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  • Concerns mount over Iranian climber Elnaz Rekabi after she competed without hijab | CNN

    Concerns mount over Iranian climber Elnaz Rekabi after she competed without hijab | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    A female Iranian climber, who did not wear a hijab at an international competition in South Korea, left for Iran on Tuesday as Iranian groups based abroad raised alarms over her fate back home.

    Elnaz Rekabi, 33, competed without a hijab during the International Federation of Sport Climbing’s Asian Championships in Seoul on Sunday. Videos of her wearing a headband with her hair in a ponytail while competing, spread on social media.

    Her return to Iran comes amid nationwide protests in Iran calling for greater freedoms for women, following the death of a 22-year-old woman who died in police custody after her arrest for allegedly wearing her hijab improperly.

    Protester says Iranian security forces firing ‘military-grade bullets’ at houses

    In a story posted on Rekabi’s Instagram page on Tuesday, the athlete said she was called to climb the wall “unexpectedly” which “unintentionally” created a problem with her hair covering.

    “Due to bad timing and unexpectedly being called to climb the wall, I inadvertently created a problem with my head covering,” she wrote.

    “Apologizing for the worries that I caused … currently, according to the pre-determined schedule I am returning to Iran with the team,” the IG story post said.

    Iran mandates women wear a hijab when officially representing the country abroad.

    A news website critical of the Iranian regime, IranWire, alleged that Rekabi will be transferred to prison upon arrival, prompting rights groups to worry about what would happen to her.

    Amnesty International said Monday it was alarmed by the prospect of Rekabi’s return.

    “Elnaz Rekabi should not be forcibly returned to Iran,” Amnesty said in a statement, adding that “she is at real risk of arbitrary arrest, torture, and other ill-treatment for violating the authorities’ compulsory veiling rules,” Amnesty wrote.

    CNN cannot independently verify reports of Rekabi being forced to return to Iran.

    The Iranian embassy in Seoul said that Rekabi departed on Tuesday along with “other members of the team” and “strongly denied all the fake, false news and disinformation.”

    In the Twitter post, the embassy posted a picture of Rekabi from previous games in Russia where she was competing wearing the hijab.

    “It is understood that all members of the Iranian delegation including Elnaz Rekabi have already left Korea after attending the sport event,” South Korea’s Foreign Affairs Ministry told CNN in a statement.

    Iran mandates women wear a hijab when officially representing the country abroad.

    “The punishment has already started,” director of Norway-based rights group Iran Human Rights Mahmood Reza Amiry-Moghaddam told CNN on Tuesday.

    “You know, the fact that she was incommunicado for one full day…and then she just wrote this one message on her Instagram. So, the pressure on her started already from South Korea,” he said, “I don’t think anyone believes in what Iranian authorities say.”

    The International Federation of Sport Climbing (IFSC) said it’s “fully aware of news” regarding Rekabi and it’s their “understanding” that she is returning to Iran.

    “There is a lot of information in the public sphere regarding Ms Rekabi and as an organisation we have been trying to establish the facts. We have also been in contact with Ms Rekabi and the Iranian Climbing Federation,” a statement by the IFSC said.

    “We will continue to monitor the situation as it develops on her arrival,” the statement said.

    In response to an inquiry, the South Korean government said they could not reveal private information on whether a person has left the country.

    Calls placed to two Iranian team coaches currently in Seoul were not answered.

    Correction: an earlier version of this story incorrectly stated the day Rekabi was said to depart Seoul.

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  • Opinion: The chilling problem with Kanye West’s definition of ‘free speech’ | CNN

    Opinion: The chilling problem with Kanye West’s definition of ‘free speech’ | CNN

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    Editor’s Note: Kara Alaimo, an associate professor in the Lawrence Herbert School of Communication at Hofstra University, writes about issues affecting women and social media. She was spokeswoman for international affairs in the Treasury Department during the Obama administration. The opinions expressed in this commentary are her own. View more opinion on CNN.



    CNN
     — 

    The conservative social media company Parler announced on Monday that it is being purchased by Kanye West, who was temporarily suspended from Twitter this month for an antisemitic tweet. A statement from Parler’s parent company announcing the deal described West, who has legally changed his name to Ye, as having taken “a groundbreaking move into the free speech media space” where “he will never have to fear being removed from social media again.”

    In a release by Parler, West said that “in a world where conservative opinions are considered to be controversial we have to make sure we have the right to freely express ourselves.”

    This development means several social media companies could soon be left in the hands of mercurial, mega-rich men who have pledged to promote “free speech,” including the kind of extreme views that got West temporarily booted from Twitter. Elon Musk is currently in the process of buying Twitter, though Twitter said in a recent court filing that federal authorities (it was not clear which ones) are investigating Musk (while Musk’s attorney said this filing was designed to distract from Twitter’s own legal issues).

    For his part, Musk has said Twitter should be “an inclusive arena for free speech.” And former President Donald Trump, who was thrown off Twitter and Facebook in January 2021, founded the company that created Truth Social, which describes itself as a “free speech haven.”

    If West and Musk go through with their deals, these three social media platforms are likely to serve as ecosystems for conservative thought. This will likely make the views of those who remain on them more extreme — which could have a radical effect on our politics. That’s because when people who think similarly come together, they reaffirm and heighten one another’s initial beliefs.

    While men such as West, Musk and Trump claim to promote free speech by not favoring the moderation of problematic content, here’s what lack of moderation really does: It drives away the people victimized by abusive content such as West’s tweet.

    A 2020 study of women in 51 countries by The Economist Intelligence Unit found that 38% have been victims of online violence, from stalking to doxxing to violent threats. As Amnesty International and others have found, women of color are most affected. Antisemitic content is also rampant online. A 2021 report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate found that a sample of 714 anti-Jewish posts on five social networks had been viewed 7.3 million times.

    When women become victims of online hate, they often “shut down their blogs, avoid websites they formerly frequented, take down social networking profiles, (and) refrain from engaging in online political commentary,” according to University of Miami law professor Mary Anne Franks.

    In practice, what these so-called free speech policies really boil down to is an ugly form of censorship that scares away the voices of people who are attacked by users of these platforms.

    West has already described Parler as a place where conservative views can flourish, and nonconservatives are unlikely to flock to Truth Social, given its association with Trump. If women, people of color and others start fleeing Twitter, that could leave it as a platform for conservatives as well. This would likely make the views of those who remain even more zealous.

    “When like-minded people get together, they often end up thinking a more extreme version of what they thought before they started to talk to one another,” Harvard University law professor Cass Sunstein writes in “On Rumors: How Falsehoods Spread, Why We Believe Them, and What Can Be Done.” Sunstein says this happens because their exchanges heighten their preexisting beliefs and make them more confident.

    So, when conservatives get together on social media, we can expect them to become more far right. And just as Rush Limbaugh and other conservative talk-show hosts radically altered the political landscape in the 1990s in ways that laid the groundwork for Trump’s presidency, the far-right views nurtured on these social networks could have a huge impact on our country’s politics. It isn’t hard to imagine that the people who commune on these sites could band together to support and elect political candidates who share their worldviews.

    We can also expect these male owners to use their platforms to amplify their own views — even when they’re sexist, misogynistic, racist or otherwise hateful.

    If West comes to own Parler and Musk takes the reins of Twitter, an already-extant conservative ecosystem will be supercharged on social media. These men’s “free speech” policies are likely to drive away people victimized by hate online. Those who remain in these conservative spaces will become even more extreme as a result of their interactions, which could cultivate a dangerous far-right ideology that has far-reaching effects on our politics.

    Just think about the way these owners already post, with Musk recently suggesting China control Taiwan and Russia keep part of Ukraine and West releasing a music video showing a doppelgänger of ex-wife Kim Kardashian’s then-boyfriend, Pete Davidson, being kidnapped and buried. If this is a glimpse of what social networks will look like in the future, we should all be very scared.

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  • How the filmmakers behind ‘Till’ depicted Black trauma without showing violence | CNN

    How the filmmakers behind ‘Till’ depicted Black trauma without showing violence | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Chinonye Chukwu didn’t want to make a movie about Black trauma.

    The director of the newly released film “Till,” which centers on Mamie Till-Mobley as she fights for justice after the killing of her son, said she wasn’t interested in depicting the moment that Emmett Till was brutally beaten to death in 1955 Mississippi.

    “The story is about Mamie and her journey, and so it wasn’t narratively necessary to show the physical violence inflicted upon Emmett,” Chukwu told CNN. “As a Black person, I didn’t want to see it. I didn’t want to recreate it.”

    In bringing the story of Till-Mobley to the big screen, Chukwu was intentional about what she chose to show and what she chose to omit. The film doesn’t dramatize the vicious and violent manner in which Emmett was killed, but it does depict his horrifically mangled body – an image that Till-Mobley famously shared with the world and that catalyzed the civil rights movement.

    Still, “Till” couldn’t avoid getting swept up into a debate about “Black trauma porn.” Soon after the release of the trailer, some corners of Black Twitter questioned why a movie about Emmett Till was even needed, swiftly characterizing it as the latest Hollywood project to capitalize on Black pain and tragedy. More than a few declared that they wouldn’t be watching.

    The filmmakers behind “Till” argue that this classification ignores the care and context that they’ve brought to this story. And they’re urging audiences not to look away.

    “Black trauma porn” – much like “disaster porn” or “poverty porn” – generally refers to graphic depictions of violence against Black people that are intended to elicit strong emotional responses. The implication is that these images can be needlessly traumatizing to Black viewers for whom violence is an inescapable fact of life.

    Increasingly, the term has been applied not just to videos of police shootings repeatedly shared online, but also to films and TV series. Amazon’s horror anthology series “Them” and the thriller film “Antebellum” are among recent projects criticized for depicting gratuitous violence against Black characters to make a point about the evils of racism. But the “Black trauma porn” label has also been leveled more broadly at historical dramas about slavery or Jim Crow, such as Barry Jenkins’ miniseries “The Underground Railroad” and now, “Till.”

    Given that wide umbrella, some experts feel that the term “Black trauma porn” is overused and dismissive, leaving little room for discussion about how creatives might explore traumatic events and experiences on screen thoughtfully.

    It’s not hard to understand where the impulse to use that label is coming from, said Kalima Young, an assistant professor at Towson University whose work focuses on representations of race and gender-based trauma in media. Black people are exhausted from constantly being subjected to real-life images of Black pain and death, and seeing that replicated on screen as entertainment can feel exploitative. Still, she said it’s important to separate viral videos from creative works.

    “When we use the term ‘trauma porn,’ we conflate the two, and we collapse what’s happening,” Young said. “It takes some of the nuance out of the conversation.”

    Janell Hobson, a professor of women’s, gender and sexuality studies at the University at Albany, understands why some Black viewers might not have the appetite for “Till.” The two White men accused of Emmett Till’s murder were ultimately acquitted, despite later admitting to the killing, while earlier this year a grand jury declined to indict the White woman who accused him of making advances toward her. Viewers know that there was no justice, and that’s painful.

    Chukwu said she deliberately didn't depict the brutal manner in which Emmett was killed in the film.

    But though Hobson hasn’t yet seen “Till,” she feels it’s a mistake to call it “Black trauma porn.”

    “There’s a difference between criticizing a film that is designed to exploit and to create titillation around images of Black trauma and Black pain versus a drama that is designed to raise awareness around a very troubling part of our history,” she said. “There’s a difference between telling a story of Black trauma and telling a story that is ‘Black trauma porn.’”

    What, then, is the line between a story of Black trauma and “Black trauma porn?”

    For Young, the distinguishing factor is context. Creators have a responsibility to justify why a particular Black character is being subjected to violence or why that violence is being depicted a certain way, she said – a balance that can be tricky to achieve in genres such as horror, in which violence has long been key. Failing to provide a clear and compelling case for those choices can contribute to a feeling that Young refers to as “empty empathy.”

    “Empty empathy,” according to Young, is when viewers are invited to empathize with characters who are experiencing trauma without being provided the space or context to process those visceral feelings. In other words, it’s when trauma is presented as mere spectacle.

    To avoid falling into that trap, filmmakers and TV producers have to think creatively about how they tell stories of trauma, Hobson said. That might involve subverting audience expectations as Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” does when a police cruiser pulls up at the end, or telling a familiar story from a different perspective, as “Till” does by highlighting the journey of Mamie Till-Mobley. Strong character development, as well as interspersing moments of humor or rest, can also help soften the blow, Young added.

    Despite its heavy subject matter,

    The team behind “Till” says they’ve worked hard to tell the story of Till-Mobley sensitively. In interviews leading up to its release, Chukwu has emphasized repeatedly that the film contains no physical violence against Black people. It also grounds Till-Mobley’s story in joy and dignity – the opening scene depicts Till-Mobley driving around Chicago with a carefree Emmett singing along to the radio. The ending also closes on a lighter moment between mother and son.

    But trauma, too, is integral here, and in giving this story the big screen treatment, the filmmakers are honoring the memory of the real-life Till-Mobley.

    Keith Beauchamp, a producer and co-writer of “Till” who was a mentee of Till-Mobley, has a deep connection to this history. He worked closely with Till-Mobley on a documentary about the case. “The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till,” released in 2005, led to the federal government reopening an investigation into the crime. Recently, he helped unearth an unserved arrest warrant from 1955 for the woman whose accusations led to Emmett’s murder.

    Beauchamp said “Till” has been 29 years in the making for him personally, and that Till-Mobley herself wanted this story to be told through film. He sees “Till” as a continuation of her fight for justice – not just for Emmett, but for all those who came after him.

    “We’re not in the business of re-traumatizing America,” he said. “But this is the story of Emmett Louis Till, and it was that photograph that inspired generations of people and continues to inspire generations of people today.”

    When complaints of “trauma porn” are leveled, critics often ask who a particular work is for. Put bluntly, is that depiction of Black trauma intended to appeal to the sympathies of White people?

    Young considers that implication a knee-jerk reaction. While skeptics of “Till” might feel that they are plenty familiar with the history of Emmett Till, there are layers to that story that have not been fully unpacked.

    “Did they truly understand the context of why the situation occurred?” Young asked. “Have we had enough time to sit in the conversation of why Mamie Till would make that decision to have an open casket?”

    Whether someone considers a story about Black trauma too much to endure or whether they consider it imperative to witness is inherently subjective. It’s notable that many of the recent projects deemed to be “Black trauma porn” have been the work of Black creatives – an obvious reminder that Black people are not a monolith.

    At a time when Republican legislatures are attempting to prevent the nation's fully history from being taught in schools, the filmmakers behind

    Hobson also points out that Black creatives have only recently been given the platform to tell their own stories. Viewers, of course, can opt not to watch, but Black creators should be allowed the space to air their wounds, however imperfect their attempts.

    At a time when Republican state legislatures are trying to restrict discussions of race and history in schools, Young said it’s crucial that stories such as “Till” not be dismissed.

    “In a country right now that is trying so desperately to tamp down on the ghosts that are living under the soil of this country, it’s important that we keep on doing this digging – that we keep on doing the sowing, that we keep on allowing a myriad of voices to tell Black experiences of racial terror and history,” she added.

    Beauchamp, for his part, hopes viewers will give “Till” a chance. Till-Mobley was “the mother of the civil rights movement” – an unsung hero who never got her due. In revisiting her story now, he hopes to resurrect her spirit.

    “I just want to awaken the sleeping giant of revolutionary change once again that is desperately needed in this country right now.”

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  • The Latino voter shift comes into focus in South Texas | CNN Politics

    The Latino voter shift comes into focus in South Texas | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    What first appeared as statistical noise is now becoming clearer: Historically left-leaning Latino voters are shifting toward the GOP, with the potential to swing major races come November’s midterm elections.

    And with razor-thin margins determining control of Congress, Hispanic communities where Donald Trump unexpectedly made gains in 2020 are coming into sharp focus, especially the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas.

    Here, the battle for Texas’s 15th Congressional District between Republican Monica De La Cruz and Democrat Michelle Vallejo is arguably the state’s most competitive House race and may be a test for Republicans’ appeal among Hispanic Americans.

    Hispanic Americans make up a fifth of registered voters in more than a dozen hotly contested House and Senate races in Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Nevada and Texas. While Democrats are still expected to win a majority of Latino voters, their margins appear to be shrinking – dramatically, in some cases.

    “What we’re seeing now is that the GOP has stepped in and helped us get our messaging out to show Latinos their values of faith, family and freedom really align with the Republican Party,” De La Cruz said

    Vallejo argues that the shift is tied to an increase in outside spending by the GOP: “I think the resources and money they’re getting from the outside really does add fuel to their fire. … It’s not deeply connected with the desire from the community to drive up and bring solutions that are specifically from South Texas.”

    For De La Cruz, attending her first Trump rally inspired her to start a career in politics.

    “I was busy raising a family, raising my business,” De La Cruz said. “(Trump) caught my attention to look at national politics and what was happening in DC and say, ‘Those policies don’t reflect me or my values.’”

    The entrepreneur insurance agent and mother of two says she’s a former Democrat whose family voted against Republicans for generations, including her “abuelita.”

    “This area had been under Democrat rule for over 100 years and what we’re seeing here is that Democrats haven’t done anything for us. … (They) just abandoned Latinos and Latinos are seeing that their values of faith, family and freedom just align better with the Republican Party.”

    Part of a trio of Latina Republican congressional nominees on the ballot in South Texas, De La Cruz is attempting to redefine the region’s political tradition alongside Cassy Garcia, a former Ted Cruz aide who is running in the 28th District, and US Rep. Mayra Flores in Texas’ 34th who became the party’s first representative from the Rio Grande Valley in more than a century after winning a special election earlier this year.

    The “triple threat,” as some Republicans call them, are part of a record number of Republican Latino nominees this fall, with many taking a page from Trump’s pro-border wall playbook.

    Asked whether she ever felt insulted by Trump’s rhetoric toward Latino immigrants (“They are bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists,” the then-candidate said when announcing his first presidential run in 2016), De La Cruz, the granddaughter of Mexican immigrants, said his words didn’t turn her away.

    “Honestly, I probably wouldn’t have said things the way he said them, but I think people were able to look past those things because they knew he’s not a politician. He didn’t have a political background. He was a businessman,” said De La Cruz. “He stood up against the establishment and put forth policies that worked for American families.”

    Like her GOP opponent, Vallejo, the Democrat running in Texas’ 15th, is a relatively new to politics and an entrepreneur. She operates the Pulga Los Portales flea market in Alton, which her parents founded some 25 years ago.

    “Our community deserves more attention and more respect,” Vallejo said of the newly drawn district, which would have voted for Trump by nearly 3 percentage points in 2020. “I think that both national parties were leaving us out.”

    Vallejo said Republicans have “demonized” Latino immigrants to score political points.

    “We have pride and dignity and we will not stand for anyone making fun of us, making fun of our community and our culture. We’re deserving and we give a lot back to this country,” she said.

    Running as a progressive in an area that more often elects moderate Democrats, Vallejo defeated her primary opponent by only 35 votes and is campaigning on guaranteed abortion rights, expanding Medicaid and Medicare, and raising the minimum wage to $15.

    “There are a lot of issues being ignored,” Vallejo said. “It’s time we see a change for South Texas, and we need progressive, bold policies … so that we finally get a voice at the table.”

    Vallejo points to outside influence and spending to account for the GOP’s gains in the area, saying, “Outside interests did see an opportunity to swoop in, pouring millions and millions of dollars to pretty much buy up our seat.”

    As for Latinos who drifted from Democrats to support Trump, Vallejo said she “looks forward to hopefully earning their support.”

    “I’m fighting for all our families here in South Texas, whether they’re Republican, independent or people who have never felt engaged by the political system before,” she said.

    Polling indicates that Latino voters are more likely than any other ethnic groups to cite the economy or inflation as the most important issue facing the country. But other issues, such as immigration and abortion, also loom large.

    “It’s become so difficult. … Supply chain issues are a big problem. And inflation – we used to pay $19 for a box of eggs. Now, I pay $54,” said Rodolfo Sanchez-Rendon, the owner of Teresita’s Kitchen in McAllen.

    Sanchez-Rendon also faults Democrats for undervaluing faith, family and small business.

    “Their values have changed,” he said. “Extremely liberal, where religion becomes an afterthought. … They’ve drifted from our values.”

    But the economy remains the most important issue to voters like Sanchez-Rendon, who immigrated to the United States in 1986 and said unchecked illegal immigration is out of control across the southern border.

    Contractor Edgar Gallegos said he plans to vote Republican because of the economy, despite Trump’s rhetoric about Latino immigrants.

    “I’ll take a mean tweet right about now, over what we have,” Gallegos said.

    Other voters, like Justin Stubbs, say they feel Democrats lack urgency on the issue of immigration.

    “It seems like Republicans care and talk about the border issue a lot more. … I just don’t see a lot of Democrats talking about the border crisis and honestly, there’s a lot of people down here that are affected by that,” he said.

    One voter in nearby Alton, Texas, said he and his wife will remain loyal to the Democratic Party because he believes it will do more to help the community.

    “We want candidates who will pay attention to our needs,” says Jose Raul Guerrero, who says he’s voting for Vallejo partly because he’s known her since she was a child. “She understands our needs. … and we need a lot of help right now.”

    “What people have to understand is that Hispanic Americans have hard working-class values,” said Giancarlo Sopo, a former Barack Obama campaign worker who led Trump’s hyper-local Hispanic advertising in 2020.

    “Who’s America’s blue-collar billionaire? Donald Trump,” he said.

    Sopo said part of the Trump’s campaign’s success with Latinos was tied to an ad campaign that “used words and ways of speaking” that were unique to specific nationalities and generations, tailoring ads meant to target Puerto Ricans, for example, with slang and references common to the island.

    “The reality is there are many Hispanic communities,” Sopo says. “You open the door with culture and engage Hispanics on a policy level.”

    Pointing to trends over the last decade that show Latinos experiencing gains when it comes to incomes, home purchases and starting new businesses, Sopo said many in the community view Trump aspirationally – adding that among some Latinos, especially men, the former President’s brash rhetoric may have worked to his advantage.

    “To a lot of Hispanic Americans – the same way that Bill Clinton was the first Black president before Barack Obama – Donald Trump, to them, is the first Hispanic president,” Sopo said. “He’s very charismatic, he’s not politically correct, he’s a successful entrepreneur. … These values really resonate.”

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  • Kaley Cuoco expecting first child with boyfriend Tom Pelphrey | CNN

    Kaley Cuoco expecting first child with boyfriend Tom Pelphrey | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Kaley Cuoco’s next role is a big one – mom.

    The “Flight Attendant” star announced on Tuesday via Instagram that she’s expecting her first child, a girl, with boyfriend Tom Pelphrey.

    The child is due in 2023, the former “Big Bang Theory” star shared, adding that she feels “beyond blessed and over the moon.”

    Pelphrey, an actor known for his work on shows like “Ozark” and “Iron First,” wrote to Cuoco in his own Instagram post: “Love you more than ever.”

    The pair have been dating since earlier this year.

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  • Superyacht linked to Russian billionaire mysteriously shows up in Hong Kong | CNN

    Superyacht linked to Russian billionaire mysteriously shows up in Hong Kong | CNN

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    Hong Kong
    CNN
     — 

    A megayacht linked to a sanctioned Russian oligarch has dropped anchor in Hong Kong, amid efforts by the West to seize the luxury assets of Russian elites in allied ports as the war in Ukraine drags on.

    The Nord, a nearly 142-meter (466-foot) yacht that is said to be one of the world’s largest, was spotted by CNN on Friday in Hong Kong’s waters, just minutes from the central downtown district. The vessel is estimated to be worth at least $500 million and widely believed to belong to Alexey Mordashov, an industrial billionaire, according to a yacht broker who spoke with CNN.

    The yacht, 1.5 times the size of an American football field, arrived in Hong Kong on Wednesday from the Russian port of Vladivostok, according to the Chinese city’s Marine Department. The government agency told CNN on Friday that it hadn’t been notified about when the yacht would depart for its next destination.

    As of Friday afternoon, the Nord was seen flying a Russian flag, with the name of its home base, “Vladivostok,” emblazoned on its stern. A few people, apparently crew members dressed in uniform, were spotted on the vessel’s deck.

    Mordashov is one of Russia’s wealthiest billionaires, with an estimated net worth of $18.7 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. That’s down by $10 billion so far this year, according to the wealth tracker.

    The tycoon is chairman of Severstal, a Russian steel and mining giant that at last count had 54,000 employees across 69 countries.

    The US State Department sanctioned him and Severstal in June, in addition to three of Mordashov’s other companies, his wife and two adult children.

    In a statement at the time, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that the Treasury Department was taking further action to “degrade the networks allowing Russia’s elites, including President [Vladimir] Putin, to anonymously make use of luxury assets around the globe.”

    But the United States isn’t the only country cracking down. Several superyachts tied to Russian businessmen have been seized this year in high-profile cases around the world, including in Spain, Germany and the United Kingdom.

    Mordashov has challenged sanctions against him in European courts. In May, he argued that an EU court should annul the decision to add him to a list of those penalized over the Russian invasion of Ukraine, according to European Union filings.

    “I have absolutely nothing to do with the emergence of the current geopolitical tension and I do not understand why the EU has imposed sanctions on me,” he said this spring, at the beginning of the war, according to TASS, Russia’s state news agency.

    Nord seen anchored in Hong Kong on Friday, Oct. 7, just minutes by boat from the city's central district.

    Hong Kong may provide some refuge. Reached for comment by CNN on Friday, the Hong Kong Marine Department said that it would “not comment on any individual cases of vessel entry.”

    The city requires overseas yacht owners to gain permission from authorities to enter, including showing proof of insurance, according to the Marine Department.

    “We note that certain countries may impose unilateral sanctions against certain places on the basis of their own considerations,” it said.

    But the government “does not implement, nor do we have the legal authority to take action on, unilateral sanctions imposed by other jurisdictions,” the department added, saying only that it would enforce “sanctions imposed by the United Nations Security Council.”

    On Tuesday, Hong Kong leader, Chief Executive John Lee, said the city had “no legal basis” to act on Western-imposed sanctions – referring to the United States– but “will comply with any United Nations resolution on sanctions.”

    Lee himself is among nearly a dozen people sanctioned by the US in 2020 for undermining the city’s autonomy and democratic processes, to which he described as a “a very barbaric act” on Tuesday.

    “Hong Kong respects the rule of law. As an international financial city, Hong Kong’s regulatory system is on par with international standards. We will not do anything that has no legal basis,” Lee said.

    Russia and China — of which Hong Kong is a part — are two of the five members on the Security Council with veto power. Russia has consistently vetoed resolutions on the council in recent months, impeding action on Ukraine.

    Severstal did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Mordashov on Friday.

    MarineTraffic, the global maritime analytics provider, shows that the Nord arrived in Hong Kong this week after a seven-day journey through the Sea of Japan and East China Sea.

    It’s hard to know exactly why the crew chose to come to the Asian hub now, said Michael Maximilian Bognier, a yacht broker with Next Wave Yachting in Hong Kong.

    But he noted that the port of Vladivostok could get relatively cold in the winter, making it tougher to maintain such a vessel.

    “Not [an] ideal climate to keep a boat like that,” Bognier told CNN.

    Asked whether the lack of sanctions could be a draw, Bognier acknowledged the current political climate wasn’t helping.

    “This could be a reason why she’s here,” he said, referring to the yacht. “It could be a free ticket.”

    It’s rare to see proof of direct ownership of such lavish vessels. Bognier noted, however, that word usually got around about top industry sales and said it was common knowledge that Mordashov was the owner of the yacht.

    “Running a boat this size is almost [like] running a city or a business,” he added.

    The Nord was built by German shipping giant Lürssen.

    “This is definitely one of the most iconic yachts,” said Bognier. “It’s got a very flat bow, not unlike an aircraft carrier actually. That’s a very distinctive feature about this yacht. So it’s very, very difficult, let’s say, to mistake it for something else.”

    Sky-high carrying costs could make it tough for even the world’s wealthiest to maintain such assets. Bognier estimated that it could range from approximately $45 million to $70 million just to keep the yacht running each year, not factoring in variable costs of fuel or maintenance after any long journeys.

    That would break down to an average bill of $100,000 to $200,000 a day.

    The Nord is seen in Hong Kong on October 7, 2022.

    The Nord yacht boasts two helipads, and would likely have an extensive staff on board, including a full-time chef, fitness instructor, massage therapist, and possibly a helicopter pilot, according to Bognier.

    “When we talk about boats this size, these are standard items,” he said.

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  • Filmmaker Jennifer Siebel Newsom, wife of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, is set to testify against Harvey Weinstein in his Los Angeles sexual assault trial | CNN

    Filmmaker Jennifer Siebel Newsom, wife of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, is set to testify against Harvey Weinstein in his Los Angeles sexual assault trial | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Jennifer Siebel Newsom, an award-winning filmmaker and wife of California Gov. Gavin Newsom, is set to testify in the sexual assault trial of disgraced movie producer Harvey Weinstein in Los Angeles, her attorneys told CNN Monday.

    “Like many other women, my client was sexually assaulted by Harvey Weinstein at a purported business meeting that turned out to be a trap,” said Beth Fegan, one of Newsom’s attorneys.

    “She intends to testify at his trial to seek some measure of justice for survivors and as part of her life’s work to improve the lives of women,” Fegan said.

    Weinstein, 70, is set to go on trial again, more than two years after he was convicted of first-degree criminal sexual act and third-degree rape charges in New York and sentenced to 23 years in prison.

    After he was found guilty in New York, the once-powerful movie mogul was moved to Los Angeles, where he’s been serving his prison sentence.

    In Los Angeles, Weinstein faces multiple sexual assault charges that he has pleaded not guilty to last year, including four counts of rape, four counts of forcible oral copulation, sexual penetration by force and sexual battery by restraint in incidents dating from 2004 to 2013.

    Jury selection for Weinstein’s trial began Monday in Los Angeles County Superior Court. Newsom will likely testify “on or around November 8” but this could change as the schedule is fluid, attorney Mark Firmani said.

    As the trial in Los Angeles is set to get underway, Weinstein has maintained his innocence and denied all allegations against him. New York’s highest court in August agreed to hear his appeal challenging his 2020 conviction on sex crime charges.

    The allegations against Weinstein helped fuel the global #MeToo movement, encouraging women around the globe to speak out against sexual abuse.

    Just a day after The New York Times published its bombshell report on Weinstein in October 2017, Newsom wrote an opinion editorial for the Huffington Post where she shared that she had an experience very similar to the allegations reported by the Times.

    “I was naive, new to the industry, and didn’t know how to deal with his aggressive advances ― work invitations with a friend late-night at The Toronto Film Festival, and later an invitation to meet with him about a role in The Peninsula Hotel, where staff were present and then all of a sudden disappeared like clockwork, leaving me alone with this extremely powerful and intimidating Hollywood legend,” Newsom wrote.

    Weinstein spokesman Juda Engelmayer declined to comment on Newsom’s allegation.

    Siebel Newsom is a Stanford University graduate who has written, directed and produced several documentaries, including “Miss Representation,” “The Mask You Live In” and “The Great American Lie.” During her time as California’s First Partner, Siebel Newsom has advocated for working mothers and launched initiatives focused on closing the pay gap, among other efforts, and has been involved in several social activism campaigns.

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  • Madonna’s latest TikTok video has people talking | CNN

    Madonna’s latest TikTok video has people talking | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Did Madonna just come out?

    That’s the debate after she posted a video on her verified TikTok account.

    In it, the legendary singer holds a pair of what appear to be pink panties with writing on the video which states, “If I miss, I’m Gay.”

    Madonna then tosses the underwear towards a waste basket, misses and then gestures “Oh well.”

    The video comes on the heels of the 64-year-old singer being spotted locking lips with Dominican rapper and content creator Tokischa, 26.

    The pair are also pretty affectionate in the music video for “Hung Up on Tokischa,” which is a remix of Madonna’s 2005 single “Hung Up.”

    Madonna has long been viewed as an ally of the LGBTQ+ community.

    During an interview with The Advocate in 1991, Madonna said “I think everybody has a bisexual nature.”

    CNN has reached out to her representatives for comment.

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  • Do your little kids love horror? They’re not alone | CNN

    Do your little kids love horror? They’re not alone | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Some kids cling to security blankets. Others clutch a well-loved stuffed animal or good luck charm to feel safe and confident.

    Kayla Lopez’s kids, meanwhile, just need to pull on their Michael Myers masks to feel invincible.

    “I don’t really know of anybody that likes horror as much as them, honestly,” she said.

    Dominic, 6, and his 8-year-old sister Aubriella are hooked on horror, running around their home in the mask Myers dons in the “Halloween” series to discreetly dispatch his victims. It’s a sight that’s extra hilarious when juxtaposed against their short stature, delightful giggles and footie pajamas.

    Lopez documents their scary shenanigans on TikTok: Sometimes Dominic will hide under beds dressed like Pennywise the Dancing Clown from “It” or reveal a hockey mask à la Jason of “Friday the 13th” beneath his beloved Myers facade. Oftentimes, Aubriella and her little brother will just stare at their mother from underneath their creepy rubber masks. Attempting to scare each other has become a treasured family pastime.

    The Lopez kids aren’t the only youngins interested in the macabre: Briar Rose Beard, a cherubic 3-year-old from Florida, recently enchanted the internet by falling in love with a Halloween prop baby doll named Creepy Chloe and toting the demonic-looking doll everywhere. The Sumner family of Idaho, whose matriarch Kailee posts on TikTok as @sumcowkids, recently went viral when their youngest member, still in the babbling stages of babyhood, was filmed growling at his older sister in a decrepit witch mask.

    Adorable kids and horror paraphernalia seem like an incongruous pairing. But a child’s interest in horror is “almost always a harmless fascination,” said Coltan Scrivner, a research scientist at the Recreational Fear Lab at Denmark’s Aarhus University.

    “It’s normal for children to want to explore the boundaries of their own fears and what society deems as acceptable,” said Scrivner, who studies horror media and fear, among other “scary” subjects. “This is one way for them to learn about those boundaries.”

    Just as some children play dress-up with princess gowns or Jedi robes, Dominic and Aubriella get a kick out of dressing up like horror characters – usually Myers. It’s a daily activity for the siblings, safe within the confines of their home.

    “Scary experiences are only fun if they are couched in the context of play,” Scrivner said. “That is, we have to be scared but also be sure we are safe.”

    Getting into scary stuff at a young age isn’t usually cause for alarm, Scrivner said – young horror fans are braver than most children their age, to be sure, but they’re really just exploring the complexities of their world, which is scary enough in real life.

    “By exploring scary things from a safe place, children can also learn more about how they respond to feelings of fear and anxiety,” he said.

    Child horror buffs aren’t that different from us older folks, either: Frank Farley, former president of the American Psychological Association and professor emeritus at Temple University, said that humans are naturally fascinated with horror, both real and fictional. Hence the true crime boom, the horror genre’s continued success and the popularity of authors like Stephen King.

    Aubriella pushes her younger brother Dominic in a baby bouncer, both wearing Michael Myers masks.

    “It’s pretty amazing that we have Halloween,” he said, referring to the holiday as a “national day of horror.” “It bespeaks, in my view, the deep human interest in the dark side of life. There’s no doubt we’re interested in that.”

    The Lopez kids have what Farley calls “type-T personalities” – the “T” stands for thrill-seeking. While most of us are at least slightly interested in the scary, only “T” types will actively engage with it, whether it’s riding a mammoth roller coaster or marathoning horror films. “White-bread behavior,” as Farley puts it, isn’t interesting to the “T” types, who seek adventure and aren’t afraid to take risks, he said.

    Another reason some kids might prefer the company of vampires and zombies to, say, the animated cast of “Paw Patrol” or the Muppet neighbors on “Sesame Street,” is so they earn a badge of bravery among their peers, said Glenn Sparks, a Purdue University professor who studies the social impact of mass media, including scary movies.

    When a young child overhears friends, parents or other loved ones discuss how terrifying a film was, they might try to brave it themselves to prove their courage.

    “Some children may be more willing to expose themselves to potentially scary things, perhaps because of the gratification they think they will experience from being able to conquer those things,” Sparks said.

    For as long as her kids have loved him, Myers has been an irreplaceable member of the Lopez family, so much so that the kids watch his films regularly – on Wednesday, they had a living room matinee screening of “Halloween Kills.”

    Of course, now that her children’s love of all things “Halloween” is documented online, some parents have accused her of exposing her children to horror too young.

    Dominic and Aubriella don masks from two of their favorite franchises,

    But introducing kids to horror at a young age doesn’t have to traumatize them – it can even make them more resilient people, said Stephen Graham Jones, a bestselling horror author of books including “The Only Good Indians” and “My Heart is a Chainsaw,” as well as a professor of distinction at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

    When Jones’ children expressed an interest in the genre, he started them on the family-friendly “Monster House” and Tim Burton’s twisted fairytale, “Edward Scissorhands,” movies that aren’t necessarily scary but nod to the horror genre. Eventually, they worked their way up to horror comedies and gorier fare. But the point he imparts on his children, he said, isn’t to take away negative messages from slasher flicks in which the villain wins – it’s to emulate the heroes.

    “I don’t want to teach them that cruelty is to be lauded,” Jones told CNN. “What I want them to learn instead is that if you’re vigilant, if you fight, if you stand up for your crew, then you can make it through whatever this ordeal might be.”

    Even the most dedicated cosplaying kids have limits: Coral DeGraves, a 9-year-old horror fan, makes regular appearances at fan conventions in impressive costumes inspired by the fearsome Pinhead of “Hellraiser” or a demented version of Ronald McDonald, among other scary icons. But her mother, Cheyenne, says that Coral still isn’t ready to see some of the gorier films she nods to. Her parents screen films before sharing them with her, and for some of the more intense films, they’ll at most share clips of characters for inspiration rather than the entire, blood-soaked feature.

    Horror doesn’t define DeGraves’ child’s life, either: When Coral isn’t playing an adorably frightening Pennywise or possessed doll, she enjoys learning about backyard critters or meeting with her Girl Scout troop.

    “I never found it difficult to support her interest in horror,” Cheyenne DeGraves told CNN. “In fact, the more she learns and creates on her own, I’m even more happy to support her.”

    It can be isolating for Dominic and Aubriella Lopez to feel like the only horror fans among their young friends, their mother said. (Lopez recalled Dominic’s third birthday, when he shocked his friends by excitedly unwrapping a Chucky doll, his favorite gift.) They’ve learned to filter themselves around their pals so as not to scare the other kids and save it for when they’re home, where their horror habits aren’t questioned.

    But now that it’s October, and the rest of the US seems to embrace the same fanaticism for scary stuff that the Lopez kids celebrate year-round, Dominic and Aubriella are excited to share their fandom without freaking out their fellow children, Lopez said.

    “They know that around Halloween is the time that Michael (Myers) and Chucky and all things horror come out – that means it’s all okay to be ourselves, go all out,” Lopez said.

    For Halloween this year, the Lopez family is still narrowing down a potential list of costumes. Aubriella is thinking of dressing like Anabelle, the haunted (and haunting!) doll introduced in “The Conjuring.” As for Dominic, well, you can guess – he’s already asked his mother for a new Myers mask to add to their growing collection.

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  • Elon Musk’s bumpy road to possibly owning Twitter: A timeline | CNN Business

    Elon Musk’s bumpy road to possibly owning Twitter: A timeline | CNN Business

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    CNN Business
     — 

    A board seat accepted and then rejected. A stunning $44 billion takeover offer with uncertain financing. And a surprise early morning tweet putting the deal on hold, temporarily.

    Even by the standards of Twitter, a company that has known plenty of chaos and dysfunction in its history, the weeks-long effort by billionaire Elon Musk to buy the company has proven to be uniquely tumultuous – and there’s no clear end in sight.

    Should the deal go through, it would place the world’s richest man in charge of one of the world’s most influential social media platforms. The acquisition has the potential to upend not just Twitter itself but politics, media and the tech industry. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO has repeatedly stressed that his goal is to bolster what he calls “free speech” on the platform, by which he means all legal speech that complies with local laws in the markets where Twitter operates. He has also said he would reverse Twitter’s ban of former President Donald Trump.

    But the attempt by Musk, a wildly successful entrepreneur with a history of erratic behavior, to buy Twitter has been viewed with some skepticism from the start. On the day he made his offer, Musk said: “I’m not sure I’ll actually be able to acquire it.” Some have questioned how he would finance the deal, especially as shares of Tesla

    (TSLA)    , which he’s partially using to back his financing of the Twitter deal, and the broader tech sector have declined in the weeks since.

    After Musk recently said he was temporarily pausing the deal so he could assess the amount of spam and fake accounts, it prompted speculation that the billionaire might be looking to renegotiate the deal – or back out of it entirely. His actions in the days that followed only reinforced that thinking.

    Here is a look back at the many twists and turns in one of the most high-profile tech deals in recent memory.

    Musk starts quietly buying up Twitter shares, building his stake in the company. But it would be months before he disclosed this fact to the public.

    Musk’s stake in Twitter tops 5%, but that fact is not disclosed until the following month. Musk was obligated to disclose his stake within 10 days of crossing the 5% threshold, but waited 21 days to do so. During that time, he continued building up his stake.

    The billionaire begins to make pointed statements about the platform from his account. “Twitter algorithm should be open source,” he wrote, with a poll for users to vote “yes” or “no.”

    The following day, Musk tweets out another poll to his followers: “Free speech is essential to a functioning democracy. Do you believe Twitter rigorously adheres to this principle?”

    Musk reaches out to Twitter cofounder and former CEO Jack Dorsey to “discuss the future direction of social media,” according to a company filing later put out by the company. The two tech founders are known to have a bit of a billionaire bromance on and off Twitter.

    Twitter’s board and some of its leadership team meet with representatives from Wilson Sonsini, a law firm, and J.P. Morgan to discuss the possibility of Musk joining the company’s board, according a later securities filing. Dorsey is said to have told the board that “he and Mr. Musk were friends,” according to the filing.

    In the meeting, the Twitter board discussed wanting Musk to agree to “‘standstill’ provisions”,” according to the filing. This would effectively “limit his public statements regarding Twitter, including the making of unsolicited public proposals to acquire Twitter (but not private proposals) without the prior consent of the Twitter Board.”

    Musk is revealed to be Twitter’s largest individual shareholder, with a more than 9% stake in the company.

    News of the purchase sends shares of the social media company soaring more than 20% in early trading and kicks off a wave of speculation about how Musk might push for changes on the platform.

    Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal announces Musk will join Twitter’s board of directors. “Through conversations with Elon in recent weeks, it became clear to us that he would bring great value to our Board,” Agrawal says in a post on Twitter.

    As part of the appointment, Musk agrees not to acquire more than 14.9% of the company’s shares while he remains on the board. His term on the board is set to go through 2024, according to a regulatory filing.

    Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal (left) and former CEO Jack Dorsey in an undated photo.

    Agrawal announces that Musk has decided not to join the board after all. “I believe this is for the best,” Agrawal writes in a letter to the Twitter team.

    The reversal opens the door for Musk to pursue a greater stake in the company – and frees him to tweet his many thoughts about the company.

    Musk stuns the industry by making an offer to acquire all the shares in Twitter he does not own at a valuation of $41.4 billion. The cash offer represents a 38% premium over the company’s closing price on April 1, the last trading day before Musk disclosed that he had become the company’s biggest shareholder.

    “I invested in Twitter as I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the globe, and I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy. However, since making my investment I now realize the company will neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form. Twitter needs to be transformed as a private company,” Musk writes in his offer letter. “Twitter has extraordinary potential. I will unlock it.”

    Twitter’s board of directors adopts a “poison pill” provision, a limited-term shareholder rights plan that potentially makes it harder for Musk to acquire the company.

    Tesla CEO Elon Musk speaks during the official opening of the new Tesla electric car manufacturing plant on March 22, 2022 near Gruenheide, Germany.

    Musk lines up $46.5 billion in financing for the deal, including two debt commitment letters from Morgan Stanley and other unnamed financial institutions and one equity commitment letter from himself, according to a regulatory filing.

    The billionaire also reveals that he has not received a formal response from Twitter a week after his acquisition offer. He said he is “seeking to negotiate” a definite acquisition agreement and “is prepared to begin such negotiations immediately” — an apparent reversal from his statement in his acquisition offer letter that it would be his “best and final” offer.

    Although he is the richest person in the world, much of Musk’s wealth is tied up in Tesla stock, and some followers of the company speculate that it could be challenging for Musk to raise debt against the historically volatile stock.

    Twitter announces that it has agreed to sell itself to Musk in a deal valued at around $44 billion. At a conference later in the day, Musk describes his offer to buy Twitter in characteristically sweeping terms as being about “the future of civilization,” not just making money.

    At an all-hands meeting that afternoon, Twitter employees raise questions about everything from what the deal would mean for their compensation to whether former US President Donald Trump would be let back on the platform.

    Filings reveal Musk sold $8.5 billion of his Tesla stock in the three days after Twitter board agreed to the sale for an average of $883.09 per share. The filings did not disclose the reason for the sale, but Musk appeared to be raising funds to buy Twitter.

    Tesla cars sit in a dealership lot on March 28, 2022 in Chicago, Illinois.

    Musk raises another $7 billion in financing for the deal. The new investors include Oracle founder Larry Ellison, cryptocurrency platform Binance and venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, according to a filing.

    Musk aims to increase Twitter’s annual revenue to $26.4 billion by 2028, up from $5 billion last year, according to a New York Times report, citing Musk’s pitch deck presented to investors. To achieve that lofty goal, Musk intends to bolster Twitter’s subscription revenue and build up a payments business while decreasing the company’s reliance on advertising sales, according to the report.

    Musk confirms what many have assumed for weeks: he would reverse Twitter’s Trump ban if his deal to buy the company is completed.

    “I do think it was not correct to ban Donald Trump, I think that was a mistake,” Musk said. “I would reverse the perma-ban. … Banning Trump from Twitter didn’t end Trump’s voice, it will amplify it among the right and this is why it’s morally wrong and flat out stupid.”

    Former President Donald Trump looks at his phone during a roundtable with governors on the reopening of America's small businesses, in the State Dining Room of the White House in Washington, June 18, 2020.

    Twitter confirms to CNN Business that the platform is pausing most hiring and backfills, except for “business critical” roles, and pulling back on other non-labor costs ahead of the acquisition. In addition, Twitter says general manager of consumer, Kayvon Beykpour, and revenue product lead, Bruce Falck, are leaving the company.

    Musk tweets that the deal is on hold, linking to a Reuters report from nearly two weeks earlier, about Twitter’s most recent disclosure about its amount of spam and fake accounts. The figure cited in the report, however, is in line with prior quarterly disclosures.

    “Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users,” Musk tweeted.

    Shares of the social media site plummet after Musk’s announcement, dropping more than 10% at market open. Two hours after announcing the hold, Musk says he remains set on purchasing Twitter. “Still committed to acquisition,” he wrote.

    Later in the day, Musk says his team is testing Twitter’s numbers and “picked 100 as the sample size number, because that is what Twitter uses to calculate

    Musk tweets out that Twitter’s legal team accused him of breaking a nondisclosure agreement when the billionaire revealed the platform’s sample size for automated user checks is allegedly just 100 users.

    “Twitter legal just called to complain that I violated their NDA by revealing the bot check sample size is 100! This actually happened,” wrote Musk.

    The standoff over bot accounts continues as Musk exchanges a series of tweets with Agrawal over the issue. After Agrawal carefully explains how Twitter attempts to combat and measure spam accounts, Musk responds with a poop emoji.

    Musk follows up with a somewhat more thoughtful question. “So how do advertisers know what they’re getting for their money?” Musk asked. “This is fundamental to the financial health of Twitter,” he added.

    Musk announces that his acquisition of Twitter “cannot move forward” until he sees more information about the prevalence of spam accounts, claiming that the social media platform falsified numbers in filings. Without citing a source, he claims in a tweet that Twitter is “20% fake/spam accounts” and suggests Twitter’s previous filings with the SEC were misleading.

    Later in the day, Musk posts a poll to his Twitter followers: “Twitter claims that >95% of daily active users are real, unique humans. Does anyone have that experience?” before calling on the SEC to evaluate the platform’s numbers. “Hello @SECGov, anyone home?” Musk tweets, in an apparent attempt to get the regulator to look into the matter.

    In a statement, Twitter says it remains “committed to completing the transaction on the agreed price and terms as promptly as practicable.” Later, the company says it intends to “enforce the merger agreement.”

    In a letter to Twitter’s head of legal, Musk threatens to walk away from his purchase of the platform, alleging that Twitter is “actively resisting and thwarting his information rights” as outlined by the deal.

    In the letter, an attorney for Musk accuses the social media company of breaching the merger agreement by not providing the data he has requested on Twitter spam bots, stating that the lack of information gives him a right “not to consummate the transaction” and “to terminate the merger agreement.”

    Musk moved to terminate the acquisition agreement. A lawyer representing him claimed in a letter to Twitter’s top lawyer that the company is “in material breach of multiple provisions” of the deal over its alleged failure to provide all the data Musk says he needs to evaluate the number of spam and fake accounts on the platform.

    “For nearly two months, Mr. Musk has sought the data and information necessary to ‘make an independent assessment of the prevalence of fake or spam accounts on Twitter’s platform,’” the letter reads. “This information is fundamental to Twitter’s business and financial performance and is necessary to consummate the transactions contemplated by the Merger Agreement. … Twitter has failed or refused to provide this information.”

    Twitter was not having it.

    “The Twitter Board is committed to closing the transaction on the price and terms agreed upon with Mr. Musk and plans to pursue legal action to enforce the merger agreement,” Twitter board chair Bret Taylor said in a tweet Friday, echoing earlier statements by the company that it planned to follow through with the deal. “We are confident we will prevail in the Delaware Court of Chancery.”

    Twitter sued the Tesla billionaire in Delaware court in an attempt to force him to complete the deal.

    The 62-page lawsuit, sprinkled with memes, tweets and a poop emoji, effectively highlighted the bizarre spectacle of the deal from the start. The company paints Musk as a non-serious potential owner — alleging at one point that he has “disdain” for the company, and at another saying, “Musk’s strategy is … a model of bad faith” — while seeking to compel him to become its owner. (Twitter’s board has an obligation to its shareholders to try to see the deal through if they believe it is in their best interest. The dispute could also end in a settlement.)

    Twitter’s lawsuit against Musk over his move to terminate their $44 billion acquisition agreement will go to trial on Oct. 17 and run for five days, a Delaware judge ruled.

    The decision came after Judge Kathaleen St. Jude McCormick, who is overseeing the case, previously ruled in Twitter’s favor that the proceedings could be expedited and take place in October. Twitter initially pushed for an October 10th start.

    Musk’s legal team had asked for the trial to take place in 2023. Twitter’s legal team argued it was necessary to expedite the case in order to limit the “harm” to its business and to ensure the deal can be completed before Oct. 24, the “drop dead” date by which the two sides had previously agreed to close the deal.

    Peiter

    Twitter whistleblower Peiter “Mudge” Zatko testifies before Congress in his first public appearance after his bombshell allegations against the social media company were reported in August by CNN and The Washington Post.

    In a whistleblower disclosure sent to multiple lawmakers and government agencies in July, Zatko accused Twitter of failing to safeguard users’ personal information and of exposing the most sensitive parts of its operation to too many people, including potentially to foreign spies. Zatko — who was Twitter’s head of security from November 2020 until he was fired in January — also alleged company executives, including CEO Parag Agrawal, have deliberately misled regulators and the company’s own board about its shortcomings.

    Zatko claimed in his testimony that Twitter is extremely vulnerable to being penetrated and exploited by agents of foreign governments, as well as detailed some of the personal information Twitter collects on users and alleged that the company does not know where the majority of its collected data goes.

    Days earlier, a judge allowed Musk’s legal team to add arguments based on the whistleblower disclosure to its case.

    Musk sends a letter to Twitter proposing to complete the deal as originally signed for $54.20 per share, citing people familiar with the negotiations. News of the letter, revealed in a security filing the next day, sends Twitter stock surging more than 20%, approaching the deal price for the first time in months.

    Such an agreement could bring to an end a contentious, months-long back and forth between Musk and Twitter that has caused massive uncertainty for employees, investors and users of one of the world’s most influential social media platforms.

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  • A single mom’s 4 kids had to fend for themselves when tragedy struck. How a chance encounter years ago saved their future | CNN

    A single mom’s 4 kids had to fend for themselves when tragedy struck. How a chance encounter years ago saved their future | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    On a dark autumn evening almost four years ago, Janie Yoshida was driving her daughter home from high school play rehearsal when she noticed a teenager walking by himself next to a busy road.

    Tre Burrows, it turned out, was also in the play at Somerset Academy Canyons High School in Boynton Beach, Florida.

    “I pulled over to the side of the sidewalk and rolled the window down and said, ‘Hey, where do you live? I’ll take you home,’” Janie recalled.

    The 17-year-old kept insisting he was fine, until Janie put on “my mom’s voice” and demanded: ‘“Get in the car.”

    The polite young man with the gregarious smile complied. But, Janie soon learned, he led a life more challenging than she imagined – one in which she’d soon play a far bigger role.

    “He wanted me to drop him off at a main intersection. And I said, ‘Of course not. Just show me where you live.’ And he goes, ‘No, I can walk the rest of the way,’” Janie recalled.

    Reluctantly, Tre directed Janie to where he and his family were living.

    A motel.

    “I tried to play it off, like no big deal,” Janie recalled. But in reality, “I’m thinking to myself, ‘Oh my God … just terrible.’”

    From that point on, Janie gave Tre a ride every day after play rehearsal. Sometimes, she would make up an excuse to get fast food along the way, just to make sure Tre had a hot meal.

    “‘I don’t want to cook tonight,’” she’d tell him. “’Let’s just go through the drive thru.’”

    Then one day, Tre let slip another detail about his family life.

    “‘I’m gonna save this (meal),’” he told Janie, “’and split it with my sisters’” – one older and two younger, all together at the motel.

    Tre’s mother, it turned out, had been working two jobs and hanging by a thread to support her four children against immeasurable odds.

    Despite the financial challenges, Cindy Dawkins worked tirelessly to give her kids everything they needed. She had every meal ready, even without a kitchen. She helped with homework. Instead of asking her older ones to work part-time to support the family, she encouraged extracurricular activities such as track or school theater.

    Eventually, Tre told Janie why he’d been so nervous about telling anyone where he lived.

    “He didn’t want anybody to know because he was worried that the Department of Children and Families would come and take them away from his mom,” Janie said. “That’s just heartbreaking.”

    Janie asked to meet this matriarch – and was floored by her work ethic and strength.

    And as much as he loved his mom, Tre had no idea how much she sacrificed for her children.

    Soon, immense tragedy would force him to learn.

    A native of the Bahamas, Cindy moved to the US for what seemed like a promising career in the hospitality industry. But an avalanche of “bad luck on top of bad luck” fell on her, Janie said, including a layoff and a divorce.

    She ended up waitressing at two restaurants – one during the day, the other at night.

    “For the longest (time), she was working two jobs just to keep us afloat, paycheck to paycheck,” said Tre, now 21.

    “And she did all of that with a smile on her face because she didn’t want us to know exactly how hard it was to do all that.”

    But despite working two jobs, Cindy couldn’t get an apartment on her own because of a prior eviction. So she and her children moved into the motel, which cost far more per month than an apartment.

    The late Cindy Dawkins, with her daughter Zoe Clarke, moved to the US from the Bahamas.

    For three years, Cindy raised her four children in a motel room while working multiple jobs.

    Behind the omnipresent smile she put on for her kids, though, Cindy was struggling.

    She lamented that “‘in three years, I haven’t been able to make a home-cooked meal,’” Janie recalled.

    “She was like, ‘I don’t have a moment to myself or any privacy except when I’m in the shower. So if I’m going to break down, I’m going to cry, it’s going to be in the shower,’” Janie recalled.

    “‘And I’ve got to put my face back on, walk out of the bathroom in front of the kids and make sure that they don’t see it from me because I have to make them think everything’s OK.’”

    The family’s bad luck culminated the day Tre missed play rehearsal.

    The next day, Janie asked if he had been sick.

    “‘They kicked us out of the hotel because my mom couldn’t pay,’” Janie recalled him telling her.

    Janie went home and told her husband: “We need to get this family an apartment. I’m going tomorrow.”

    And as readily as she’d opened her car door to Tre that first time, “we just rented an apartment for them,” she said.

    With Janie’s name on the lease, the family of five moved into a two-bedroom apartment – mom in one bedroom, her four children sharing the other.

    Cindy meticulously paid the rent and utilities “earlier or on time – always,” Janie said.

    She got a raise at one of her restaurant jobs, Tre said, allowing her to quit her second job and spend more time with her kids.

    But that cherished time with her children would be short-lived.

    With a new home and better pay, Cindy and her kids eagerly anticipated celebrating her 50th birthday last summer.

    “We were planning on going up to Orlando a few days before and then spend her birthday up there,” Tre said.

    “We noticed that she started getting sick literally the day that we got there. As soon as we arrived, she went to bed and went to sleep and was just sleeping the entire time.”

    Cindy spent her birthday, August 1, in bed with severe Covid-19. The disease ravaged her body so quickly, “I didn’t even get to see her after she went into the hospital,” Tre said.

    On August 7, 2021 – six days after her birthday – Cindy died.

    Disbelief exacerbated her children’s agony.

    “She didn’t have any prior illnesses. … We just didn’t think anything like that would happen because we were healthy,” Tre said.

    “We were seeing the news (about) all the people passing away from Covid, but you never really understand exactly how bad it is until you experience it firsthand. We weren’t thinking this would completely uproot our lives.”

    Tre said his mother did not get vaccinated, in part due to rumors about side effects.

    “We didn’t want to do this and then (have it) potentially cause us to get sick,” Tre said. “We know better than that now. But I guess that was the reasoning behind her not getting” vaccinated.

    Tre and his siblings joined a growing group of children no one wants to be part of: the orphans of Covid. More than 212,000 US children have lost one or both parents to Covid-19, according to estimates from Imperial College London. And the number of children robbed of their parents keeps rising.

    “It never crossed my mind,” Tre said, “that me and my older sister would be the ones taking care of our little sisters.”

    Tre was the first to hear from the doctor his mother had passed. He rushed to the hospital and told his older sister, Jenny Burrows, now 25, to get there immediately.

    When Jenny arrived, “We cried for hours,” Tre recalled. “Our little sisters were at home (sleeping). Then we gathered ourselves and we tried to figure out, ‘OK, how are we going to tell our sisters?’”

    They woke up heir siblings Zoe Clarke, then 15, and Sierra Clarke, then 12. The most horrific nightmare had just turned into reality.

    The late Cindy Dawkins, with daughter Sierra Clarke, worked multiple jobs to support her children.

    But Tre and Jenny didn’t have time to mourn. Their minds were racing:

    “‘OK, are we about to get kicked out of the apartment we’re staying in because we can’t afford the bills?

    “‘How are we going to move on from this home?

    “‘How are we going to get the girls … everything they need for school?’”

    And the biggest question of all: Will the younger children get taken away?

    Despondent, overwhelmed and tasked with planning a funeral, Tre told Janie his mother passed.

    “I just lost it. I couldn’t believe it,” Janie said. “It was devastating.”

    She realized the siblings quickly needed help – and not just financially.

    They needed to learn how to parent on the fly.

    So once again, like she did all those years back from the driver’s seat, Janie went into mom mode.

    Without a living legal guardian, the children’s greatest fear was getting separated. Maybe the younger siblings would get taken away into state custody and foster care. Or maybe they would be sent to the Bahamas to live with relatives.

    Janie helped Jenny get to work on Priority No. 1: Becoming the younger girls’ legal guardian. It was one of the myriad legal complications that followed their mother’s death.

    “Another thing that’s helping us tremendously is we were able to get the girls set up with Social Security benefits from my mom,” Tre said, which will help support Sierra and Zoe until they turn 18.

    Janie and her husband also paid the remaining six months on the apartment’s lease. And she started a GoFundMe account, with an initial goal of paying for Cindy’s funeral expenses.

    Then just as Janie had stepped in as a stranger to help Tre’s hard-working but struggling family, hundreds more strangers did the same.

    The crowdsourcing fund grew so popular, it yielded enough for a down payment on a house so the children wouldn’t have to worry about getting evicted. Any extra funds likely will go toward Sierra’s and Zoe’s college education in the coming years.

    Janie also taught the older siblings about car insurance, credit and other life skills they would need to know immediately, now that they had dependents.

    Tre Burrows, left, and Jenny Burrows, right, became unexpected parents after their mom Cindy Dawkins died from Covid-19.

    The hardest part of being both a brother and a parent to younger siblings is “definitely the mental aspect of all of that,” Tre said.

    “The attitude stuff is a big thing for teenagers. They’re teenagers. Like getting chores done, getting your homework done, the attitude that comes with all that … basically, everything that goes with raising a 16- and 12-year-old,” he said.

    He and Jenny try to balance it all “while also making sure they don’t look at it like, ‘Oh, since Mom isn’t here, now you think you’re the boss and you can do all this stuff?’”

    And Tre tries to balance tough love with “not being too harsh with them, obviously, because we all just went through a horrible situation.”

    Tre and Jenny also now juggle a daily marathon of jobs, their own schooling and taking care of their sisters’ basic needs, their education and their mental health.

    Tre works at a computer repair company and has started training to become an emergency medical technician and firefighter. And Jenny, a dental assistant, wants to finish training to become a dental hygienist.

    The older siblings devised a plan for how to finish their education while paying the bills and taking care of the girls.

    “When I was going through EMT school … my sister would drop them off at school. I would pick them up, and (then) I would head to school. That was our plan,” Tre said.

    “And my sister would be the one at home with them, making sure they’re getting their homework done, making sure they’re OK mentally. And obviously I would help with that whenever I’m not in school. And basically I would get through that, get through the fire academy, doing the same thing,” he said.

    “And then once I’m done with schooling, the roles will kind of be reversed. So I’ll be the one that’s dropping them off, and I’ll be home with them (while) my sister’s at school, getting her career situated.”

    It’s a daunting task. But it’s nothing compared to what his own mother did, Tre said.

    “My biggest (concern) was just making sure I can fill her shoes,” he said. “I never really understood exactly how much she was doing until now, when my sister and I are the ones who have to do it.”

    Tre is also immensely grateful to the countless strangers who helped him and his siblings find a home and stay together.

    And it all traces to Janie giving him a ride home from school that dark autumn evening.

    “Without her,” he said, “we wouldn’t know what we would have done.”

    And Janie has learned from Cindy’s children, she said. Perhaps they inherited their mother’s fortitude.

    “I know they have the same instinct inside of them, just like their mom did – that hey, even if it sucks, let’s get up and make the best of it,” she said.

    “They’re my inspiration now.”

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  • Thailand’s day care massacre unites families and a country in grief | CNN

    Thailand’s day care massacre unites families and a country in grief | CNN

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    Uthai Sawan, Thailand
    CNN
     — 

    Smears of dried blood still stained the wooden floor of a classroom in northeastern Thailand on Friday, a day after the country’s worst massacre unfolded in perhaps one of the most unlikely places.

    At the Child Development Center Uthai Sawan, school bags sat uncollected on colored shelves, and photos of children smiled from the wall, clipped into place with pegs near cardboard cut-outs of ladybirds.

    Outside, sobbing parents sat on blue plastic chairs in a makeshift shed, nursing their grief and clinging to each other and their children’s blankets and bottles, any reminder of life, as officials finalized plans for a visit from the country’s top leaders.

    More than 20 young children ages 2-5 lost their lives in this classroom during nap time on Thursday when a former policeman armed with a knife and handgun forced his way inside and slashed them in their sleep.

    In a strange mix of grief and grandeur, at the center’s front door, a red carpet had been rolled out for the delivery of a floral wreath, a gift from the Royal Highness Princess Sirivannavari Nariratana Rajakanya, the King’s youngest daughter.

    Later Friday, the King and Queen visited the injured survivors and their families at Nong Bua Lam Phu Hospital in a rare appearance, a source with direct knowledge of the king’s schedule told CNN.

    Their visit followed that of the country’s prime minister, Prayut Chan-o-cha, who earlier met with families at the relief center set up by the government, visited hospitalized victims and laid flowers outside the day care.

    Thailand is accustomed to the underlying tensions that come in a nation governed by leaders of a military coup, but violence of the type perpetrated on Thursday is rare. The last mass death in the southeast Asian country was two years ago, when a former soldier went on a rampage at a military site before targeting shoppers at a mall in Nakhon Ratchasima Province, known as Korat, further south.

    In that case, the shooter was said to have erupted after an argument with another soldier over a land-selling commission fee. In this case, the motive is unclear but after terrorizing the childcare center, Panya Kamrab, a 34-year-old former policeman drove home and shot his wife and child, before taking his own life.

    The total death toll was 36, including Panya’s wife and two-year-old stepson, who normally attended that day care center, but who wasn’t there when the officer came searching for him. The toddler’s death takes the number of children killed to 24.

    Drugs don’t seem to have played a direct role – a forensic examination conducted by Udon Hospital found no evidence Panya used drugs in the 72 hours before the massacre.

    National police chief Pol. Gen. Damrongsak Kittiprapas said authorities believe Panya thought his wife would leave him, and she reported having a fight with him and phoning his mother for help.

    Nopparat Phewdam sat outside the day care center on Friday with other parents, though she lost her brother in the attack. Unlike others there, Nopparat knew the killer. She said he was a frequent customer to her convenience store and often came in with his stepson. “He seemed polite and spoke softly,” she said.

    Noppart Phewdam told CNN she lost her brother in the massacre.

    Details of the massacre have been slow to emerge, but the accounts given so far describe a man armed to kill, who didn’t hesitate to attack innocent children, and even shot dead a pregnant staff member who was a month away from giving birth.

    One staff member said Panya entered the center around noon, while two other staff members were having lunch. They heard sounds “like fire crackers” and saw two colleagues collapse on the floor. “Then he pulled another gun from his waist…I didn’t expect he would also kill the kids,” they said.

    Pol. Gen. Damrongsak said the suspect went to the day care center when he couldn’t find his wife and stepson at home. He crashed his vehicle on the way and shot three teachers before entering the building.

    Most of the deaths were the result of “stabbing wounds,” local police chief Major General Paisan Luesomboon told CNN. First responders told CNN of the grim scene that awaited them – most injuries were to the head, they said.

    In the any community, the loss of 36 people in one atrocity would be keenly felt, but the deaths of so many young children in a small rural area has shaken the village of around 6,300 people.

    Distraught families sat side by side outside the center, united in grief, as they waited Friday for details of government support.

    This couple lost their four-year-old son in the massacre.

    They included the heavily pregnant mother of four-year-old Thawatchai Siphu, also known as Dan, who was too distraught to speak. Dan’s grandmother, Oy Yodkhao, told CNN the family had been excited to welcome a new baby brother.

    Now their joy is drowned in loss and disbelief that someone could murder innocent children.

    “I couldn’t imagine there would be this kind of people,” said Oy. “I could not imagine he was this cruel to children.”

    Also sitting in numb grief were Pimpa Thana and Chalermsilp Kraosai, the parents of talkative twin boys, Weerapat and Worapon, who were yet to celebrate their fourth birthday – with two children, their family had been complete.

    Pimpa said her mother had phoned her to tell her there’d been a shooting at the day care center. “At that time I was not aware that my children were dead, my husband kept the news from me. I know it after I returned home.”

    Rows of small toddler-sized coffins in white and pale pink were laid on the ground as police retrieved the bodies from the classroom Thursday.

    Across the country on Friday, people wore black and flags flew at half-staff at government buildings, as thoughts turned to what lessons could be learned from a massacre within the walls of a classroom.

    A Thai officer lays a wreath of flowers from the royal family to mourn those killed at a child care center in the country's north.

    Gregory Raymond from Australian National University says he sees parallels between the mass shooting in 2020 and what happened Thursday at the day care center. Both perpetrators had served as officers in a country with a strong policing and military presence.

    “These are young men. They appear to have become alienated in some way. And they had access to weapons,” he said.

    It’s not known what mental issues Panya had been suffering, though it was believed he had a long-term drug problem – a perennial issue in the country, especially near its northern borders and the Golden Triangle, a global hub for illicit drugs.

    Last year, officials seized a record amount of methamphetamine – nearly 172 tons – in East and Southeast Asia in 2021, including the first haul of over 1 billion methamphetamine tablets.

    “There’s a lot of manufacturing going on in the Mekong sub region, and there’s also a lot of trafficking through Thailand,” said Raymond. “So all of that means that there’s more people who are developing problems with methamphetamine, and I think that has to be seen as a pretty significant cause of what’s happened here.”

    The mix of drugs and mental health issues among the forces is a problem Thailand needs to address, he added.

    “Thailand might have to start to think more about how it manages mental health amongst professionals, particularly those who have access to guns, or who have become used to having used to having violence as a kind of tool for their occupation.”

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  • Iran’s ‘women’s revolution’ could be a Berlin Wall moment | CNN Politics

    Iran’s ‘women’s revolution’ could be a Berlin Wall moment | CNN Politics

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



    CNN
     — 

    The Islamic regime in Iran has ruled for decades with fear and intimidation.

    Outrage at the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22 year-old who died after being detained by Iran’s morality policy, allegedly for improperly wearing her hijab, ignited nationwide protests across the country that have gone on for weeks.

    That Iranians are risking their lives and freedom to stand up to their government has sparked hope among many that change is coming. Read CNN’s latest report.

    I talked on the phone to Masih Alinejad, an Iranian in exile in the US who works as a journalist and activist.

    Key points:

    • She uses social media – 8 million followers on Instagram alone – to amplify and aid the protests inside Iran.
    • US authorities charged four Iranian nationals with trying to kidnap her last year.
    • To Alinejad, that women in Iran are removing their headscarves as an act of protest is equal to the fall of the Berlin Wall.
    • She sees solidarity with dissidents from other oil-rich autocracies like Russia and Venezuela, and has a stern message for feminists in the West.

    Our conversation, edited for clarity and length, is below. I’ve also added some context and links in parentheses where appropriate.

    WHAT MATTERS: This newsletter is not usually focused on Iran. Can you first just explain what’s happening?

    ALINEJAD: Mahsa Amini was only 22 years old. … She came from Saqqez to Tehran for a vacation. Then she got arrested by the so-called morality police – because I call them the hijab police.

    And for your audience, if they don’t know what morality police means, they’re a bunch of police walking in the streets, telling people whether their way of wearing hijab is proper or not.

    Mahsa was arrested for wearing inappropriate hijab. So she was not unveiled.

    (Here is a CNN report in which the Iranian police deny the allegation she was beaten.)

    ALINEJAD: That created huge anger among Iranians. And that is why women across Iran first started to cut their hair. Then they took to the street and they started to burn their headscarves. And now, with men, shoulder to shoulder, across Iran they’re not only saying no to compulsory hijab, they are actually chanting against the dictator and they are saying we want an end to the Islamic Republic.

    This is a revolution.

    To me, this is a women’s revolution against a gender apartheid regime.

    WHAT MATTERS: The Iranian government has tried to crack down on this. We see video that gets out of Iran of these protests. How have things changed in the weeks since Mahsa’s death?

    ALINEJAD: From the beginning, the level of crackdown was so brutal. They opened fire, they really opened fire on teenagers, school leaders, university students, they opened fire on unarmed people.

    Now some reports say more than 130 people have been killed. But it’s strongly believed the number is much more than this. Only in Zahedan on only one day, they opened fire on those who were praying. Who were praying. They killed more than 80 people in Zahedan.

    (CNN has not verified all of these claims. Related CNN report: Iranian security forces beat, shot and detained students of elite Tehran university, witnesses say.

    Amnesty International has reported on the killing of 66 in Zahedan along with other deaths recorded in other places.

    Regarding death tolls: CNN cannot independently verify the death toll –  a precise figure is impossible for anyone outside the Iranian government to confirm – and different estimates have been given by opposition groups, international rights organizations and local journalists.)

    ALINEJAD: The Iranian regime cut off the internet in some cities to prevent the rest of the world from getting to know about the crackdown, to get to learn about the number of people killed.

    But again. That didn’t stop people. Actually, it changed the tone of the protesters. They became more angry. They were holding the names and photos of those who got killed and the major slogan was this: ‘We are ready to die, but we won’t live under humiliation.’

    One of the young women whose name was Hadis Najafi, she was only 20 years old. She made a video of herself walking in the street and saying I’m joining the protests. In the future, if I see that Iran has changed, that change came, then I was proudly part of this demonstration. She got killed. There are many of them.

    (CNN has reported that Najafi’s family said she was shot six times and never made it home from a protest. She was 23. There are reports of multiple young women killed. Here’s a CNN video report on Nika Shahkarami, whose family found her body at a morgue after not being able to find her for 10 days following an Instagram story of her burning her headscarf.)

    Students filmed themselves burning their headscarves, but they got killed. But murdering and killing didn’t stop the protests. Instead they became more angry. Now schoolgirls came out, university professors came out, teachers came out and ask for a strike.

    (Here’s a CNN report that explains the special significance of strikes in Iran.)

    WHAT MATTERS: The flashpoint is one woman’s death that set off all of these protests. But it’s a movement that’s been building for months –

    ALINEJAD: Don’t say for months. I don’t accept that. It has been building for years. Years of women pushing back the boundaries the anti-woman laws, especially compulsory hijab laws.

    For years and years, these women that you see in the streets, they have been fighting back compulsory hijabs alone. Like lonely soldiers. I myself have published videos of women being beaten by morality police under the hashtag #mycameraismyweapon. I really want you to go and check this hashtag. Brave women filming themselves while being harassed by morality police and looking to the morality police and saying that you cannot tell me what to wear.

    Slavery used to be legal. I’m not going to respect bad law in Iran.

    This is being built up by women within the society practicing their civil disobedience in bravely saying no to forced hijab and the gender apartheid regime for years and years. That’s my opinion. Mahsa’s name became a symbol of resistance for women to take to the streets in large numbers. That’s the new thing.

    WHAT MATTERS: How will this be transformed into permanent change? How will it evolve from here?

    ALINEJAD: Look, this is not going to happen overnight. This is the beginning of an end. It takes time. It reminds me of the revolution 40 years ago. People were taking to the streets for like one month and were going back home and then coming back again. The national strike helped a lot. For me and millions of people, this is just the beginning to an end.

    The compulsory hijab is not just a small piece of cloth for Iranians. It’s like the Berlin Wall. I keep saying that. If women can successfully tear this wall down, the Islamic Republic won’t exist.

    Maybe in the West, people ignore me and they never take this seriously. But the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, he knows what I’m talking about. That’s why, just two days ago, he referred to my statement comparing the hijab to the Berlin Wall, saying that ‘she is an American agent and we have taken action against her.’

    (Alinejad shared this video of Khamenei on Twitter, in which he refers to US political elements making the comparison to the Berlin Wall.)

    ALINEJAD: But it’s not me. It’s millions of people who believe that compulsory hijab is like the main pillar of the religious dictatorship. It’s like the main pillar of the Islamic Republic.

    That’s why I believe that now people are being fearless and clear that we want to break this weakest pillar of the Islamic Republic… I strongly believe that the biggest threat to the Islamic Republic are the women who are leading the revolution, who are facing guns and bullets and saying that we want an end for this gender apartheid regime.

    WHAT MATTERS: In Iran, and we’ve seen this in Russia as well, social media is helping spread the word and is essential to organizing protests. Here in the US, it is often viewed as a threat to our democracy because that’s where misinformation is spread. I wonder if you had any thoughts on that dichotomy.

    ALINEJAD: Let me be very clear with you. Right now, the tech companies are actually helping the Islamic Republic. First of all, Iranians are banned from using social media – Instagram, Facebook and Twitter are filtered. The leaders like Khamenei and other officials who ban 80 million people from using social media, they all have verified accounts. They have multiple accounts on social media. Basically, the Iranian regime cut off the Internet for its own people, but they’re being more than welcomed on social media to spread fake information, misinformation, disinformation.

    (Accounts that appear to be associated with Khamenei are on Twitter and Instagram and have large followings. They are not verified by Instagram or Twitter. Twitter did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesman for Meta said this in an email: “Iranians use apps like Instagram to stay close to their loved ones, find information and shed light on important events – and we hope the Iranian authorities restore their access soon. In the meantime, our teams are following the situation closely, and are focused on only removing content that breaks our rules, while addressing any enforcement mistakes as quickly as possible.”)

    WHAT MATTERS: The US government has tried to increase Iranian’s access to the internet. Is that working?

    ALINEJAD: Oh, of course, this is phenomenal. But we need more. We need more.

    The thing is, at the same time, the US government, we’re pleased that they’re providing internet access for Iranians. This is good. We appreciate that.

    But at the same time, the US government is focused on getting a deal from this regime, the same regime.

    They condemn the brutality, they condemn the Iranian government for killings, but at the same time, they try to give money, billions of dollars, to the same murderers. And I don’t understand this contradiction.

    (The US government could give Iran’s government ​access to billions of dollars of frozen Iranian funds if it re-joins an agreement whereby Iran can sell oil in exchange for abandoning nuclear weapons capability. Recent talks, however, have not gone well. Read more.)

    ALINEJAD: Many people in the streets are now risking their lives and want an end for the same regime. They aren’t asking for US government to go there and save them at all. They’re brave enough to do it themselves. But they’re really clearly asking the US government not to save the Iranian regime. …

    People believe that the money goes to the benefit of the people. It doesn’t go to the people. The money goes to Syria, Lebanon, to Hamas, Hezbollah, to terrorist organizations.

    For millions of Iranians now, this is the moment they want the US government to ask its allies, the European countries, to recall their ambassadors and to cut their ties with the murders until the day that they are sure that the Iranian regime is stopped killing its own people.

    (CNN isn’t able to confirm that all the money goes to terrorist organizations or that none of it goes to Iranian people. Iran does fund terror groups outside its borders, according to the US government, and its own Islamic Revolutionary Guard is a terror group, according to the US government.)

    WHAT MATTERS: I want to talk about another dichotomy you’ve pointed out. You wrote in The Washington Post that feminists all over the world need to pay attention and take to the streets.

    ALINEJAD: You cannot call yourself a feminist in the West, in America, and not take action on one of the most important feminist revolutions, in Iran.

    By saying that, I don’t mean that I want the feminists to just appear on TV and cut their hair to show their solidarity.

    I want, especially the female politicians, to cut their ties … and instead take to the streets to show their solidarity with the women of Iran. When the Women’s March happened here in America, like every single feminist around the world showed solidarity. I was part of the Women’s March in New York. The main slogan was ‘my body my choice.’

    But at the same time I’m witnessing that when it comes to Iran and Afghanistan, it seems that my body my choice is not as important as it is in the West.

    (Here Alinejad said women representing Western governments who meet with Iranian and Afghan officials should refrain from wearing headscarves.)

    WHAT MATTERS: You took part this week in an Oslo Freedom Forum event in New York with other dissidents from Russia and Venezuela. Those are two places that are repressive, and they’re also funded largely by oil. The US wants more oil on the market. I just wondered if you had any larger comments to make on this question?

    ALINEJAD: This is what’s missing here. The dictators are more united than our freedom fighters.

    Let me give you an example. Just two months ago, (Vladimir) Putin went to Iran. (Nicolás) Maduro from Venezuela went to Iran … from China to Russia to Venezuela to Nicaragua, everywhere. The leaders from autocracies and dictatorships are united. They’re helping each other. They’re supporting each other to oppress protests taking place in each country. But we the freedom fighters, we the opposition to these dictators must be united as well, because when we fight against autocracy or dictatorship on our own, we’re not going to be successful.

    (Alinejad said she has talked to dissidents from Russia and Venezuela about calling a World Liberty Congress for opposition and activist leaders.)

    ALINEJAD: If we don’t get united to end dictatorship, then the dictators will get united to end democracy. We’re not fighting just for ourselves. I’m not fighting just for Iran. Garry Kasparov is not fighting for just Russia. Leopoldo Lopez is not fighting just for Venezuela. We are fighting for democracy. We’re trying to protect the rest of the world from these dictators.

    (Our conversation continued from here and Alinejad argued the “United Nations is useless.” It’s true the United Nations prioritizes inclusion of most countries over action. And it is awkward at best that Iran sits on the UN’s Commission on Women’s Rights and Russia sits on the Security Council.)

    ALINEJAD: We need to have our own alternative United Nations, where all the good people get united, not the bad guys. Now the bad guys are winning because they’re helping each other. So this is the time that all the good people who care for freedom and democracy get united and have their own society.

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  • Velma in new ‘Scooby Doo’ clip delights fans who say her LGBTQ+ identity has been confirmed | CNN

    Velma in new ‘Scooby Doo’ clip delights fans who say her LGBTQ+ identity has been confirmed | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    It appears Velma wants a same-sex boo in the an upcoming HBO Max Scooby Doo Halloween movie.

    Clips from the animated special “Trick or Treat Scooby-Doo!” have been making the rounds on social media, with folks using them to proclaim that the character is finally being shown as gay.

    “OMG LESBIAN VELMA FINALLY CANON CANON IN THE MOVIES LETS GOOOOOO,”one person tweeted, with a clip showing Velma getting googly-eyed over a female character named Coco Diablo.

    Other clips have also been circulating on social media, including one in which Velma tells fellow sleuth Daphne that she’s “crushing big time” and asking for advice on what to do.

    Fans have long believed Velma was part of the LGBTQ+ community.

    In 2020, director James Gunn said he tried to make the character “explicitly gay” in his script for the live-action “Scooby-Doo” movie.

    “In 2001 Velma was explicitly gay in my initial script” (for 2002’s live-action “Scooby-Doo”), he tweeted at the time. “But the studio just kept watering it down & watering it down, becoming ambiguous (the version shot), then nothing (the released version) & finally having a boyfriend (the sequel).”

    Gunn wrote both the 2001 live-action film and its 2004 sequel, which both starred Linda Cardellini as Velma.

    In the sequel, actor Seth Green played Velma’s boyfriend and there was nothing in the film to imply she was gay.

    Tony Cervone, supervising producer on the “Mystery Incorporated” series, posted on Instagram during 2020 Pride Month about Velma and the character Marcie in a photo that used Pride colors.

    “I obviously don’t represent every version of Velma Dinkley, but I am one of the key people that represents this one. We made our intentions as clear as we could ten years ago,” the caption read. “Most of our fans got it. To those that didn’t, I suggest you look closer.”

    CNN has reached out to Warner Bros., which like HBO Max, is owned by CNN’s parent company, for comment.

    “Trick or Treat Scooby-Doo!” debuts on HBO Max on Oct. 16.

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  • How Buffalo is ensuring the Black community isn’t left behind after mass supermarket shooting | CNN

    How Buffalo is ensuring the Black community isn’t left behind after mass supermarket shooting | CNN

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    Buffalo, NY
    CNN
     — 

    The day after Buffalo experienced the largest mass shooting in its history, teams of emergency volunteers and mental health counselors arrived on the scene, offering emotional support and distributing food.

    The response was robust and swift, but there was one big problem.

    “The community didn’t feel comfortable coming up the stairs to the center because what they saw was a large group of White people,” said Kelly Wofford, Erie County’s director of health equity.

    A White gunman had deliberately opened fire at a predominantly Black neighborhood’s only grocery store, a Tops supermarket, on a busy Saturday in May. Eleven of the 13 people shot were Black, including the 10 killed. Authorities called the shooting racially motivated.

    “In any other kind of tragedy, like a hurricane or flood, anyone offering resources would be gladly welcomed, but this was different. This tragedy had a face and a hatred for a certain group of people,” said Thomas Beauford Jr., president and CEO of the Buffalo Urban League, which was one of the community organizations on site the day of the shooting.

    “They completely rejected it,” said Beauford, adding, “The immediate reaction to the counselors was, ‘We need to see counselors that look like us.’”

    By Monday, the problem was addressed. Wofford, who grew up down the street from the Tops, tapped her network to ensure there were more Black counselors on site, that Black people were the ones handing out flyers on the street about available services, and that Black people greeted folks at the help center.

    “We made sure the community affected felt comfortable seeking the services they need,” Wofford said.

    Her response efforts – and the spotlight the May 14 shooting put on the community’s existing disparities – exemplifies the role Erie County’s newly formed Office of Health Equity is meant to play in the community: ensuring that health services are equitably distributed across disadvantaged and marginalized populations.

    Within Erie County, there is a significant disparity between the health outcomes of White residents and residents of color, which became even clearer as Covid-19 disproportionately affected Black and brown communities there, as well as across the country.

    Even before the pandemic, the life expectancy of Black Buffalo residents was 12 years shorter than White residents, according to a report published by the Buffalo Center for Health Equity in 2015, the most recent data available.

    Erie County’s Office of Health Equity was launched to help address those disparities. It was established in January by county law, and the funding was made possible by a major federal pandemic relief package known as the American Rescue Plan that distributed money to states, counties and cities across the country.

    Kelly Wofford is the first director of the Erie County Office of Health Equity, which launched earlier this year.

    Erie County allocated roughly $1 million of the nearly $179 million it received from the American Rescue Plan for the creation of the Health Equity Office. It is using the remaining funds on a variety of needs, including economic assistance for small businesses, water treatment infrastructure and restoring jobs and spending that were initially cut due to the pandemic.

    While issues of health equity were addressed prior to the formation of the office, the law formalized the efforts and put funding behind them, ensuring it can work to address long-term solutions. With Wofford at the helm, the office has nine staff members, including two epidemiologists.

    “The Office of Health Equity – which did not exist and would not have existed without the funding we received from the American Rescue Plan – immediately became an integral partner in the response to the Tops shooting on May 14, by being in some ways the boots on the ground and the coordinator between third-party agencies and the county’s delivery of these services to the community,” said Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz.

    “It was unlike any experience we’ve ever had,” Poloncarz added, “and I’m very grateful that we had the Office of Health Equity in place because it would have made our job a lot tougher without it.”

    Addressing health disparities is something communities across the country are grappling with, and while the pandemic caused illness and death for millions, it also has helped spur some momentum.

    State and local health equity offices are far from being as prevalent as water departments, for example, but they are having a moment – due in part to the influx of money from the federal government meant to help communities recover.

    “The pandemic really highlighted the gross differences in our ability to keep people healthy, related to race and ethnicity,” said Lori Tremmel Freeman, CEO of the National Association of County and City Health Officials.

    The group hasn’t tracked how many formal equity offices have opened, but the number is growing, Freeman said. Philadelphia hired its first chief racial equity officer earlier this year.

    In the past, some communities have not had the political will or the resources to formalize their health equity efforts, she added.

    A memorial waterfall was built inside the renovated Tops supermarket in Buffalo, which reopened in July, two months after the mass shooting.

    High-profile killings of Black people by police, notably the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, gave rise to a number of communities declaring racism as a public health crisis, laying the groundwork for some of the offices opening now. In April 2021, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also declared racism a serious public health threat.

    Resolving health inequities will take time and requires tackling the social determinants of health. These are the factors that contribute to someone’s health that they don’t have control over themselves, like access to clean water and healthy food and other conditions where they live, work and play that can affect their health.

    “You’re really trying to create the same opportunity for health for every single person in the community, no matter what their economic status is, where they live or whether they have a job,” Freeman said.

    In mid-July, the Tops grocery store reopened to mixed reactions from the community.

    Without the supermarket, those without a car may have lacked convenient access to nutritious food. For others, it was emotionally difficult to reenter the store.

    Migdalia Lozada, a crisis counselor with the Buffalo Urban League, spent one August morning offering support to shoppers. Lozada took one woman by the hand as she walked into the store for the first time since the tragedy, feeling the woman’s tears fall onto her arm.

    The Buffalo Urban League’s community resource center, located just two blocks from the Tops, continues to serve the traumatized neighborhood. People can walk right into the space and speak with a crisis counselor. Some people are regulars who come in nearly every day. Others may have been triggered by an event like a shooting elsewhere or movement in a court case against the shooting suspect.

    “We just try to give the person some space to open up in a safe, confidential place,” said Lozada.

    While the Buffalo Urban League’s crisis counselors had already been serving the community for months, its leaders wanted a physical space nearby the Tops store after the shooting. The group found an open space down the street that had once been a neighborhood bar known as Pixie’s and opened a resource center there within days after the tragedy. The building intentionally looks and feels much more like a local watering hole than a health institution.

    Buffalo Urban League's Yukea Wright (left), a crisis counselor team leader, and Migdalia Lozada, a crisis counselor, work at the resource center near the Tops.

    The center also serves as a place that connects people with other resources to address a wide range of social determinants of health, like employment, housing and education.

    The Buffalo Urban League plans to work closely with the county, especially with the new Office of Health Equity, to help drive long-term change going forward.

    The county office is first working on training people in the Mental Health First Aid national program, so that the county can deploy counselors throughout the community – like at Bible studies and community centers – to meet people where they already may be. A recent nationwide study found that while the share of US adults who received treatment for mental health grew throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, people of color are less able to access mental health services.

    The office is also working on a survey that, in part, will show what problems members of the community would like addressed – it could be the high prevalence of diabetes or high blood pressure, for example.

    “When you look at the social determinants of health, there are inequities across all of them, so you can pick whichever one you want,” Wofford said.

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  • Instruction about race may be under siege across the US, but this course is empowering students at a Southern high school | CNN

    Instruction about race may be under siege across the US, but this course is empowering students at a Southern high school | CNN

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    In the early 2000s, when I was a student at Ridge View High School, in Columbia, South Carolina, I loved to parse the legacies of certain historical figures: W.E.B. Du Bois, in AP US History; Malcolm X, in AP English Language and Composition.

    At the same time, I wanted more. Too often, Advanced Placement curricula seemed to give attention to just a handful of Black heavyweights and, as a result, neglect the countless ways Black Americans have shaped US society. Only rarely were Black students like me reflected in lessons. (I remember learning about “A Raisin in the Sun,” Lorraine Hansberry’s jewel of a play about a Black family in south Chicago, from my mom and wondering, Why aren’t we studying this in school?)

    But things are beginning to change. Ridge View is one of about 60 high schools across the country piloting AP African American Studies in 2022. The interdisciplinary course will be the newest addition to the College Board’s panoply of AP offerings and delve into the history of the African continent and Black contributions to music, literature, science, politics and mathematics, among other fields. Mere weeks into the pilot course, students and faculty at Ridge View already see AP African American Studies as something of a salve. The course arrives at a moment when instruction about race is under siege: Educational gag orders abound, and “critical race theory” has become a lightning rod for the right.

    Given the meager representation I observed as a high school student, I was stunned – and thrilled – to learn that Ridge View, which is majority Black, is piloting AP African American Studies. It would’ve been so welcome, I thought, to see myself in this context, to probe questions of identity and inheritance.

    Plus, it’s no small thing to test out the course in South Carolina, which didn’t banish the Confederate battle flag from statehouse grounds until 2015, in the heartrending aftermath of a White supremacist massacre.

    The significance of the moment isn’t lost on Ridge View students.

    “It really makes me happy to be in this class – to know that I’m a part of history,” Nacala McDaniels, a senior, told CNN.

    In August, the Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., one of the architects of the AP African American Studies curriculum, stressed the course’s educational value.

    “Nothing is more dramatic than having the College Board launch an AP course in a field – that signifies ultimate acceptance and ultimate academic legitimacy,” he told Time magazine. “It is a mainstream, rigorously vetted, academic approach to a vibrant field of study, one-half a century old in the American academy, and much older, of course, in historically Black colleges and universities.”

    Like so many in the Ridge View community, McDaniels wants AP African American Studies to help not only other Black students but all students become well-versed in under-told histories and cultures and incubate meaningful discussions about race.

    “I hope that the course will be offered to other people who look like me and to other people who just want to learn about history that’s been covered up and history that’s been ignored,” she said. “And I hope that the course makes room for more conversation. Lots of people are scared to talk about race, but with more conversation comes better understanding.”

    High schools had been hungry for an AP African American Studies course for years. However, when the College Board asked universities about a decade ago if they’d give credit for a corresponding exam, they said no.

    But the uprisings of 2020 caused a long-overdue shift.

    “The events surrounding George Floyd and the increased awareness and attention paid toward issues of inequity and unfairness and brutality directed toward African Americans caused me to wonder, ‘Would colleges be more receptive to an AP course in this discipline than they were 10 years ago?’” Trevor Packer, who heads the College Board’s AP program, told Time.

    Yes, was the answer.

    Maybe the most exciting thing about teaching AP African American Studies is the fact that educators get to talk about people, subjects and slices of history students don’t know much about, according to Daniel Soderstrom, who leads the course at Ridge View.

    “Over the past few decades, we, as a society, have done a better job of teaching Black history and African American Studies. But I’d argue that many teachers still fall short,” he told CNN. “What I mean is that our kids hear the same stories every year. And that’s not to diminish the contributions of Rosa Parks or Martin Luther King Jr. But if those are the only people our students are learning about in school, they’re missing a lot of what’s really there.”

    The first part of the course examines early African kingdoms and some of their foundational figures, including Queen Nzinga of Ndongo, located in present-day Angola.

    “She was a very strong woman – a heroine – and fought on the front lines with her soldiers,” Soderstrom said of Nzinga, celebrated for pushing back against Portuguese colonization and the trade of enslaved people in Central Africa in the 16th and 17th centuries. “But we tend to skip the stories of people from Africa.”

    So far, the lessons appear to be resonating with the kids.

    “I didn’t even know that there were any queens in Africa in any time period. Like, at all,” Ashton Walker, a junior, told CNN. “We got to learn about Queen Nzinga and Idia. They’re both very interesting because they were powerful women leaders who did amazing things for their kingdoms.”

    Walker, who’s White, sees AP African American Studies as a means toward visibility for her Black peers, who get to be participants in their history.

    “It matters that we get to learn all these things as a society. We don’t ever really get to hear about any of these figures or what they went through,” she said. “And my (Black) classmates deserve to hear this history. It’s awesome that Ridge View is a majority-Black school and gets to help create this course.”

    Her mother, Nicole Walker, who was involved in bringing the pilot course to Ridge View and is the director of the school’s Scholars Academy Magnet for Business and Law (she also was my 9th grade English teacher), echoed some of these sentiments.

    “We know that what’s best for kids is for them to see themselves reflected in the curriculum, for them to celebrate their cultures, for them to feel valued,” she told CNN. “We know that a kid who feels safe and valued is going to do better in school.”

    Martin Luther King Jr. addresses crowds during the March On Washington, August 28, 1963.

    Jacynth Tucker, a senior, is intimately familiar with the power of inclusivity. She said that at a previous school, she and other Black students felt invisible.

    “I can’t even remember a time when we really explored Africa – talked about the history and the culture,” she told CNN. “Being in a class where that’s more of a focus is very special to me.”

    Further, the course gives Black Americans more dimension, per Clementine Jordan, a senior.

    “One activity I really liked was when our teacher showed us a collage and asked, ‘What do all these people have in common?’” she told CNN. “Their commonality was that they’re all Black. But the point of that discussion was that, yes, they’re all Black, but there’s so much diversity within the Black community, within my community: diverse religions, gender expressions, sexualities, things like that.”

    Crucially, Soderstrom noted that AP African American Studies isn’t a standard-issue history course, though it proceeds in a relatively chronological fashion and will eventually make its way to the US.

    “We’re studying Black excellence and African American success through art, through literature, through culture, through dance, through mathematics, through science, through lawyering,” he said. “It’s interesting that one day we’re looking at an art piece, the next day we’re listening to music, the next day we’re reading a poem and then the day after that we’re listening to a mathematician speak.”

    In other words, while the course charts struggles – including the mid-century civil rights movement – it also underscores Black excellence in a variety of disciplines.

    It’s pretty much impossible to separate the debut of the AP African American Studies pilot course from the Republican-led racial panic looming over many schools.

    According to an August analysis by PEN America, a literary and free expression organization, legislators in 36 states have introduced 137 laws this year restricting discussions about race, US history and gender in K-12 schools and higher education. This figure is a 250% increase over 2021.

    And last month, the American Library Association predicted that the number of attempts this year to censor books in K-12 schools, universities and public libraries grappling with race, gender and sexuality will exceed 2021’s record count. The ALA tallied 681 attempts between January 1 and August 31; the 2021 total was 729.

    These attacks seek to determine what content is and isn’t legitimate in an academic context; they’re part of a much broader counter-mobilization against efforts to topple racial and social hierarchies.

    “We’re not seeing different political conflicts. We’re seeing one big political conflict – one big reactionary political project,” as Thomas Zimmer, a visiting professor at Georgetown University, where his research focuses on the history of democracy and its discontents, told CNN in July.

    Yet Soderstrom minced no words: AP African American Studies is a vital course, regardless of anyone’s political affiliation.

    “Henry Louis Gates Jr. is one of the senior minds when we’re talking about American studies and African American history. He was quoted recently explaining that the course isn’t political,” Soderstrom said. “We’re teaching factual information, and everything is verifiable.”

    Lylou, a sophomore, shared this conviction.

    “I’m a White person, and I wanted to take this class because I don’t know that much about Black history,” she told CNN. “The course should be in the curriculum. Because why would we want to ignore this history?”

    (Lylou’s mother asked that her daughter’s last name not be included, given the intense political climate hovering over lessons about race in the US.)

    The pilot course is expected to expand to include additional high schools next year and then be available to all interested schools the following year, per the College Board.

    Ridge View kids, for their part, seem eager to see how the rest of the year unfolds.

    “The class is a learning opportunity for everybody. I take every interaction I have with anybody as a learning experience,” McDaniels said.

    Then, mirroring the same fundamental curiosity I had as a high school student nearly two decades ago, she added, “I’m just excited to see what’s next.”

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  • Tudor Dixon seeks a culture war in campaign against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer | CNN Politics

    Tudor Dixon seeks a culture war in campaign against Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Tudor Dixon, the Republican taking on Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in November’s midterm election, is turning to tactics that have worked for other Republican winners in competitive governor’s races as she seeks to turn the race into a cultural battle over education, transgender athletes and more.

    But her clash with a well-funded Democratic incumbent governor – one taking place in a state where a referendum that would enshrine abortion rights in the state’s constitution has emerged as a dominant issue – is showcasing the limits of those efforts at cultural appeals to the moderate, suburban voters who could decide the race’s outcome.

    National Republicans have largely abandoned Dixon in the race’s closing weeks, leaving her outspent and floundering in one of the nation’s most important swing states.

    Dixon sought to change the race’s trajectory on Saturday when former President Donald Trump traveled to Michigan for a rally in Warren with Dixon and other GOP candidates, including Matthew DePerno, who is challenging Attorney General Dana Nessel, and Kristina Karamo, who is taking on Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson. Dixon, DePerno and Karamo have all parroted Trump’s lies about widespread fraud in the 2020 election.

    Trump called Whitmer “one of the most radical, most sinister governors in America,” criticizing her support for abortion rights and Michigan’s pandemic-related lockdowns.

    The former President, echoing Dixon’s focus on cultural issues and education, called Dixon “a national leader in the battle to protect our children by getting race and gender ideology out of the classroom.”

    Trump’s attack on Whitmer as “sinister” is the latest in a series of rhetorical escalations by the former President. On Friday, he said on his social media website Truth Social that the top Senate Republican, Mitch McConnell, had a “death wish” after Congress approved stopgap funding to avert a government shutdown.

    Dixon, meanwhile, spoke twice Saturday – once before Trump, and again when Trump invited her on stage. As she lambasted Whitmer, the crowd repeated a familiar Trump rally chant, this time directed at Whitmer rather than 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton: “Lock her up.”

    “We’re not going to let our kids be radicalized. We’re not going to let our kids be sexualized. We’re not going to let our law enforcement be demonized. We’re not going to tell our businesses they can’t expand,” Dixon said.

    Dixon, a conservative commentator and first-time candidate, emerged from a crowded primary after receiving the financial support of former Trump education secretary Betsy DeVos’ family. The Michigan GOP megadonors funded a super PAC bolstering Dixon’s campaign. And Trump waded into the race in the closing days of the primary with a Dixon endorsement that came after a handwritten letter from DeVos urged him to back Dixon, as reported by The New York Times.

    “The Dixon campaign is seeking to get its name ID up and MAGA base fully engaged to close the polling gap and that is what they hope to gain from a Trump rally in Macomb County,” said John Sellek, a Republican public relations adviser and head of Harbor Strategic Public Affairs in Lansing.

    However, she has struggled to raise money and gain traction since her August primary victory.

    Democrats on Saturday said Dixon’s comments at the Trump rally were an effort to distract from issues on which her positions are unpopular – particularly abortion rights.

    “Tonight, Michiganders saw a schoolyard bully on stage – not a leader,” Michigan Democratic Party chairwoman Lavora Barnes said in a statement. “Tudor Dixon hurled insults and rattled off a litany of grievances because she knows that her dangerous agenda to ban abortion and throw nurses in jail, dismantle public education, and slash funding for law enforcement is out-of-step.

    “Michigan families deserve a real leader who will work with anyone to get things done, and Tudor Dixon has shown time and again she will continue to divide and pit people against each other if it means she and Betsy DeVos gain political power,” Barnes said.

    Whitmer’s campaign and her supporters have dwarfed Dixon in television advertising spending – and Dixon’s campaign is currently off the air in Michigan, underscoring the reality that major Republican donors have shifted their focus to other races they view as more winnable.

    Since the primary on August 2, Democrats have spent about $17.6 million on ads in the governor’s race, while Republicans have spent just $1.1 million, according to data from the firm AdImpact. And over the next month through election day, Democrats have $23.4 million booked while GOP has just $4.3 million booked.

    Early voting is already underway in Michigan. And in the governor’s race, Whitmer is widely viewed as the favorite by nonpartisan analysts. The race is rated as one that “tilts Democratic” by Inside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzales. The Cook Political Report and University of Virginia Center for Politics director Larry Sabato’s Crystal Ball rate it as “likely Democratic.”

    “The battle has been fought on the Democrats’ terms with millions and millions of dollars, and there’s been essentially no effort to fight back,” Michigan-based Republican strategist John Yob said on the Michigan Information & Research Service Inc.’s “MIRS Monday” podcast this week. “On the Republican side, we’ve never faced this before. And, you know, it doesn’t look very good in terms of a way out unless some serious money gets on TV pretty quickly.”

    The most dominant issue in the governor’s race has been abortion rights in the wake of the Supreme Court’s June decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Michigan’s Republican-led legislature has refused to change a 1931 law that would prohibit abortion in nearly all instances. Whitmer and other pro-abortion rights groups sued to block that law. And a Democratic-backed referendum that would amend Michigan’s constitution to guarantee abortion rights is on November’s ballot in the state.

    Dixon, who opposes abortion except when necessary to protect the life of the mother, has struggled to redirect the race’s focus.

    “You can vote for Gretchen Whitmer’s position without having to vote for Gretchen Whitmer again,” she told reporters last week, explaining that voters could support the referendum but oppose the incumbent governor.

    In an effort to shift the contest’s focus, Dixon’s campaign has borrowed tactics from Republican governors who have won in battleground states in recent years.

    For months, she has focused on parental control of schools’ curriculum, as well as school choice. It’s a message built on that of Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, the Republican whose 2021 victory was an early harbinger of a potentially favorable political landscape for the GOP in this year’s midterm elections.

    “That’s why Gov. Youngkin’s message resonated,” Dixon said in an August interview on Fox News alongside Youngkin, who was campaigning in Michigan.

    “He said, ‘I’m listening to you. I want parents involved. And I’m going to bring you back into the schools,’” Dixon said. “That’s what people want to hear right now.”

    In her latest move to redefine the race, Dixon this week proposed two policies aimed at the LGBTQ community and schools.

    In Lansing on Tuesday, Dixon proposed a policy modeled after the controversial measure Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law earlier this year that critics have dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” law.

    “This act will require school districts to ensure that their schools do not provide classroom instruction on sexual orientation or gender identity in grades K through three, or in any manner that has not age- or developmentally appropriate,” Dixon told reporters, blasting what she called “radical sex and gender instruction.”

    Florida’s HB 1557, the Parental Rights in Education bill, passed earlier this year effectively bans teachers from discussing sexual orientation and gender identity in classrooms for young students. LGBTQ advocates say the measure has led to further stigmatization of gay, lesbian and transgender children, causing more bullying and suicides within an already marginalized community.

    Then, on Wednesday in Grand Rapids, she unveiled her proposal for a “Women’s Sports Fairness Act,” which would ban transgender girls from competing in sports with the gender they identify with.

    “As a mother of four girls, nothing infuriates me more than the prospect of my daughters losing their friends and their teammates, losing opportunities in sports or otherwise, because some radically progressive politicians decided one day that they should have to compete against biological men,” she said. “Gretchen Whitmer has embraced the trans-supremacist ideology, which dictates that individuals who are born as men can be allowed to compete against our daughters.”

    Whitmer’s campaign has largely ignored Dixon’s proposals, and did not respond to a request for comment on them. Instead, Whitmer has in recent days emphasized her economic message and her support for abortion rights.

    Whitmer is leaning into policies enacted by Democrats in Washington in recent months, including the Inflation Reduction Act, which was signed into law by President Joe Biden in August.

    Whitmer in September signed an executive directive capping insulin costs at $35 per month and out-of-pocket costs at $2,000 a year for Medicare recipients.

    And last week, Whitmer announced that student loan borrowers will not be taxed on the debt relief that Biden had ordered.

    What has dominated media coverage of the race in recent days, though, are a series of jokes Dixon has made about the 2020 kidnapping plot against Whitmer.

    A federal jury in August convicted two men of conspiring to kidnap Whitmer at her vacation home in 2020. They were also convicted of one count of conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction after prosecutors detailed their plans to blow up a bridge to prevent police from responding to the kidnapping of the governor. The men now face a maximum sentence of life in prison.

    “The sad thing is that Gretchen will tie your hands, put a gun to your head, and ask if you’re ready to talk,” Dixon said at an event last week in Troy alongside Kellyanne Conway, a former Trump White House aide. “For someone so worried about being kidnapped, Gretchen Whitmer sure is good at taking business hostage and holding it for ransom.”

    After her comment drew backlash, Dixon joked again about the kidnapping plot at a second event Friday, this time with Donald Trump Jr., the son of the former President.

    She told a crowd that, at a stop with President Joe Biden at the Detroit Auto Show last week, Whitmer looked like she’d “rather be kidnapped by the FBI.”

    “Yeah, the media is like, ‘Oh my gosh, she did it again,’” Dixon said, anticipating the reaction to her second reference of the day to the 2020 kidnapping plot.

    As she told the crowd that her earlier remarks about the plot to kidnap Whitmer had been characterized as a joke, Dixon said: “I’m like, ‘No, that wasn’t a joke.’ If you were afraid of that, you should know what it is to have your life ripped away from you.”

    Whitmer’s campaign and Democratic groups condemned Dixon’s remarks Friday.

    “Threats of violence and dangerous rhetoric undermine our democracy and discourage good people on both sides of the aisle at every level from entering public service,” Whitmer campaign spokesperson Maeve Coyle said in a statement.

    “Governor Whitmer has faced serious threats to her safety and her life, and she is grateful to the law enforcement and prosecutors for their tireless work,” Coyle said. “Threats of violence – whether to Governor Whitmer or to candidates and elected officials on the other side of the aisle – are no laughing matter, and the fact that Tudor Dixon thinks it’s a joke shows that she is absolutely unfit to serve in public office.”

    This story has been updated with additional developments.

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  • Namibia can become a green energy exporter, says first lady | CNN Business

    Namibia can become a green energy exporter, says first lady | CNN Business

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    London
    CNN
     — 

    With Europe looking for alternatives to Russian energy, the European Union has set a target to produce 11 million tons of green hydrogen, and import another 11 million tons, by 2030.

    Green hydrogen (hydrogen produced using renewable energy) is being touted as a clean alternative to fossil fuels that could power heavy industry and transport. EU officials said this summer that they hoped to strike a deal to help Namibia develop its green hydrogen sector. The southern African nation is set to open the continent’s first green hydrogen production plant in 2024, operated by French power company HDF Energy.

    Namibia’s first lady, Monica Geingos, has served on policy advisory boards in her country and championed gender equality. CNN’s Melissa Mahtani spoke with Geingos at the UN General Assembly in New York last week, and sent her additional questions by email, about Namibia’s advances in green energy and the role of women in the country’s economic future.

    This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

    Namibia’s first hydrogen power plant is expected to be up and running in 2024, and there’s also a potential plan in place to partner with the EU on green hydrogen. Where do you see sustainable energy in the future of the country’s business landscape?

    Geingos: It is clear that Namibia’s green hydrogen plans extend beyond domestic energy self-sufficiency. It is also about intra-African trade as Namibia has an opportunity to export clean energy into regional power markets. Additionally, there is an opportunity to export clean (energy) to a neighboring country (South Africa) that is also Africa’s largest carbon contributor.

    Namibia has also been identified as a strategic enabler of the European Union’s decarbonization agenda, which facilitates our ability to export energy to Europe. What this means is that Namibia can go beyond the traditional relationship of being an aid recipient to become a strategic trading partner.

    Amongst many other benefits, I am excited about the vibrant economic mobilization that the business sector will benefit from as (Namibia) will be able to deploy its own resources to private-sector investment, which also enables increased risk appetite for sectors that foreign investors traditionally stay away from.

    You were an entrepreneur before becoming first lady. How did that experience prepare you for this role?

    Geingos: My career was in capital markets, corporate finance and private equity so it prepared me well to work under pressure, stand my ground and manage difficult conversations. It also helped me to develop a strong ethics compass which is helpful in navigating gray areas and understanding no-go areas.

    What barriers remain in place when it comes to elevating women to positions of power, especially in business settings?

    Geingos: Namibia’s legislative and policy framework pertaining to gender equality is very progressive. The barriers are unseen and pertain to how women are perceived, spoken about, treated and made to feel when in positions of influence, or when trying to climb the ladder.

    In essence, our mindsets are not as progressive as our laws. While public sector leadership has not reached gender parity, it leads the private sector which still lags far behind in ensuring gender equality. This is an indicator of the gains made in certain sectors but also confirmation of how much work still needs to be done.

    The African Continental Free Trade Area came into effect last year — of which Namibia is a part. How important is it that women take a lead in that, and have a seat at the table when major decisions are being negotiated?

    Geingos: It is of critical importance that women take a seat at any table where consequential decisions are made, as targeting such large opportunities without diverse thinking would be to society’s detriment.

    Women bring differentiated thinking, and capacity to the table. It makes no sense to sit around the table and make major decisions while excluding a portion of your intellectual capital. The easier movement of goods and people to facilitate intra-African trade has risks for women that need to be managed — (for example) human trafficking — but also has significant opportunities. There are bespoke pockets of capital that target women entrepreneurs which can be applied in pursuing expanded market opportunities, which make for exciting times for women entrepreneurs.

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  • ‘No matter the law, no matter the stigma, no matter the cost.’ This European network helps people access abortions | CNN

    ‘No matter the law, no matter the stigma, no matter the cost.’ This European network helps people access abortions | CNN

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    Editor’s Note: This story is part of As Equals, CNN’s ongoing series on gender inequality. For information about how the series is funded and more, check out our FAQs.


    Amsterdam, the Netherlands
    CNN
     — 

    It’s early evening in an affluent neighborhood in the Dutch city of Haarlem and bed and breakfast owners Arnoud and Marika are waiting for their next guest to arrive. They’ve prepared their single room for her, a brightly colored space with massive windows overlooking a leafy drive.

    The traveller is a woman from France. She’s only staying one night, but her hosts want her to feel at home because she’s not here on vacation. She’s come to have a second-trimester abortion.

    The Netherlands is one of just a few countries in Europe where access to abortion is possible past 12 weeks of pregnancy, and Arnoud and Marika’s guest is one of around 3,000 people from abroad who have accessed one annually in recent years.

    Here, abortions for non-Dutch residents can be carried out until 22 weeks, according to Dutch abortion providers, and nationals can access terminations up to 24 weeks.

    In the United Kingdom (with the exception of Northern Ireland), it’s possible for anyone to get an abortion until 24 weeks, and for a very limited set of circumstances afterwards, however Brexit has made it increasingly more difficult for people to travel there. And in Spain, abortions past 14 weeks of pregnancy are only legal under extremely limited circumstances, although abortion rights groups say the law is often interpreted loosely.

    The restrictions mean that, for many in their second trimester, the Netherlands is their last chance to access a safe abortion. By opening up their home, Arnoud and Marika have become part of a grassroots network of people helping to facilitate that access.

    “This is a house without taboos,” Arnoud told CNN. Arnoud and Marika are pseudonyms that CNN agreed to use over concerns that the couple’s B&B – which is also where they live – will be targeted by anti-abortion protesters.

    Now in their 70s, the retired pair have made it their mission to be a welcoming point of entry for the people they host, many of whom they receive bleary eyed from a long day or more of travel, punctuated by weeks of anxiety and stress leading up to the journey.

    “They are so relieved, they have made this terrible journey, and they come in and they’re crying,” Marika said. “I love to be a light for them.”

    Arnoud and Marika look through messages written by their guests in their B&B in Haarlem. Photo: Kara Fox/CNN

    Arnoud and Marika’s guest book. “Thanks for the kind words that cheered me up,” a message from a Polish guest in September reads. Photo: Kara Fox/CNN

    Since they opened their B&B seven years ago, Arnoud and Marika say they have hosted around 350 people seeking abortion care from across Europe. They explain that some came alone, others were joined by partners or friends, while some brought their family.

    At first, the majority of their guests came from France and Germany, where abortion is available until 14 and 12 weeks of pregnancy, respectively. (France extended that time limit from 12 to 14 weeks earlier this year.) They say they have also hosted a number of women from other European countries including Belgium and Luxembourg, and Romania. One woman traveled from as far as the Caribbean island of Martinique, they said.

    But in recent years data shows the demographics have changed, with an influx of people now traveling to the Netherlands from Poland, after the country’s highest court further tightened its abortion laws – which were already among the strictest in Europe.

    The numbers coming to the Netherlands from Poland have swelled further as Ukrainians displaced there due to the war find they need to seek safe abortion access beyond Polish borders.

    In October 2020, Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal banned virtually all abortions, allowing them only in circumstances where the pregnancy was a result of rape or incest, or if the pregnant person’s life was at risk. The law came into effect the following January. Prior to this, abortions were also allowed in the case of fetal abnormalities – which accounted for approximately 97% of all known legal terminations carried out in Poland in 2019, according to data from the Polish Ministry of Health.

    The change in the law has left many people in Poland without legal access to safe terminations in their own country, and has created an even more hostile environment for abortion rights activists and those seeking abortions.

    When asked about the worsening climate for those seeking or providing abortions in Poland, a statement provided to CNN by the Polish government simply reiterated the law, saying: “In the event of a situation that threatens the life or health of a pregnant woman (e.g. suspected infection of the uterine cavity, hemorrhage, etc.) …it is lawful to terminate a pregnancy immediately.”

    “The decision whether there are circumstances in which the pregnancy threatens the life or health of the pregnant woman is and can only be made by a doctor in a specific case,” the statement added.

    But abortion rights activists say the law has created a chilling effect on healthcare providers, with some doctors appearing more fearful of potential repercussions that include prosecution than doing everything they can to save a pregnant person’s life. Three pregnant women have died in Polish hospitals after being denied an abortion since the court decision, according to Abortion Support Network, a UK-based organization that helps people in Poland obtain abortion care as part of the Abortion Without Borders (AWB) network.

    AWB was formed in response to the Polish government’s long standing proposals to ban abortion in 2019.

    The grassroots feminist network is made up of six organizations from Poland, the UK, Germany and the Netherlands. They say the Polish state is failing women and have made it their mission to ensure safe access to abortion for any reason a person chooses to have one – including whether the pregnancy is wanted or not.

    “We don’t want to make you feel like you have to explain yourself, and that you have to earn your abortion with a sob story,” said Polish abortion rights activist Kasia Roszak.

    Kasia Roszak of Abortion Network Amsterdam says the work that she does is

    Roszak, who now lives in Amsterdam where she works with Abortion Network Amsterdam (part of AWB), says she knows exactly how it feels to not have agency over her reproductive rights, which is one of the reasons she works to ensure access for anyone globally who needs it.

    “We believe that abortions are part of life. It can be an empowering, positive experience. And if it’s not, if it’s something hard for you, then we’re going to give you space and validation of your feelings,” Roszak said. “I feel like it’s my responsibility to be able to share with people that there are options.”

    From December 2020 to December 2021, AWB says they helped 32,000 people from Poland access abortions across Europe – an almost six-fold increase from the previous year.

    In 2021, the network says they facilitated travel for 1,186 people in Poland – more than quadruple the number of people they supported with travel in 2020. More than half of those people travelled to the Netherlands, making up 52% of the total they helped to visit the country for abortions that year, according to AWB.

    Official 2021 data from the Dutch government shows 651 people from Poland had abortions in the Netherlands, more than double the number of people in 2020.

    “Effectively, we took over all [of Poland’s] fetal anomaly cases,” said Roszak. Numbers previously hovered around 1,000 cases a year in Poland, according to government data.

    The network gets connected with people who need their help through a process like this: A person with an unwanted pregnancy will first call a hotline in Poland, where they have two options, depending on how far along they are: take pills or travel for a procedure.

    If they are less than 12 weeks pregnant, they are sent the abortion pills mifepristone and misoprostol – approved by the World Health Organization – to take in the privacy of their own home. This is the case for the majority of the people who reach out to them, according to AWB data.

    Mariprist, a safe and effective abortion medication that contains mifepristone and misoprostol, seen at the Women Help Women offices in Amsterdam.

    However, for people whose pregnancies have already passed the 12-week mark, they will likely need to travel to a clinic abroad. This is also the case for those living in other European countries where laws prohibit abortions after the first trimester. For these people, the network taps into its web of volunteers and activists who will work around the clock to arrange appointments at clinics, translate documentation and provide financial assistance to help meet the cost of the procedure and related travel.

    Second trimester abortions may be available in the Netherlands but they are expensive for non-Dutch residents, costing up to 1,100 euros (roughly $1,100) for the surgical procedure which typically takes no longer than 20 minutes. Counselling, preparation for the procedure and recovery however require the better part of a day.

    Depending on each individual circumstance, assistance arrives in many ways and AWB may cover all or part of the costs, which can include flights, accommodation, and handling appointments with the treatment center directly.

    Money is raised mostly from private donations, according to activists within the AWB network, but some of the organizations within it are supported by big donors. Without financial assistance, abortion travel is especially prohibitive for working-class people, migrants and others living in poverty.

    Kinga Jelińska, Executive Director of the Amsterdam-based group Women Help Women – which is also part of AWB – told CNN: “We return abortion back to common people, no matter the law, no matter the stigma, no matter the cost.”

    Kinga Jelińska, Executive Director of Women Help Women, says the network is essentially running a

    Second-trimester abortions constitute a relatively small proportion of the total number of officially recorded abortions in high-income countries. The vast majority are carried out in the first trimester.

    Those seeking second-trimester abortions do so for a number of reasons, including not having previously realized they were pregnant; a change in personal circumstances such as financial difficulties or the breakdown of a relationship; unexpected medical problems in themselves or the fetus, and trauma surrounding rape and sexual abuse cases, which can also be a reason that one might not recognize the pregnancy until it is too late to access an abortion in their country.

    “People sometimes think that it’s a matter of fundamental principles and beliefs. [But]we see day after day, people coming to us and saying… ‘I used to be against abortion, but my situation is different,’ Jelińska explained.”The decision whether to continue the pregnancy or not, is highly contextual.”

    At the Bloemenhove clinic in Haarlem, one of two clinics in the country that offer abortions past 18 weeks, the parking lot looks “like the United Nations,” Roszak quipped, referencing the fact that car registration plates can be seen from all over Europe.

    The clinic, a bright and modern space with a peaceful garden area, treats approximately 15 people a day, 4 days a week, according to its director, Femke van Straaten. But the influx of Polish patients has, van Straaten said, led to a shift in the way that her team works.

    Prior to the Polish court ruling, more than half of the patients at Bloemenhove were Dutch and most came to terminate unwanted pregnancies, van Straaten explained. As such, staff were able to recommend in-country aftercare, including counseling resources.

    Now, with more patients coming to the clinic from Poland with wanted pregnancies (many of whom came for terminations due to fetal abnormalities), they have “different needs for care,” said van Straaten.

    One of the ways the clinic responded was to establish a memorial at a local cemetery for women to find some closure for their unviable pregnancies.

    “They couldn’t take their child back home, and they had no place for their grievance,” said van Straaten, who helped organize the memorial last year at the suggestion of the Polish abortion rights network. She added that memorial services are also available for people carrying viable fetuses who chose to terminate their pregnancies.

    As part of this aftercare, patients can opt for a cremation and are permitted to take the ashes home. For those who can’t wait for cremation, the cemetery offers to scatter the ashes on the site, where a steel tree has been erected and babies’ names are engraved onto a rainbow of leaves that hang on its branches.

    The “Little Stars Meadow,” a memorial space for people to grieve and find closure at the Haarlem cemetery. Photo: Kara Fox/CNN

    Engraved “leaves” on the memorial tree. Van Straaten says her team decided to use the word “stillborns” for the terminated pregnancies – the closest word in English that they could find – to help people who wanted their babies acknowledge their loss and move forward.. Photo: Kara Fox/CNN

    Dr. Elles Garcia, an abortion care provider at Bloemenhove since 2016, works to assuage concerns that some people – particularly those from Poland – have about returning home after their termination.

    “They often ask me the question: ‘What do I tell my gynaecologist? Can I tell them that I had a miscarriage?’ They’re so afraid of getting back to their doctor in their own country and to tell them the truth – they can’t,” she said from one of the clinic’s consultation rooms.

    Garcia said that while she assures patients that medically, their doctors back at home won’t be able to know whether they had a miscarriage or an abortion, she still encourages them to be honest about what they went through, not only for themselves, but in hopes it might start to break down societal taboos.

    “I tell them to say that you were here for an abortion, because here it’s legal – you can tell them the truth,” she said, before acknowledging, “but then they get afraid and anxious.”

    To help people prepare to return to a society where abortion is both restricted and taboo, the AWB Polish helpline has also expanded its remit to provide aftercare, including psychological counseling for those in need.

    Dr. Elles Garcia of the Bloemenhove clinic says she always advises patients from countries where abortion is taboo to talk with each other to reduce the stigma around the subject.

    Back at their B&B, Arnoud and Marika are reflecting on the past several years of providing hospitality to people at a difficult time in their lives.

    Only around a third of their guests stay for two nights, they say, the majority return to their countries of origin straight from the clinic. And so the relationships are fleeting, but the septuagenarians know their impact can be profound. They see their job as being to listen and reassure.

    “People come from the room and ask: ‘Can we talk to each other?’ said Arnoud, explaining that guests often gather around their dining room table or sit in their garden for a chat if they stay the second night.

    The couple say that while they were never planning on becoming a hub for abortion travel when they first decided to open their business, they can’t imagine their B&B in any other way.

    But unlike most business owners, they say they relish the day when their business might go bust.

    “When the law changes in France, like we have in Holland, when the law changes in Poland, like we have here, it will be better – I will sing a song,” Arnoud said.

    He looks to Marika and adds: “Our business is not important. It’s more important that women can decide for themselves … that’s the most important.”

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  • White House seeks to tackle food insecurity at first hunger conference since 1969 | CNN Politics

    White House seeks to tackle food insecurity at first hunger conference since 1969 | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Groceries cost 13.5% more than they did a year ago. Nearly 25 million adults live in households where there isn’t always enough to eat. Some 40% of food banks saw increased demand this summer.

    At a time when the affordability of food is in the spotlight, the Biden administration is hosting a White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Health on Wednesday with the goal of combating food insecurity and diet-related diseases.

    Overall, food insecurity has declined since former President Richard Nixon convened the first and only White House conference on food, nutrition and health in 1969, which led to nationwide expansions of the food stamp and school meals programs and the creation of the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, known as WIC, among other changes. General economic growth and the reduction in poverty have also contributed to the improvements in food security in recent decades.

    However, the Covid-19 pandemic and soaring inflation have increased the attention paid to food insecurity in the US over the past two years. The Biden administration released a 44-page playbook on Tuesday aimed at the “bold goal” of ending hunger by 2030 and increasing healthy eating and physical activity to reduce diet-related diseases.

    Among the key proposals: expand free school meals to 9 million more children by 2032; allow more people to qualify for food stamps; broaden the Summer Expanded Benefit Transfer program to more kids; increase funding for nutrition programs for senior citizens; and improve transportation to and from grocery stores and farmer’s markets, among other initiatives. Many of the efforts would need approval from Congress.

    President Joe Biden announced at the conference more than $8 billion in private and public sector commitments as part of the administration’s call to action.

    “In America, no child, no child should go to bed hungry,” Biden told those gathered at the conference Wednesday. “No parent should die of disease that can be prevented.”

    More than 100 organizations have made commitments, including hospitals and health care associations, tech companies, philanthropies and the food industry.

    At least $2.5 billion will be invested in start-up companies that are focused on solutions to hunger and food insecurity, according to the White House. More than $4 billion will be dedicated toward philanthropic efforts to improve access to nutritious food, promote healthy choices and increase physical activity.

    The President also urged Congress to make permanent the enhancement to the child tax credit, which was only in effect last year. Parents used the additional monthly funds to buy food and basic necessities, which Biden said helped cut child poverty in half and reduced food insecurity for families by 26%.

    Congress has poured billions into special pandemic assistance programs aimed at enabling struggling Americans to have enough food to feed themselves and their families – even as millions of jobs were lost in 2020.

    “That’s why it’s so consequential that at the onset of the Covid-19 recession, the combination of fiscal support to households – whether it is from the economic impact payments, unemployment insurance, refundable tax credits, enhanced SNAP benefits or pandemic EBT – all combined to prevent an increase in food insecurity over the past two years,” said Lauren Bauer, a fellow in economic studies at the Brookings Institution.

    The pandemic aid, particularly a temporary enhancement to the child tax credit, helped keep kids fed last year, Bauer and anti-hunger advocates maintain.

    Food insecurity among children fell in 2021, reversing a spike during the first year of the pandemic, according to a recent US Department of Agriculture report. Some 6.2% of households with children were unable at times to provide adequate, nutritious food for their kids last year, compared with 7.6% in 2020, the report found. Last year’s rate was not significantly different than the 2019 share.

    And the prevalence of food insecurity in the families who have kids dropped to 12.5% last year, the lowest since at least 1998, the earliest year that comparable records exist.

    But elderly Americans living alone and childless households both experienced an increase in food insecurity last year, the report found.

    Overall, the share of households contending with food insecurity remained statistically the same in 2021 as the year before.

    This lack of improvement in general food insecurity despite the surge in federal spending on food stamps, formally known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP, is a red flag for Angela Rachidi, senior fellow in poverty studies at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.

    “When the solution is always ‘let’s just spend more on SNAP or spend more on school lunch or WIC,’ I think that that’s not always the best use of federal dollars,” she said.

    Rachidi would like to see more of an emphasis on nutrition and healthy eating, which are among the pillars of the White House conference.

    “Many more people in the US die from diet-related disease than die from hunger,” she said, noting the health problems caused by obesity, diabetes and other conditions.

    The pandemic aid that helped keep Americans afloat has largely been exhausted, and Congress has shown little appetite to dole out more assistance – even as high inflation is squeezing many families.

    The share of people who say they live in households where there was either sometimes or often not enough to eat in the last seven days has climbed to 11.5%, according to the most recent US Census Bureau Household Pulse Survey conducted in late July and early August.

    That’s up from the 10.2% recorded by the survey in late December and early January, just after the final monthly child tax credit payment was distributed. The share had been even lower in the late summer and early fall of 2021, when the monthly installments were being sent.

    Meanwhile, shopping in the supermarket is taking a bigger bite out of people’s wallets. Egg prices have skyrocketed nearly 40% over the past year, while flour is 23% costlier. Milk and bread are up 17% and 16% respectively, while chicken is nearly 17% more expensive.

    Starting next month, it will be a little easier for those in the food stamp program to afford groceries because the annual inflation adjustment will kick in. Beneficiaries will see an increase in benefits of 12%, or an average of $26 per person, per month. This comes on top of last year’s revision to the Thrifty Food Plan, upon which benefits are based, which raised the average monthly payment by $36 per person.

    Still, the upward march in prices has driven more people to food pantries, which are also struggling to stock the shelves amid higher prices.

    Some 40% of food banks reported seeing an increase in the number of people served in July compared with June, according to a survey conducted by Feeding America, which has more than 60,000 food pantries, meal programs and partner agencies in its network. The average increase was about 10% more people. Another 40% said demand remained about level.

    Many food pantries don’t have the resources to meet this increased demand, said Claire Babineaux-Fontenot, Feeding America’s CEO, noting that she’s seen sites with nearly empty shelves but long lines out the door.

    The network provided 1.4 billion fewer meals in the fiscal year ending June 30 than the year before.

    The USDA announced earlier this month that it will provide nearly $1.5 billion in additional funding for emergency food assistance, which will help alleviate the supply shortages at food banks and pantries.

    However, Feeding America feels more should be done. It recently surveyed nearly 36,000 people for their recommendations to end hunger. Many felt that food stamp benefits should be increased and eligibility should be expanded. Nearly half felt their communities need more food pantries, grocery stores and fresh food.

    The recent infusion of federal funds will help pantries distribute more food, though it doesn’t completely close the gap. And it will take time for the supplies to arrive, Babineaux-Fontenot said.

    “Today, people are going to be looking for ways to feed themselves and their family, and there will be scarce resources for them to do that,” she said.

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