacy – that despite his thumping reelection win in November, DeSantis lacks basic political skills and strategic nous. This theme has been gathering steam following a series of missteps by DeSantis – who for months was seen as a severe threat to Trump – as he prepped his campaign. His collision with Disney also calls into question whether the bullying persona that the governor adopted to appeal to the conservative base is grounded in reality.

    In other words, has DeSantis picked an enemy – that after decades of mastering societal currents and protecting its image in the courts – is tougher and better at politics than he is? If so, what might this augur for his capacity to thrive in a coming clash with a candidate who is as feral as Trump?

    In a series of moves over the last year, DeSantis created the “Mouse trap” for himself. He recently slammed Disney during a visit to South Carolina, a key primary state and declaring: “They may have run Florida for 50 years before I got on the scene, but they don’t run Florida anymore.”

    The dispute between the governor and Disney dates back to the firm’s objections to legislation that DeSantis signed last spring that restricted the teaching of sexual orientation and gender identity for kindergarten through third grade, dubbed by critics as the “Don’t Say Gay bill.” The measure is part of his targeting of cultural issues and his campaign against “woke” diversity, equity and inclusion policies. The strategy is calculated to appeal to conservatives who believe America’s traditional values are under attack from a more diverse and inclusive society. But the governor’s clash with Disney – a huge firm that appeals to millions of mainstream Americans and has sought to become more inclusive in recent years – could hint at difficulties DeSantis might have in selling such policies toward more moderate voters in a general election.

    DeSantis claimed in his recently published autobiography that Disney had been pressured by “leftist activists” to take a position that alienated Floridians, including parents and children, and that had nothing to do with its core business. He justified his subsequent effort to take control of a special tax district that gave Disney wide autonomy by saying that it had ceased to act in the interests of Florida. “The Walt Disney Company had decided to bite the hand that had fed it for more than fifty years,” he wrote.

    Disney, in response to the governor’s moves, has accused DeSantis of infringing its right to free speech and has launched a lawsuit that could shadow his presidential campaign.

    In keeping with his bruising political persona, DeSantis reacted defiantly to Disney’s announcement that it would halt the office project. Jeremy T. Redfern, a spokesman for his office said, “Disney announced the possibility of a Lake Nona campus nearly two years ago. Nothing ever came of the project, and the state was unsure whether it would come to fruition.” Redfern also took a swipe at the entertainment empire: “Given the company’s financial straits, falling market cap and declining stock price, it is unsurprising that they would restructure their business operations and cancel unsuccessful ventures.”

    Whatever the economic backdrop of this dispute, it has enormous political implications, as could be seen from the swift reactions of some his potential GOP primary rivals.

    Trump’s camp issued several statements, including one that crowed that “President Trump is always right,” and recirculated his previous prediction that DeSantis would be “absolutely destroyed by Disney.” The situation is a win-win for Trump: It allows him to portray DeSantis as weak and politically naive and also to take shots at an impressive economic and political record in Florida the governor is using as a bedrock of his campaign. Trump has long styled himself as a famed dealmaker, and while this persona may not be justified by his years of questionable investments and business failures, it remains a powerful one among GOP primary voters, and could help him drive home his attacks on the DeSantis business record.

    “Ron DeSantis’ failed war on Disney has done little for his limping shadow campaign and now is doing even less for Florida’s economy,” the Trump campaign said in a statement.

    Another possible GOP primary candidate, former Vice President Mike Pence, also leveraged the Disney announcement to jab DeSantis. He argued the governor should have simply taken the win in the legislature over the teaching of gender issues in schools.

    “I like Walt Disney, not woke Disney,” Pence said on Fox Business. “I just don’t believe it’s in the interests of the people of any state for a government to essentially go after a business that they disagreed with on a political issue.”

    Democrats also weighed in, foreshadowing general election attacks they could make against DeSantis should he win the Republican nomination.

    “Gov DeSantis is more interested in running for President than running the state of Florida” and is trying to “out-Trump Trump” in the GOP primary, Florida Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer on the “Situation Room.”

    “And now the people of Florida are paying the price,” he said.

    Given his political exposure on Disney and the combative political image that is central to his White House hopes, DeSantis probably has no option but to further escalate the showdown.

    “He wants Republicans to know that ‘I am not going to give in just because somebody clamored for it, because the winds changed,’” said Scott Jennings, a veteran of the George W. Bush White House and a CNN political commentator.

    So the feud with Disney is unlikely to end while DeSantis is a presidential candidate, even though it may eventually end up hurting both the well-known entertainment giant and the state that hosts Disney World – and that he calls home.

    “I think that there’s a growing sense that – how does this end in a positive way?” said Johnston, the Rollins College professor. “It’s not Disney needs to lose and the state needs to win or vice versa. It’s how do we do this so that both sides can walk away from this and we can go back to having a great relationship between Disney and the state of Florida.”

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  • Biden picks Air Force general to lead NSA and Cyber Command | CNN Politics

    Biden picks Air Force general to lead NSA and Cyber Command | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden has nominated an Air Force general to head the nation’s powerful electronic spying agency and the US military command that conducts offensive cyber operations – a crucial position as the US continues to battle Russia, China and other foes in cyberspace.

    Lt. Gen. Timothy Haugh, who has served for years in senior US military cyber positions, is Biden’s choice to replace outgoing Army Gen. Paul Nakasone as head of the National Security Agency and US Cyber Command, an Air Force official confirmed to CNN.

    Politico first reported on Haugh’s nomination.

    The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

    Haugh’s nomination could face a roadblock in the Senate after Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama put a hold on senior military nominations because he objects to the department’s abortion travel policy.

    Haugh is currently deputy of US Cyber Command, a command of thousands of US military personnel who conduct offensive and defensive cyber operations to protect US critical infrastructure. Officials from the command traveled to Ukraine in late 2021 to prepare Kyiv for an onslaught of Russian cyberattacks that accompanied the full-scale Russian invasion.

    The command and NSA also have taken an increasingly active role in helping defend American elections from foreign interference under Nakasone’s leadership over the last five years.

    During the 2020 election, Iranian hackers accessed a US municipal website for reporting unofficial election results and Cyber Command kicked the hackers off the network out of concern that they might post fake results on the website, a senior US military official revealed last month.

    Haugh’s nomination signals a continued emphasis on election security work at Fort Meade, the sprawling military base in Maryland where the NSA and Cyber Command are housed. As a senior US military cyber official, Haugh has been involved in election security discussions in recent midterm and general elections.

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

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

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    CNN
     — 

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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  • AI is already linked to layoffs in the industry that created it | CNN Business

    AI is already linked to layoffs in the industry that created it | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    Many have raised alarms about the potential for artificial intelligence to displace jobs in the years ahead, but it’s already causing upheaval in one industry where workers once seemed invincible: tech.

    A small but growing number of tech firms have cited AI as a reason for laying off workers and rethinking new hires in recent months, as Silicon Valley races to adapt to rapid advances in the technology being developed in its own backyard.

    Chegg, an education technology company, disclosed in a regulatory filing last month that it was cutting 4% of its workforce, or about 80 employees, “to better position the Company to execute against its AI strategy and to create long-term, sustainable value for its students and investors.”

    IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said in an interview with Bloomberg in May that the company expects to pause hiring for roles it thinks could be replaced with AI in the coming years. (In a subsequent interview with Barrons, however, Krishna said that he felt his earlier comments were taken out of context and stressed that “AI is going to create more jobs than it takes away.”)

    And in late April, file-storage service Dropbox said that it was cutting about 16% of its workforce, or about 500 people, also citing AI.

    In its most-recent layoffs report, outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said 3,900 people were laid off in May due to AI, marking its first time breaking out job cuts based on that factor. All of those cuts occurred in the tech sector, according to the firm.

    With these moves, Silicon Valley may not only be leading the charge in developing AI but also offering an early glimpse into how businesses may adapt to those tools. Rather than render entire skill sets obsolete overnight, as some might fear, the more immediate impact of a new crop of AI tools appears to be forcing companies to shift resources to better take advantage of the technology — and placing a premium on workers with AI expertise.

    “Over the last few months, AI has captured the world’s collective imagination, expanding the potential market for our next generation of AI-powered products more rapidly than any of us could have anticipated,” Dropbox CEO Drew Houston wrote in a note to staff announcing the job cuts. “Our next stage of growth requires a different mix of skill sets, particularly in AI and early-stage product development.”

    In response to a request for comment on how its realignment around AI is playing out, Dropbox directed CNN to its careers page, where it is currently hiring for multiple roles focused on “New AI Initiatives.”

    Dan Wang, a professor at Columbia Business School, told CNN that AI “will cause organizations to restructure,” but also doesn’t see it playing out as machines replacing humans just yet.

    “AI, as far as I see it, doesn’t necessarily replace humans, but rather enhances the work of humans,” Wang said. “I think that the kind of competition that we all should be thinking more about is that human specialists will be replaced by human specialists who can take advantage of AI tools.”

    The AI-driven tech layoffs come amid broader cuts in the industry. Many tech companies have been readjusting to an uncertain economic environment and waning levels of demand for digital services more than three years into the pandemic.

    Some 212,294 workers in the tech industry have been laid off in 2023 alone, according to data tracked by Layoffs.fyi, already surpassing the 164,709 recorded in 2022.

    But in the shadow of those mass layoffs, the tech industry has also been gripped by an AI fervor and invested heavily in AI talent and tech.

    In January, just days after Microsoft announced plans to lay off 10,000 employees as part of broader cost-cutting measures, the company also confirmed it was making a “multibillion dollar” investment into OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT. And in March, in the same letter to staff Mark Zuckerberg used to announce plans to lay off another 10,000 workers (after cutting 11,000 positions last November), the Meta CEO also outlined plans for investing heavily in AI.

    Even software engineers in Silicon Valley who once seemed uniquely in demand now appear to be at risk of losing their jobs, or losing out on salary gains to those with more AI expertise.

    Roger Lee, a startup founder who has been tracking tech industry layoffs via his website Layoffs.fyi, also runs Comprehensive.io, which examines job listings and compensation data across some 3,000 tech companies.

    Lee told CNN that a recent analysis of data from Comprehensive.io shows the average salary for a senior software engineer specializing in artificial intelligence or machine learning is 12% higher than for those who don’t specialize in that area, a data point he dubs “the AI premium.” The average salary for a senior software engineer specializing in AI or machine learning has also increased by some 4% since the beginning of the year, whereas the average salary for senior software engineers as a whole has stayed flat, he said.

    Lee noted Dropbox as an example of a company offering notably high pay for AI roles, citing a base salary listing of $276,300 to $373,800 for a Principal Machine Learning Engineer role. (By comparison, Comprehensive.io’s data puts the current average salary for a senior software engineer at $171,895.)

    Those looking to thrive in the tech industry and beyond may need to brush up on their AI skills.

    Wang, the professor at Columbia Business School, told CNN that starting this past spring semester, he began requiring his students to familiarize themselves with the new crop of generative AI tools on the market. “That type of exposure I think is absolutely critical for setting themselves up for success and once they graduate,” Wang said.

    It’s not that everyone needs to become AI specialists, Wang added, but rather that workers should know how to use AI tools to become more efficient at whatever they’re doing.

    “That’s where the kind of a battleground for talent is really shifting,” Wang said, “as differentiation in terms of talent comes from creative and effective ways to integrate AI into daily tasks.”

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  • Harris accuses ‘so-called leaders’ of pushing propaganda and waging culture wars in fiery Florida speech | CNN Politics

    Harris accuses ‘so-called leaders’ of pushing propaganda and waging culture wars in fiery Florida speech | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Vice President Kamala Harris went headfirst into flashpoint culture war issues Friday when she slammed Florida Republicans for the state Board of Education’s newly approved set of standards for teaching Black history, accusing “so-called leaders” of pushing propaganda and willfully misleading children.

    It’s the latest example of Harris acting as a rapid response voice for the administration, quickly deploying around the country in the immediate aftermath of a controversial vote or law being passed to offer forceful pushback of moves taken by state Republicans on guns, abortion and education. On Wednesday, the Florida Board of Education approved a new set of standards for how Black history should be taught in the state’s public schools, sparking criticism from education and civil rights advocates who said students should be allowed to learn the “full truth” of American history.

    “We know the history. And let us not let these politicians who are trying to divide our country win” Harris said in her fiery high-profile speech. “They are creating these unnecessary debates. This is unnecessary to debate whether enslaved people benefited from slavery. Are you kidding me? Are we supposed to debate that?”

    Harris said that she was concerned Republicans want to “replace history with lies.” She highlighted new standards, which, according to a document posted to the state’s Department of Education website, require instruction for middle schoolers to include “how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”

    It is the latest development in the state’s ongoing debate over African American history, including the education department’s rejection of a preliminary pilot version of an Advanced Placement African American Studies course for high school students, which it claimed lacked educational value. The White House has spoken out forcefully against book bans and other steps to remove elements of American history from school curricula, and the issue was included in Biden’s reelection announcement video in April.

    The president’s advisers view the issue as one that can galvanize Democrats in next year’s elections, and Harris’ presence in the state at the epicenter of boiling culture wars seeks to present Harris and Biden as the safeguards against extremist steps that could limit freedoms and speech.

    On her eighth trip to Florida since taking office, Harris criticized the state’s governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis – though not by name – in what has become a clear strategy to increase the Biden administration’s engagement with the Republican. That strategy has been bolstered by polling and research showing Americans opposed to banning books that include information on slavery and other issues.

    DeSantis hit back Friday, accusing Harris and Democrats in a tweet of spreading lies “to cover for their agenda” and telling reporters in Utah that the vice president’s criticism of Florida’s Board of Education was “absolutely ridiculous.”

    Earlier in the day, the former California attorney general had adopted a prosecutorial cadence to shine light on the Biden administration’s efforts to stand as a safeguard against what she called a national agenda by extremists to claw back rights.

    “These extremists, so-called leaders should model what we know to be the correct and right approach if we really are invested in the well-being of our children. Instead, they dare to push propaganda to our children. This is the United States of America. We’re not supposed to do that,” she said.

    Harris made the point that American allies and enemies abroad know the history of slavery in the US but these proposals, she alleged, would leave children from the US without that same knowledge.

    “That’s building in a handicap for our children that they are going to be the ones in the room who don’t know their own history with the rest of the world,” she said.

    On the standards themselves, Harris described the atrocities of slavery in detail, reciting how children were ripped from their mothers’ arms and were treated as less than human.

    “So, in the context of that, how is it that anyone could suggest that in the midst of these atrocities, that there was any benefit to being subjected to this level of dehumanization,” Harris questioned.

    Asked by CNN about the benchmark, DeSantis deflected, saying he “wasn’t involved.”

    “You should talk to them about it. I didn’t do it. I wasn’t involved in it,” the governor said.

    Pressed further, DeSantis said: “I think that they’re probably going to show some of the folks that eventually parlayed, you know, being a blacksmith into, into doing things later in life. But the reality is, all of that is rooted in whatever is factual. They listed everything out. And if you have any questions about it, just ask the Department of Education.”

    Harris has spent the summer months traveling the country to speak out in support of freedoms she and Democrats believe are under attack by Republicans, including abortion and the right to learn. The vice president has appeared in front of base Democratic voters that include Black voters, women and young people to deliver her message.

    Friday’s last-minute trip to Florida – it was only scheduled on Thursday night – marks the second time this year she’s delivered high-profile remarks in the Sunshine State meant to condemn Republican attacks on rights. Harris told the mainly Black crowd in Jacksonville’s historic LaVille neighborhood that the administration was listening and quickly responding to their concerns.

    “You are not alone,” Harris said.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • Blinken says US is ‘engaged with Syria’ in efforts to free missing journalist Austin Tice | CNN Politics

    Blinken says US is ‘engaged with Syria’ in efforts to free missing journalist Austin Tice | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The United States is “engaged with Syria, engaged with third countries” to try to bring detained journalist Austin Tice home, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday.

    “We are extensively engaged with regard to Austin, engaged with Syria, engaged with third countries, seeking to find a way to get him home. And we’re not going to relent until we do,” Blinken said in remarks at a Washington Post event on World Press Freedom Day.

    Tice was taken hostage in Syria in 2012. President Joe Biden declared last year that the US government knows “with certainty that he has been held by the Syrian regime” and called on Damascus to cooperate on efforts to release him.

    The government of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad has not publicly acknowledged they are detaining Tice. The US does not have diplomatic relations with the Syrian regime and has voiced opposition to rapprochement with Assad.

    Blinken did not provide details about the engagements to bring Tice home. White House and State Department officials would not confirm a report from the Wall Street Journal that US officials had held talks with Syrian officials in Oman.

    “We cannot confirm any specific meetings past or present. As you know in general meetings and negotiations to secure the release of wrongfully detained Americans, that is incredibly sensitive,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said at a White House briefing. “We want to be really, really careful and mindful and don’t want to confirm any specific conversation from the past or in the present.”

    CNN reported last August that the Biden administration had direct engagements with the Syrian government in an effort to secure Tice’s release. In 2020 under the Trump administration, Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs Roger Carstens secretly traveled to Damascus and met with Assad regime officials.

    Austin Tice’s mother Debra Tice told CNN Monday that she thinks that the administration is committed to bringing her son home but “they stumble over what needs to be done.” She said she had no doubt that her son would walk free.

    Biden paid tribute to Austin Tice and other wrongfully detained Americans, including Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan in Russia, in remarks at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner on Saturday.

    A number of family members of wrongfully detained Americans – many of whom have joined forces in an organization called the “Bring Our Families Home” campaign – as well as those who had been freed from detention gathered in Washington, DC, this week to seek a meeting with the president and call on the US government to do more to secure the release of their loved ones.

    “Although our loved ones are wrongfully detained and held hostage abroad, including China, including Russia, including Iran, Syria, the United Arab Emirates and Venezuela, our voices are stronger together,” said Harrison Li, the son of Kai Li, who is detained in China.

    “Although each case has its own idiosyncrasies, we all need the same things: for President Biden to meet with us, and to use all tools to bring them home,” he said.

    “We have asked for a meeting with the president for so long now that I frankly don’t know how else to ask or what else to say,” Hannah Sharghi, whose father Emad Shargi is detained in Iran, said at a news conference Wednesday.

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  • Newsom’s vow to appoint a Black woman to the Senate looms large amid Feinstein health concerns | CNN Politics

    Newsom’s vow to appoint a Black woman to the Senate looms large amid Feinstein health concerns | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    As California Gov. Gavin Newsom stepped on stage at the state Democratic Party Convention this weekend, Vilma Dawson applauded with the visible faith of someone who had supported him through multiple elections and a recall campaign.

    Dawson does not expect her loyalty to Newsom will be tested in a politically fraught decision that may lie ahead – selecting a successor to fill the seat of Sen. Dianne Feinstein, should the 89-year-old, who has already announced she’s not running for reelection in 2024, resign before the end of her term.

    “I’m sure Governor Newsom has a plan to appoint an African American female,” said Dawson. Pausing to consider her words, she continued, “I don’t think the governorship is where he’s going to stop his political career. People have long memories as to whether they can trust someone to support, shall we say, promises that they made.”

    In 2021, Newsom had said, “The answer is yes,” when asked on MSNBC if he would nominate a Black woman for Feinstein’s seat.

    After Feinstein was absent from the Senate for months due to a shingles diagnosis that resulted in complications of Ramsay Hunt syndrome and encephalitis, California Democrats gathered for their state convention with her health top of mind.

    “We do believe that Governor Newsom will keep his promise. We have known him to be a man of his word,” said Kimberly Ellis, a Democratic strategist and activist in California.

    Ellis is part of an effort by Democratic Black women lobbying Newsom on the Senate choice, should he have to make it. Ellis described the effort as “putting our shoulder to the wheel – really trying to ensure that we get the best qualified person to lead us at this moment in time.”

    Two Black women have served in the US Senate – Carol Moseley Braun, who served from 1993 to 1996, and Kamala Harris, who left to join the Biden administration as vice president. Currently, there are no Black women senators.

    Citing battleground states like Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, Ellis said, “Black women are the margin of victory. We get it done. [Newsom] knows that just like many in the country know that. And so, we have no doubt that he will indeed appoint a Black woman. The only question that’s on the table is which Black woman.”

    Ellis thinks Rep. Barbara Lee should be first on Newsom’s list, calling her sentiment “Barbara or bust.”

    Lee has already declared her candidacy for the seat in 2024.

    Greeting supporters at her booth at the party convention meeting, Lee said her campaign would be fueled by a “multi-generational, multi-racial, progressive coalition.”

    Calling the lack of Black women representation in the US Senate “outrageous,” Lee declined to press Newsom on any possible nomination choice. “I’m not going to get involved in his process,” she said. “He made a commitment. But I’m focused on this campaign. I am running to win this election.”

    But choosing Lee wouldn’t be a simple choice for Newsom. The US Senate race is already underway, with three sitting members of Congress representing various factions of the Democratic Party in the race.

    Lee’s rivals include Reps. Adam Schiff and Katie Porter.

    Schiff is both a state and nationally known figure as the lead prosecutor in former President Donald Trump’s first impeachment trial. He also has been endorsed by former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whose involvement in the Senate race has opened up political intrigue.

    Pelosi’s eldest daughter, Nancy Corinne Prowda, was reported and later pictured around Feinstein as she returned to the Senate. The Pelosi and Feinstein families have been close friends for decades, but a Pelosi family member so closely assisting Feinstein led to further speculation about the political dealings around the Senate seat.

    “You can’t help but think about how it could impact your campaign,” Schiff said about Feinstein’s future and the wildcard it presents. “She’ll make a decision that she feels is consistent with her health and what’s best for the state.”

    Regarding the noise surrounding a possible Newsom appointment, Schiff said he was doing his best to ignore it. “My father gave me some very good advice, which is focus on the things you can control, not the things you can’t. I do think that ultimately, voters want to decide this race and they want that choice to make. And I think they will have that choice.”

    Porter, a favorite of California and national progressives, said, “I assume that Governor Newsom will keep his promise, but I can’t speak for him or what he’s thinking about,” adding that she was grateful for Feinstein’s return to Washington.

    But she stressed that the campaign is about the future. “It’s not just about the next six months. It’s about the next six years and the next 60 years for California.”

    At an event honoring Black women at the state party convention, Patrice Marshall McKenzie of Pasadena called herself “cautiously optimistic, but not confident” that Newsom would deliver. “I’m trying to keep my expectations moderate so that there’s not an issue of being disappointed if there’s under deliverance.”

    Under-deliverance, for several Black women Democrats, would mean nominating a caretaker in the seat – either a non-political appointee or a politician who pledges not to run in 2024.

    Tracie Stafford, a Democratic activist from Sacramento, said she was bracing herself for disappointment should Feinstein step aside before the election.

    “The reality is, unfortunately, that there have not been ramifications for not keeping promises to specifically Black people and Black women,” she said.

    “The reality is, where else are we going to vote? What else do we have, but our Democratic Party and our Democratic elected officials? We are absolutely between a rock and a hard place.”

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  • LA mayor says Newsom should appoint Rep. Barbara Lee to Senate in case of vacancy | CNN Politics

    LA mayor says Newsom should appoint Rep. Barbara Lee to Senate in case of vacancy | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said Sunday that California Gov. Gavin Newsom should “absolutely” appoint Rep. Barbara Lee to the Senate should Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s seat become vacant before the end of her term.

    “I absolutely think he should appoint Barbara Lee. But we will see,” Bass told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.”

    Newsom has pledged to appoint a Black woman to the Senate in case of a vacancy.

    Bass and Lee were longtime Democratic colleagues in the House – both have chaired the Congressional Black Caucus – before Bass was elected LA mayor last year. Bass has already endorsed Lee’s bid to succeed Feinstein, who is not seeking reelection next year.

    Bass pointed out Sunday that Lee had been under consideration to fill Kamala Harris’ Senate seat, which became vacant in 2021 when she assumed her role as vice president. Newsom, however, ultimately picked California Secretary of State Alex Padilla, who became the state’s first Latino senator.

    Feinstein, who was first elected to the Senate in 1992, returned to the Capitol last month after an extended absence while recovering from shingles. During her absence, the 89-year-old senator faced calls to resign from some fellow Democrats in the House, with many pointing to the delay in advancing certain judicial nominees of President Joe Biden that her absence had caused.

    But Bass noted Sunday that with Feinstein still in office, “It’s not an issue right now.” Pressed by Tapper if the senator should be in office, Bass said, “That’s her decision.”

    “I worry about her. I worry about her health. But, ultimately, of course, that’s her decision to make,” the mayor said.

    Newsom is under enormous pressure to stick to his pledge to appoint a Black woman to the Senate. In 2021, the governor said, “The answer is yes,” when asked on MSNBC if he would appoint a Black woman should Feinstein’s seat become open.

    But choosing Lee wouldn’t be a simple choice for Newsom. The US Senate race is already underway, with Lee and fellow House Democrats Adam Schiff and Katie Porter representing various factions of the Democratic Party in the race. Another Democrat, tech executive Lexi Reese, recently filed paperwork to run for Senate.

    There are currently three Black men in the Senate and no Black women in the legislative body that is made up of 100 officials. Throughout history, there have been eleven Black senators in total, including two Black female senators – Harris and former Illinois Sen. Carol Moseley Braun.

    In her interview with Tapper, Bass spoke about the pushback former President Barack Obama has received over his call for the Republican Party to acknowledge issues of racial inequality in the US instead of espousing rhetoric that opportunities in the country are equal and fair.

    “What President Obama was talking about was basically our history,” Bass said. “We are in a period right now where there are certain states, certain cities, where they literally do not want to tell the truths about US History.”

    “What’s great about our country is everything, the whole package. You can’t just talk about the nice stories – George Washington’s cherry tree but not the 350 enslaved individuals that he had. All of it is the American story, and it all needs to be told, because we’re not going to overcome the problems if we cannot even reflect on how we got where we are,” Bass continued.

    South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, a GOP presidential contender whom Obama had mentioned by name in his remarks, said Sunday that there was “no higher compliment than to be attacked by President Obama.”

    “Whenever the Democrats feel threatened, they pull out, drag out the former president and have him make some negative comments about someone running, hoping that their numbers go down,” Scott told Fox News. “The truth of my life disproves the lies of the radical left.”

    Scott had earlier responded on Twitter to Obama’s comments, saying, “Let us not forget we are a land of opportunity, not a land of oppression.”

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • US-Israeli citizen charged with arms trafficking, acting as Chinese agent | CNN Politics

    US-Israeli citizen charged with arms trafficking, acting as Chinese agent | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    US prosecutors unsealed an indictment Monday charging the co-director of a think tank with illicit arms trafficking, violating US sanctions laws, and other charges, five months after he was arrested in Cyprus and fled from authorities.

    The US-Israeli citizen, Gal Luft, co-director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, is also someone House Oversight Chairman James Comer, a top Republican, has described as an informant claiming to have incriminating information on Hunter Biden.

    Luft has tweeted denials of the allegations, saying in February, “I’ve been arrested in Cyprus on a politically motivated extradition request by the US. The US, claiming I’m an arms dealer. It would be funny if it weren’t tragic. I’ve never been an arms dealer. DOJ is trying to bury me to protect Joe, Jim&Hunter Biden.”

    An attorney for Luft did not immediately respond to a request for comment. CNN has reached out to the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security.

    Luft is a fugitive, prosecutors say.

    Luft was charged with failing to register as an agent for China in the US, including in 2016 acting through a former high-ranking US official who was then advising President-elect Donald Trump. He was also charged with acting as a middleman to aid Chinese companies buying weapons. The indictment also alleges Luft violated US sanctions by attempting to broker sales of Iranian oil.

    House Republicans are investigating the Biden family’s financial dealings and have requested information from the Justice Department about its investigation into Hunter Biden, who has agreed to plead guilty to two tax misdemeanors. At least one Republican, Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, has claimed that Luft is an important witness in that investigation.

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  • Juul seeks authorization on a new vape it says can verify a user’s age. Here’s how it works | CNN Business

    Juul seeks authorization on a new vape it says can verify a user’s age. Here’s how it works | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    E-cigarette company Juul Labs is seeking US authorization to sell a “next-generation” vape with age verification capabilities in the United States.

    To verify a user’s age, the proposed vape pairs with a phone app, requiring a customer to either upload their government ID and a real-time selfie or input personal information and allow a third-party database to verify their identity, according to a Juul spokesperson.

    A unique Pod ID chip within the Juul device can also detect counterfeit cartridges made by other companies, many of which have flooded the market with illegal fruity flavors that appeal to minors.

    The mission of the new platform is twofold, according to the company: Encourage adult smokers to switch from combustible cigarettes to e-cigarettes while restricting underage access.

    The legal age to purchase e-cigarettes in the United States is 21.

    “We look forward to engaging with FDA throughout the review process while we pursue this important harm-reduction opportunity,” Juul’s Chief Regulatory Officer Joe Murillo said in a company news release.

    If authorized by the US Food and Drug Administration, Juul Labs hasn’t yet decided on the name to market their new product in the US. In the UK and Canada, where it’s already for sale, it’s called the JUUL2.

    Advertising itself as an alternative nicotine product, Juul publicly advises that adults vape only as a replacement for combustible cigarettes.

    But Juul has a troubled history in US markets.

    “They were the spark that ignited the flame,” said Robin Koval, CEO of the nonprofit Truth Initiative, organizers of the nation’s largest campaign for youth to quit vaping. “This is not a company known to tell the truth.”

    Juul Labs has settled more than 5,000 cases brought by approximately 10,000 plaintiffs since its vaping devices initially skyrocketed in popularity in 2016, with some alleging the company deceived or failed to warn consumers about the risks of its products. The e-cigarette maker also agreed to pay $462 million to six US states and Washington, DC, in April after a lawsuit accused Juul Labs of directly promoting its products to high school students. In total, Juul Labs has agreed to pay more than $1 billion in its various legal settlements.

    Juul dominated over 70% of the US e-cigarette market at its peak in late 2018. In the same year, 27% of high school students and 7.2% of middle school students said they used tobacco for one or more days in the month, according to the 2018 National Youth Tobacco Survey.

    Juul is now a less favored brand among youth. When asked what e-cigarette brands they used in the past 30 days, youth e-cigarette users in the 2022 National Youth Tobacco Survey answered Puff Bar most frequently (29.7%), followed by Vuse (23.6%) and then Juul (22%), with the first two being disposable vaping products.

    In 2019, Juul suspended all flavors other than tobacco and menthol and suspended broadcast, digital and print publication marketing.

    Even with limited flavors, the FDA banned Juul products in the US last year after reviewing Juul’s applications seeking marketing authorization for their devices. The FDA determined that the applications lacked “sufficient evidence” within the toxicological profile of the vaporizers to prove that marketing the products would be in the interest of public health.

    The FDA has placed the ban on hold while Juul Labs appeals.

    Juul's new device is currently marketed as JUUL2 in the UK and Canada.

    Juul Labs submitted its most recent application to the FDA on July 19, as all e-cigarette manufacturers are required to do before their product can be marketed and sold legally in the United States. This first filing concerns just one flavor, Virginia Tobacco, with a nicotine concentration of 18 mg per mL.

    Although Juul’s new platform has age verification capabilities, the company does not intend to lock all their new pods before use. For example, the Virginia Tobacco pods will not come automatically locked. The spokesperson for Juul said doing so could create “friction” for the adult smokers the tobacco flavor is most likely to target.

    “If you’re an adult smoker and you go to buy a cigarette, it’s pretty easy to use the product,” a Juul spokesperson told CNN. “If you add in another barrier before product use, that creates some level of friction.”

    Using the new Pod ID feature, Juul’s new vaping device could tell a Virginia Tobacco pod apart from a menthol-flavored pod. It could then require age verification to activate only the latter, according to the spokesperson.

    Juul has researched other flavors that combine tobacco and menthol with fruity tones to potentially submit to the FDA following this filing. Juul currently sells the flavor Autumn Tobacco in the UK, which contains “tangy apple notes,” according to its website.

    Just because e-cigarette companies are required to comply with the FDA doesn’t mean all of them do. In fact, most don’t. To date, the FDA has authorized only 23 specific e-cigarette products, all of which are tobacco flavored.

    Yet more than 2.5 million US middle and high school students said they use e-cigarettes as of last year, according to the 2022 National Youth Tobacco Survey. Almost 85% consume fruity, candy or other flavored products, despite them being illegal.

    Koval of Truth Initiative said the tobacco industry “floods the market” with products such that the FDA can’t keep up.

    “It is a little bit like Whac-a-Mole for the FDA and for those of us who are trying to promote healthier behaviors for young people,” Koval said. The total number of e-cigarette brands increased by 46.2% between January 2020 and December 2022, from 184 to 269, according to a study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

    To gain FDA authorization for its latest platform, Juul must prove to the FDA that in aiding the public health crisis of adult smoking, it is not further exacerbating the spread of youth vaping.

    “This is only the beginning of new tech being developed and refined for the US market and abroad to eliminate combustible cigarettes and combat underage use,” Juul’s Chief Product Officer Kirk Phelps said.

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  • Who is Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan DA leading the historic criminal case against Trump? | CNN Politics

    Who is Alvin Bragg, the Manhattan DA leading the historic criminal case against Trump? | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Alvin Bragg, a former New York state and federal prosecutor, drew national attention when he made history as the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office’s first Black district attorney. Now, he is back in the spotlight after a grand jury voted to indict Donald Trump following a yearslong investigation into the former president’s alleged role in a hush money scheme.

    The indictment was unsealed Tuesday as Trump was arraigned in a Manhattan criminal court, unveiling the 34 felony criminal charges of falsifying business records made against the former president.

    In Bragg’s first comments following the arraignment, he called the charges the “bread and butter” of his office’s work.

    “At its core, this case today is one with allegations like so many of our white collar cases,” he said.

    Bragg inherited the probe from his predecessor, Cy Vance, who began the investigation when Trump was still in the White House.

    Trump, who pleaded not guilty to the charges, cast Bragg’s case as political and called for his resignation in a speech Tuesday evening.

    “I never thought anything like this could happen in America, never thought it could happen,” Trump said. “The only crime that I have committed is to fearlessly defend our nation from those who seek to destroy it.”

    In March, Trump announced on social media, ahead of any details from Bragg’s office, that he anticipated he would be arrested within days in connection with the investigation. The Manhattan district attorney’s office declined at the time to comment on the former president’s remarks.

    The high-profile case relates to a $130,000 payment made by Trump’s former personal attorney Michael Cohen to adult film star Stormy Daniels days before the 2016 presidential election in exchange for her silence about an alleged affair with Trump a decade prior. Trump has continuously denied having an affair with Daniels.

    The indictment is historic, marking the first time a former US president and major presidential candidate has ever been criminally charged.

    In the lead-up to Bragg’s decision, sources told CNN that city, state and federal law enforcement agencies in New York City had been discussing how to prepare for a possible Trump indictment, with the former president having called on his supporters to protest if he were to be arrested.

    Discussions between the New York Police Department and the FBI also have focused on the possibility of increased threats against Bragg and his staff from Trump’s supporters in wake of an indictment, sources told CNN. Bragg said in an email to staff earlier in March that his office will “not tolerate attempts to intimidate our office or threaten the rule of law in New York.”

    Bragg has aggressively pursued Trump and other progressive priorities so far in his tenure, including not prosecuting some low-level crimes and finding alternatives to incarceration.

    Before Bragg’s swearing-in last year, he had already worked on cases related to Trump and other notable names in his role as a New York state chief deputy attorney general.

    He said he had helped sue the Trump administration more than 100 times, as well as led a team that sued the Donald J. Trump Foundation, which resulted in the former president paying $2 million to a number of charities and the foundation’s dissolution.

    Bragg also led the suit against disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein and his company, which alleged a hostile work environment.

    The Harvard-educated attorney previously served as an assistant US attorney in the Southern District of New York, worked as a civil rights lawyer and as a professor and co-director of the New York Law School Racial Justice Project, where he represented family members of Eric Garner, who died in 2014 after being placed in an unauthorized chokehold by a then-police officer, in a lawsuit against the City of New York seeking information.

    Bragg emerged the winner in a crowded Democratic primary in the summer of 2021 to lead the coveted Manhattan District Attorney’s Office, for which Vance had announced earlier that year he would not seek reelection. While campaigning, he often spoke about his experience growing up in Harlem, saying he was once a 15-year-old stopped “numerous times at gunpoint by police.”

    “In addition to being the first Black district attorney, I think I’ll probably be the first district attorney who’s had police point a gun at him,” he said during a victory speech, following his historic election to the office. “I think I’ll be the first district attorney who’s had a homicide victim on his doorstop. I think I’ll be the first district attorney in Manhattan who’s had a semi-automatic weapon pointed at him. I think I’ll be the first district attorney in Manhattan who’s had a loved one reenter from incarceration and stay with him. And I’m going to govern from that perspective.”

    Bragg ran as a reformer, releasing a memo just days after taking office detailing new charging, bail, plea and sentencing policies – a plan that drew criticism from police union leaders. He said his office would not prosecute marijuana misdemeanors, fare evading and prostitution, among other crimes.

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • EPA preparing to release strict vehicle emissions rules | CNN Politics

    EPA preparing to release strict vehicle emissions rules | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The US Environmental Protection Agency is preparing to release strict new proposed federal emissions standards for light-duty vehicles that, if implemented, would move the US car market decisively toward electric vehicles over the next decade.

    The EPA is considering emissions standards that could make up to two-thirds of new passenger vehicles sold in the US electric by 2032, according to a source familiar with the proposal.

    If implemented, the new greenhouse gas performance standards would start for light-duty vehicles that are model year 2027 and gradually increase through model year 2032.

    By 2032, the rules would ensure that 64% to 67% of all new-car sales in the US would be electric vehicles, according to the source.

    The EPA’s proposal, which was first reported by The New York Times, comes after California air regulators voted last year to ban the sale of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035 and set interim targets to phase these cars out.

    EPA spokesperson Tim Carroll did not comment on the specifics of the proposal but said the agency is working on developing new standards “to accelerate the transition to a zero-emissions transportation future, protecting people and the planet,” as directed by a previous executive order from President Joe Biden.

    “Once the interagency review process is completed, the proposals will be signed, published in the Federal Register, and made available for public review and comment,” Carroll said.

    The new rules could come as soon as Wednesday.

    The EPA proposal is a monumental step toward zero-emissions vehicles, coming as the US tries to keep up with other countries racing toward EV adoption, one expert told CNN.

    “I believe it’s pretty doable,” said Margo Oge, chair of the International Council on Clean Transportation and a former Obama EPA official. “The industry is there. Europe is ahead of the US, China is ahead of Europe, and these companies are global companies.”

    Oge noted that in the US, California is already proposing 70% new zero-emissions vehicle sales by 2030 and other states are planning to adopt California’s rules – meaning much of the US car industry will be transitioning ahead of any proposed federal rule.

    Still, the EPA’s proposal takes a different approach from California’s policy. Whereas California is mandating car companies sell a certain percentage of electric vehicles, the EPA would gradually raise greenhouse gas emissions standards to increasingly stringent levels from 2027 to 2032, pushing the industry toward electric vehicles to meet those high standards.

    The EPA rule would ensure that the rest of the country and the US car industry would follow California’s lead, Oge said.

    Biden has made electrifying the cars that Americans drive a key part of his climate goals. In 2021, the president set a new target that half of all vehicles sold in the US by 2030 would be battery electric, fuel-cell electric or plug-in hybrid.

    The US Treasury Department is set to release rules for new federal electric vehicle tax credits on April 18. While these tax credits are complex and could take time for consumers to take full advantage of, experts hope they will help accelerate the transition to EVs in the US.

    “Given the industry, the [Inflation Reduction Act] and what companies are doing globally, I just don’t see this number as being out of reach,” Oge said.

    The proposed EPA rules will go through a lengthy public comment process and could be changed before they are finalized.

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