ReportWire

Tag: vandalism

  • French rioting appears to slow on 6th night after teen’s death in Paris suburbs

    French rioting appears to slow on 6th night after teen’s death in Paris suburbs

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    Unrest across France sparked by the police shooting of a 17-year-old appeared to slow on its sixth night, but still public buildings, cars and municipal trash cans were targeted nationwide by fires and vandalism overnight into Monday

    Police officers patrol on the Champs Elysees in Paris, Saturday, July 1, 2023. President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday scrapped an official trip to Germany after a fourth straight night of rioting and looting across France in defiance of a massive police deployment. Hundreds turned out for the burial of the 17-year-old whose killing by police triggered the unrest. (AP Photo/Christophe Ena)

    The Associated Press

    PARIS — PARIS (AP) — Unrest across France sparked by the police shooting of a 17-year-old appeared to slow on its sixth night, but still public buildings, cars and municipal trash cans were targeted nationwide by fires and vandalism overnight into Monday.

    In all, according to the Interior Ministry, there were 157 arrests overnight, out of a total of 3,354 arrests in all since June 27, and two law enforcement stations were attacked, among other damage.

    Around 45,000 officers were deployed nationwide to counter violence fuelled by anger over discrimination against people who trace their roots to former French colonies and live in low-income neighborhoods. Nahel, the teenager killed last Tuesday, was of Algerian descent and was shot in the Paris suburb of Nanterre.

    Across France, 297 vehicles were torched overnight along with 34 buildings.

    A 24-year-old firefighter died of a heart attack while responding to a blaze in an underground garage that spread to the apartment building above, according to a statement from Paris police. The cause of the fire was under investigation, the statement said.

    A burning car stuck the home of the mayor of the Paris suburb L’Hay-les-Roses over the weekend, an unusually personal attack amid the backdrop of fires and vandalism targeting police stations and town halls.

    French President Emmanuel Macron has blamed social media for the spread of the unrest and called on parents to take responsibility for their teenagers. Eric Dupond-Moretti, the justice minister, told France Inter radio that parents who abdicated that responsibility “either through disinterest or deliberately” would be prosecuted.

    He was cautious when asked whether he thought the protests had eased definitively.

    Mayor Vincent Jeanbrun said his wife and one of his children were injured and criticized the government for doing too little, too late — and said blaming social media or parents was papering over a bigger problem.

    “The base ingredients are still there. For several years now, all summer long, explosives go off that keep people from sleeping, that make them crazy,” he told BFM television on Monday. “We are powerless summer after summer.”

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  • Pride flags vandalized at Stonewall National Monument in New York | CNN

    Pride flags vandalized at Stonewall National Monument in New York | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The New York Police Department is investigating “a criminal mischief pattern” of vandalism against Pride and transgender flags at the Stonewall National Monument during Pride month, it said in a statement.

    The police department said its Hate Crime Task Force is investigating three incidents, which occurred June 10, June 15 and June 20.

    According to police, individual or individuals were seen removing Pride flags that were displayed on the fence of the monument. In two of the incidents, the flags were also broken, the statement said.

    There were no injuries as a result of the alleged crimes, and it’s not clear from the statement released Monday if the same person or people were involved.

    Earlier this month, the NYPD tweeted a photo of individuals it said were “wanted for criminal mischief” in connection to the June 10 incident and asked for public assistance.

    President Barack Obama in 2016 designated the area around the Stonewall Inn, the site of the 1969 Stonewall uprising, as the country’s first national monument to honor the LGBTQ+ community.

    The uprising occurred when a police raid of the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar, turned violent after patrons fought back. The incident led to the first march for gay and lesbian rights.

    The Stonewall National Monument includes Christopher Park, the Stonewall Inn and the surrounding streets and sidewalks where the uprising occurred.

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  • Men charged with vandalizing homes of New Hampshire journalists

    Men charged with vandalizing homes of New Hampshire journalists

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    CONCORD, N.H. — Three men face federal charges alleging they vandalized multiple homes associated with New Hampshire journalists in retaliation for a report detailing sexual misconduct allegations against a prominent businessman.

    Tucker Cockerline, 32, of Salem; Michael Waselchuck, 35, of Seabrook; and Keenan Saniatan, 36, of Nashua, were charged with conspiring to commit stalking through interstate travel, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts said Friday.

    “Freedom of the press is a cornerstone of any health democracy and these three men are now accused of infringing on that freedom by conspiring to harass and intimidate two New Hampshire journalists who were simply doing their jobs,” said Christopher DiMenna, acting special agent in charge of the Boston FBI office.

    The targets were a New Hampshire Public Radio reporter and editor. In six incidents in April and May 2022, their homes and the home of the reporter’s parents were hit with bricks, rocks and red spray paint. In one incident, a brick was thrown through the reporter’s window and the phrase “JUST THE BEGINNING!” was spray-painted on the front of her home.

    The vandalism came after NHPR published an investigation into Eric Spofford, the founder of the state’s largest network of addiction rehabilitation centers. Spofford, who is suing the radio station, has denied the sexual misconduct allegations and said he had nothing to do with the vandalism.

    Federal prosecutors, however, allege that a “close, personal associate” of Spofford’s solicited two of the three men to vandalize the homes, and that one of them recruited the third. In court documents, investigators don’t identify either Spofford or the associate by name but say cell phone and other records show they were in regular contact around the time of the vandalism, and that the associate also contacted Cockerline and Saniatan.

    Investigators also said they used cellular phone location data and internet search histories to determine that the men searched for the relevant addresses and were near the homes at the time of the vandalism.

    Cockerline and Waselchuck were arrested Friday and detained following an initial court appearance. Their attorneys declined to comment. Saniatan remains at large.

    Neither Spofford nor his attorney responded to emails seeking comment.

    Jim Schacter, president and CEO of NHPR, said in an email that everyone at the station is grateful for law enforcement’s persistence and trusts that the perpetrators will be held accountable.

    “Journalists doing their jobs — reporting open-mindedly in the public interest – should not have to worry about threats of violence or attacks on their homes and their families,” he said. “That’s true for NHPR’s staff, and for journalists everywhere.”

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  • Chinese man arrested over anti-US graffiti at US Consulate in Hong Kong, police say

    Chinese man arrested over anti-US graffiti at US Consulate in Hong Kong, police say

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    Hong Kong police have arrested a man who allegedly spray-painted graffiti on the wall and gate of the U.S. Consulate

    ByZEN SOO Associated Press

    Security guards stand outside the Consulate General of the United States after it was vandalized with graffiti in Hong Kong, Tuesday, June 13, 2023. Hong Kong police on Tuesday arrested a man who allegedly spray-painted graffiti on the wall and gate of the U.S. consulate, according to media reports and the police. (AP Photo/Louise Delmotte)

    The Associated Press

    HONG KONG — Hong Kong police on Tuesday arrested a man who allegedly spray-painted graffiti on the wall and gate of the U.S. Consulate, according to media reports and the police.

    Photos from local media including the South China Morning Post showed the English word “hegemony” and the Chinese words for “double standards” painted in white on the gate and a nearby wall.

    The vandalism comes amid a deterioration in US-Chinese relations as the nations clash over trade issues and tensions over Taiwan, a self-governed island that China claims is part of its territory.

    Police said that they received a report at 5.22 a.m. from the consulate reporting the vandalism. They arrested a 47-year-old man surnamed Wen from mainland China on suspicion of criminal damage.

    Offenders found guilty of destroying or damaging property could face a maximum penalty of 10 years in jail.

    The consulate did not immediately comment when contacted by The Associated Press.

    The graffiti was removed by late Tuesday morning.

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  • Man charged with setting fire to Minneapolis mosque

    Man charged with setting fire to Minneapolis mosque

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    MINNEAPOLIS — A man suspected of setting fires to Minneapolis mosques and vandalizing the office of U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar was indicted Thursday on federal charges of arson and damage to religious property.

    Jackie Rahm Little, 36, was indicted by a federal grand jury for an April 24 fire at the Masjid Al-Rahma mosque. Authorities are also investigating him as a suspect in a fire that damaged the Masjid Omar Islamic Center inside a Somali shopping mall on April 23, as well as in the January vandalism of U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar’s office and of a Somali American police officer’s vehicle, U.S. Attorney Andrew Luger said at a news conference.

    “The freedom to worship is sacrosanct. We will respond to any attack on any house of worship with urgency and determination,” said Luger, who noted that the charge accusing Little of damaging religious property is a civil rights violation.

    Little pleaded not guilty at a brief hearing Thursday, where his attorney said he may seek an evaluation of his client’s mental competency. Hennepin County court records show that Little had been committed as mentally ill three times in 2021 and 2022 but had been free recently on a provisional discharge that was formally revoked last Friday.

    Little was arrested Saturday on a state charge of second-degree arson in the April 24 fire, which had prompted the evacuation of about 40 children from a day care at the Masjid Al-Rahma mosque.

    Little’s mother told investigators she recognized her son in video surveillance photos from the arsons and vandalism, according to an affidavit filed in support of the federal criminal complaint. She also said she strongly suspected that Little was involved in several unreported arsons.

    According to the affidavit, surveillance video captured Little entering the Masjid Al-Rahma mosque minutes before the fire.

    Investigators later found cardboard, seven metal canisters designed to hold olive oil, and an odor consistent with gasoline in the third-floor hallway of the mosque, the affidavit said. The hallway and stairwells on both ends were damaged.

    A day earlier, Little lit a cardboard box on fire in a second-floor bathroom stall of the Masjid Omar Islamic Center inside the 24 Somali Mall, the court filing said. An employee interrupted Little and chased him out of the building, the document said.

    Little’s mother also told law enforcement officials that while her son was living in transitional housing, he “extensively harassed a Muslim female.” That included sending the woman a photo of the Quran in a toilet, according to the affidavit.

    State Sen. Zaynab Mohamed, of Minneapolis, a Muslim and Somali, said people in the community have been frightened that the person who lit the fires would come back or try to attack other mosques.

    “It’s alarming. It’s scary for the community,” she said.

    She is pursuing legislation to expand data collection on hate crimes that she hopes will address the issue. Instead of leaving it solely to law enforcement to report data on bias crimes, the legislation would direct the state Department of Human Rights to also collect data from community organizations, school districts and individuals who might not report such incidents to law enforcement. The provision is part of a broad public safety budget proposal being considered by the Legislature.

    ___

    Trisha Ahmed is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues. Follow Trisha Ahmed on Twitter: @TrishaAhmed15

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  • A Black teen’s murder sparked a crisis over racism in British policing. Thirty years on, little has changed | CNN

    A Black teen’s murder sparked a crisis over racism in British policing. Thirty years on, little has changed | CNN

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    London
    CNN
     — 

    Neville Lawrence sometimes imagines walking through London and looking at buildings his son Stephen might have worked on, had he lived long enough to fulfill his dream of becoming an architect. The closest he ever got to that was building a miniature.

    “He did his work experience with an architect and he built a model of a building down in Deptford. So, every time I pass Deptford and see the building, it reminds me of him,” Lawrence told CNN, referring to a neighborhood in southeast London. It’s been 30 years, but he still gets emotional speaking about Stephen.

    Stephen Lawrence was murdered when he was just 18 years old in a racially motivated attack on April 22, 1993. His killing and the subsequent failure of the London Metropolitan Police Service to properly investigate the crime sparked a national outcry. It culminated in a landmark official inquiry that concluded the force was institutionally racist.

    But despite decades of promises, reviews and reforms, a new government report published last month, just four weeks before the 30th anniversary of Stephen’s murder, reached the same conclusion. The Met is still institutionally racist.

    Raju Bhatt, a civil liberties lawyer who has dedicated his career to representing people making claims of wrongful conduct against the police, said nothing in the new report – the Baroness Casey Review – came as a surprise.

    “What our clients see is a machinery which just doesn’t want to hear what they have to say and as a result, what happens is a failure to address the cultural problems, that culture of impunity, which arises when police officers know that they won’t be brought to account – when [they] know that whatever they do, their managers will be there to back them up, or, at the very least, their managers will look away,” he said.

    The Met Police chief Mark Rowley has acknowledged “systemic” problems in the force but has so far declined to use the word “institutional.”

    Protesters demonstrate outside the Lawrence inquiry in south London in June 1998.

    For Bhatt, the Casey report was just the latest development in a familiar cycle of events that began when he graduated from university in 1981.

    That summer, racial tensions in Britain boiled over and sparked violent clashes between mostly Black protesters and the police, in south London’s Brixton neighborhood and elsewhere. Bhatt worked as a community volunteer, helping people who were arrested during the protests.

    An official government inquiry into the riots and the police response concluded there was an “urgent need for changes in training and law enforcement and the recruitment of more ethnic minorities into the police force.” It also found that there was “evidence of harassment of minorities by some policemen.”

    Stephen Lawrence was murdered 12 years after the Brixton riots. Within days of his killing at a bus stop in southeast London, five White teens were identified as being involved. They were arrested, but none was successfully prosecuted at the time.

    It took years of campaigning by the Lawrence family — and public support from the likes of Nelson Mandela and the national press — to get the investigation moving. A 1997 inquest into Lawrence’s death found that he was unlawfully killed in a “completely unprovoked racist attack by five white youths.”

    A wave of protests forced the then-government to commission an inquiry into the murder and the Met’s handling of it, which concluded in 1999 that “professional incompetence, institutional racism and failure of leadership by senior officers” was to be blamed for the botched investigation.

    The review, known as the Macpherson report, made 70 recommendations on how to improve the police force and increase the public’s trust in the force. They included recruiting more Black and other minority ethnic officers to make sure the force reflects the communities it serves, taking steps to tackle disparities in the use of police powers against people from minority groups and developing specific guidelines on how to investigate and tackle racist crimes.

    The Macpherson report was damning, but like the Brixton riots review, it failed to result in lasting and substantive reform of the Met Police.

    As a Black man who grew up in 70s and 80s Britain, Leslie Thomas says he knows what it’s like to be on the receiving end of police racism. He recounts how he has been racially profiled and stopped and searched by officers several times in the past, including once when he was driving with his wife and baby in the back of his car and once when he was just 14 years old.

    “I was 14, in school uniform, coming home from school and a police van pulls up alongside me. Four officers jump out [and say] ‘you look suspicious’,” he said.

    Like Bhatt, Thomas is a lawyer who has spent decades representing people in claims against the police and other public authorities. And, just like Bhatt, he has little faith that the latest report will lead to much change.

    “Here’s the thing. You can’t hit a target unless you acknowledge the target itself. The Metropolitan Police have said, ‘oh, we want to be a more inclusive organization,’ but steadfastly, they refuse to acknowledge through their leadership that they’ve got a problem with institutional racism,” Thomas said.

    “If it were just a few bad apples, then you wouldn’t expect, as we have seen, repetition after repetition, generation after generation,” he added.

    The Met has not yet responded to CNN’s request for comment. But speaking to the London Assembly Police and Crime Committee last month, Rowley refused to label the Met Police “institutionally” racist, saying the word “institutional” is ambiguous and politicized.

    In a statement released when the Casey report was published, Rowley said it “must be a catalyst for police reform” and “needs to lead to meaningful change.” He added: “I want us to be anti-racist, anti-misogynist and anti-homophobic. In fact, I want us to be anti-discrimination of all kinds.”

    Thomas specializes in representing families of people who have died in police custody – an issue that disproportionately affects people of color.

    Black people in the UK are seven times more likely to die from police restraint than White people, according to statistics compiled by Inquest, a charity that focuses on deaths in police and prison custody, immigration detention, mental health settings and other state settings.

    stephen lawrence file polglase

    The legacy of Stephen Lawrence’s murder, 30 years later

    At a protest in London, Marcia Rigg embraces Carole Duggan, whose nephew Mark Duggan was shot dead by the police in 2011.

    Thomas represented the family of Sean Rigg, who died in 2008 after being pinned down in a police arrest while experiencing a mental health crisis. While an initial investigation by then-police watchdog the Independent Police Complaints Commission cleared the police of any wrongdoing, the Rigg family kept fighting.

    In 2012, an inquest jury found that Rigg died of cardiac arrest after being restrained in a prone position for approximately eight minutes and said the level and length of restraint used by the police was “unsuitable” and “unnecessary” and that this “more than minimally” contributed to his death.

    In light of the findings, the police watchdog re-examined the case. But a police misconduct panel cleared five officers of gross misconduct in connection to Rigg’s death in 2019. One of those officers had earlier been acquitted of perjury relating to his account of events on the night Rigg died.

    Marcia Rigg, Sean’s sister, is still fighting. She and her family have spent years watching CCTV footage of Sean’s last moments, trying to piece together what really happened. The process has been deeply upsetting and it hasn’t, so far, led to the justice she wants for her brother.

    “It was four years before we had an inquest. And basically myself and my family, particularly me and my brother Wade, we had to become investigators ourselves … to see your loved one being treated in that way by officers that should be helping us. It’s traumatizing, it makes you angry,” she told CNN.

    Rigg said she still dreads the police. “I hate the sound of (the sirens), I hate the sight of the uniform, what it represents.”

    The death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May 2020 brought back all of the trauma for Rigg. Like Sean, Floyd was held face down by police in a prone position. Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin kneeled on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes and was ultimately found guilty of murdering him.

    But it also made her even more determined to fight. “When George Floyd died, and everybody witnessed that murder, (British politicians) were on the side of the people, (saying) that this can’t happen. I said, well, they need to look in their own backyard,” she said.

    A protester holds a picture of Sean Rigg during a 2021 demonstration in London.

    Deborah Coles, Inquest’s executive director, said the struggles of the Lawrences and the Riggs to get justice for their loved ones mirror the experiences of nearly everyone she’s worked with.

    She said the “cultures of denial and defensiveness and delay” within official government agencies, as well as victim blaming and the tendency to demonize the victim’s family and community, add to families’ suffering in such cases, as does “this ongoing institutional denial about the fact that institutional racism is a live and enduring issue.”

    Successive governments and police chiefs have dismissed the severity of the issue, she told CNN. “We’ve always said that one of the problems is that when it comes to looking at deaths (in custody), they see them as isolated incidents, rather than being evidence of a systemic, enduring issue. This is a systemic issue across police forces.”

    The UK’s largest police force commissioned the latest independent inquiry in 2021, after a serving Metropolitan Police officer was convicted of the kidnapping, raping and murdering Sarah Everard, a 33-year-old London woman. The eventual Casey report was damning, finding the Met not just institutionally racist, but also institutionally misogynistic, sexist and homophobic.

    According to a separate parliamentary report published last year, Black people are more than nine-and-a-half times more likely to be stopped and searched than White people, even though the vast majority of “stop and search” actions don’t result in any further action.

    The Met is still overwhelmingly White, with only 17% of officers identifying themselves as non-White in 2022, despite the city they police being far more diverse.

    While that is more than the 3% figure recorded in the early 2000s, it is still well below its own targets and not at all reflective of the communities the police serve.

    “We see time and again critical reviews, inquiries, inquest findings, coroner’s recommendations, a whole wealth of potentially lifesaving recommendations, but also very critical recommendations about structural changes needed. And yet there is no enforcement of those recommendations,” Coles said.

    Inquest and other organizations are calling for a new oversight mechanism that would follow up and report on whether correct actions have been taken in response to the numerous inquiries, she added.

    Neville Lawrence, speaking to CNN, says the family has had to fight for justice itself.

    As the Lawrence family and their supporters mark the 30th anniversary of Stephen’s killing, they are still fighting for his killers to face justice.

    It wasn’t until 2012, 19 years after the murder, that two of the five attackers – Gary Dobson and David Norris – were finally convicted and sent to prison. It took a change in law that allowed for a retrial in cases where new evidence is found.

    To date, the other three people allegedly involved in the killing have not been brought to justice.

    Neville Lawrence remains determined to keep fighting – although he said that the publication of the Casey report has made it clear to him, once again, that the family is on its own in this.

    “If you want justice, you have to try and fight for it yourself, you don’t have anybody who is going to be doing it the way they should be doing it,” he said.

    After years of being consumed by grief and anger, Lawrence decided to move back to Jamaica, where his son is buried. “I accept the situation where I had to leave this place so I can have some peace,” he told CNN.

    “I couldn’t even bury my son here because of the vandalism that would have taken place. The amount of times that they vandalized the (memorial) plaque where he fell, that they had to put a camera on it to stop people going there and desecrating it … so just imagine Stephen, if he was here, what they would have done,” he said.

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  • Vandals attack French politician’s office over pensions row

    Vandals attack French politician’s office over pensions row

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    Protesters have vandalized the Nice office of the president of the Republicans party in an apparent threat to get his right-wing party to vote to block President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reform

    PARIS — Protesters have vandalized the Nice office of the president of the Republicans party in an apparent threat to get his right-wing party to vote to block President Emmanuel Macron’s pension reform.

    Eric Ciotti tweeted a photo of his office in the French Riviera city with shattered windows, after a paving stone was thrown at it overnight into Sunday. The vandals also scrawled the words “the motion or the stone” — in reference to the motions of censure against the pension reform that will be voted on Monday in the National Assembly in Paris.

    Amid weeks of mass protests over Macron’s plan to raise the retirement age from 62 to 64, Macron last week ordered Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne to invoke a special constitutional power to skirt a vote in the lower chamber of parliament. In response, lawmakers at both ends of the political spectrum filed no-confidence motions against her Cabinet on Friday.

    Ciotti had announced his party would not vote for either of the two motions of censure — meaning there would not be enough votes to stop the law.

    Reacting to the vandals, Ciotti tweeted: “I will never give in to the new disciples of terror.”

    Getting a no-confidence motion to pass will be challenging — none has succeeded since 1962, and Macron’s centrist alliance still has the most seats in the National Assembly. A minority of conservatives could stray from the Republicans party line, but it remains to be seen whether they’re willing to bring down Macron’s government.

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  • Fact check: Trump delivers wildly dishonest speech at CPAC | CNN Politics

    Fact check: Trump delivers wildly dishonest speech at CPAC | CNN Politics

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    Washington
    CNN
     — 

    As president, Donald Trump made some of his most thoroughly dishonest speeches at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference.

    As he embarks on another campaign for the presidency, Trump delivered another CPAC doozy Saturday night.

    Trump’s lengthy address to the right-wing gathering in Maryland was filled with wildly inaccurate claims about his own presidency, Joe Biden’s presidency, foreign affairs, crime, elections and other subjects.

    Here is a fact check of 23 of the false claims Trump made. (And that’s far from the total.)

    Crime in Manhattan

    While Trump criticized Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, who has been investigating Trump’s company, he claimed that “killings are taking place at a number like nobody’s ever seen, right in Manhattan.”

    Facts First: It isn’t even close to true that Manhattan is experiencing a number of killings that nobody has ever seen. The region classified by the New York Police Department as Manhattan North had 43 reported murders in 2022; that region had 379 reported murders in 1990 and 306 murders in 1993. The Manhattan South region had 35 reported murders in 2022 versus 124 reported murders in 1990 and 86 murders in 1993. New York City as a whole is also nowhere near record homicide levels; the city had 438 reported murders in 2022 versus 2,262 in 1990 and 1,927 in 1993.

    Manhattan North had just eight reported murders this year through February 19, while Manhattan South had one. The city as a whole had 49 reported murders.

    The National Guard and Minnesota

    Talking about rioting amid racial justice protests after the police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020, Trump claimed he had been ready to send in the National Guard in Seattle, then added, “We saved Minneapolis. The thing is, we’re not supposed to do that. Because it’s up to the governor, the Democrat governor. They never want any help. They don’t mind – it’s almost like they don’t mind to have their cities and states destroyed. There’s something wrong with these people.”

    Facts First: This is a reversal of reality. Minnesota’s Democratic governor, Tim Walz, not Trump, was the one who deployed the Minnesota National Guard during the 2020 unrest; Walz first activated the Guard more than seven hours before Trump publicly threatened to deploy the Guard himself. Walz’s office told CNN in 2020 that the governor activated the Guard in response to requests from officials in Minneapolis and St. Paul – cities also run by Democrats.

    Trump has repeatedly made the false claim that he was the one who sent the Guard to Minneapolis. You can read a longer fact check, from 2020, here.

    Trump’s executive order on monuments

    Trump boasted that he had taken effective action as president to stop the destruction of statues and memorials. He claimed: “I passed and signed an executive order. Anybody that does that gets 10 years in jail, with no negotiation – it’s not ’10’ but it turns into three months.” He added: “But we passed it. It was a very old law, and we found it – one of my very good legal people along with [adviser] Stephen Miller, they found it. They said, ‘Sir, I don’t know if you want to try and bring this back.’ I said. ‘I do.’”

    Facts First: Trump’s claim is false. He did not create a mandatory 10-year sentence for people who damage monuments. In fact, his 2020 executive order did not mandate any increase in sentences.

    Rather, the executive order simply directed the attorney general to “prioritize” investigations and prosecutions of monument-destruction cases and declared that it is federal policy to prosecute such cases to the fullest extent permitted under existing law, including an existing law that allowed a sentence of up to 10 years in prison for willfully damaging federal property. The executive order did nothing to force judges to impose a 10-year sentence.

    Vandalism in Portland

    Trump claimed, “How’s Portland doing? They don’t even have storefronts anymore. Everything’s two-by-four’s because they get burned down every week.”

    Facts First: This is a major exaggeration. Portland obviously still has hundreds of active storefronts, though it has struggled with downtown commercial vacancies for various reasons, and some businesses are sometimes vandalized by protesters. Trump has for years exaggerated the extent of property damage from protest vandalism in Portland.

    Russian expansionism

    Boasting of his foreign policy record, Trump claimed, “I was also the only president where Russia didn’t take over a country during my term.”

    Facts First: While it’s true that Russia didn’t take over a country during Trump’s term, it’s not true that he was the only US president under whom Russia didn’t take over a country. “Totally false,” Michael Khodarkovsky, a Loyola University Chicago history professor who is an expert on Russian imperialism, said in an email. “If by Russia he means the current Russian Federation that existed since 1991, then the best example is Clinton, 1992-98. During this time Russia fought a war in Chechnya, but Chechnya was not a country but one of Russia’s regions.”

    Khodarkovsky added, “If by Russia he means the USSR, as people often do, then from 1945, when the USSR occupied much of Eastern Europe until 1979, when USSR invaded Afghanistan, Moscow did not take over any new country. It only sent forces into countries it had taken over in 1945 (Hungary 1956, Czechoslovakia 1968).”

    NATO funding

    Trump said while talking about NATO funding: “And I told delinquent foreign nations – they were delinquent, they weren’t paying their bills – that if they wanted our protection, they had to pay up, and they had to pay up now.”

    Facts First: It’s not true that NATO countries weren’t paying “bills” until Trump came along or that they were “delinquent” in the sense of failing to pay bills – as numerous fact-checkers pointed out when Trump repeatedly used such language during his presidency. NATO members haven’t been failing to pay their share of the organization’s common budget to run the organization. And while it’s true that most NATO countries were not (and still are not) meeting NATO’s target of each country spending a minimum of 2% of gross domestic product on defense, that 2% figure is what NATO calls a “guideline”; it is not some sort of binding contract, and it does not create liabilities. An official NATO recommitment to the 2% guideline in 2014 merely said that members not currently at that level would “aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade.”

    NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg did credit Trump for securing increases in European NATO members’ defense spending, but it’s worth noting that those countries’ spending had also increased in the last two years of the Obama administration following Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea and the recommitment that year to the 2% guideline. NATO notes on its website that 2022 was “the eighth consecutive year of rising defence spending across European Allies and Canada.”

    NATO’s existence

    Boasting of how he had secured additional funding for NATO from countries, Trump claimed, “Actually, NATO wouldn’t even exist if I didn’t get them to pay up.”

    Facts First: This is nonsense.

    There was never any indication that NATO, created in 1949, would have ceased to exist in the early 2020s without additional funding from some members. The alliance was stable even with many members not meeting the alliance’s guideline of having members spend 2% of their gross domestic product on defense.

    We don’t often fact-check claims about what might have happened in an alternative scenario, but this Trump claim has no basis in reality. “The quote doesn’t make sense, obviously,” said Erwan Lagadec, research professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs and an expert on NATO.

    Lagadec noted that NATO has had no trouble getting allies to cover the roughly $3 billion in annual “direct” funding for the organization, which is “peanuts” to this group of countries. And he said that the only NATO member that had given “any sign” in recent years that it was thinking about leaving the alliance “was … the US, under Trump.” Lagadec added that the US leaving the alliance is one scenario that could realistically kill it, but that clearly wasn’t what Trump was talking about in his remarks on spending levels.

    James Goldgeier, an American University professor of international relations and Brookings Institution visiting fellow, said in an email: “NATO was founded in 1949, so it seems very clear that Donald Trump had nothing to do with its existence. In fact, the worry was that he would pull the US out of NATO, as his national security adviser warned he would do if he had been reelected.”

    The cost of NATO’s headquarters

    Trump mocked NATO’s headquarters, saying, “They spent – an office building that cost $3 billion. It’s like a skyscraper in Manhattan laid on its side. It’s one of the longest buildings I’ve ever seen. And I said, ‘You should have – instead of spending $3 billion, you should have spent $500 million building the greatest bunker you’ve ever seen. Because Russia didn’t – wouldn’t even need an airplane attack. One tank one shot through that beautiful glass building and it’s gone.’”

    Facts First: NATO did spend a lot of money on its headquarters in Belgium, but Trump’s “$3 billion” figure is a major exaggeration. When Trump used the same inaccurate figure in early 2020, NATO told CNN that the headquarters was actually constructed for a sum under the approved budget of about $1.18 billion euro, which is about $1.3 billion at exchange rates as of Sunday morning.

    The Pulitzer Prize

    Trump made his usual argument that The Washington Post and The New York Times should not have won a prestigious journalism award, a 2018 Pulitzer Prize, for their reporting on Russian interference in the 2016 election and its connections to Trump’s team. He then said, “And they were exactly wrong. And now they’ve even admitted that it was a hoax. It was a total hoax, and they got the prize.”

    Facts First: The Times and Post have not made any sort of “hoax” admission. “The claim is completely false,” Times spokesperson Charlie Stadtlander said in an email on Sunday.

    Stadtlander continued: “When our Pulitzer Prize shared with The Washington Post was challenged by the former President, the award was upheld by the Pulitzer Prize Board after an independent review. The board stated that ‘no passages or headlines, contentions or assertions in any of the winning submissions were discredited by facts that emerged subsequent to the conferral of the prizes.’ The Times’s reporting was also substantiated by the Mueller investigation and Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee investigation into the matter.”

    The Post referred CNN to that same July statement from the Pulitzer Prize Board.

    Awareness of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline

    Trump claimed of his opposition to Russia’s Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline to Germany: “Nord Stream 2 – Nobody ever heard of it … right? Nobody ever heard of Nord Stream 2 until I came along. I started talking about Nord Stream 2. I had to go call it ‘the pipeline’ because nobody knew what I was talking about.”

    Facts First: This is standard Trump hyperbole; it’s just not true that “nobody” had heard of Nord Stream 2 before he began discussing it. Nord Stream 2 was a regular subject of media, government and diplomatic discussion before Trump took office. In fact, Biden publicly criticized it as vice president in 2016. Trump may well have generated increased US awareness to the controversial project, but “nobody ever heard of Nord Stream 2 until I came along” isn’t true.

    Trump and Nord Stream 2

    Trump claimed, “I got along very well with Putin even though I’m the one that ended his pipeline. Remember they said, ‘Trump is giving a lot to Russia.’ Really? Putin actually said to me, ‘If you’re my friend, I’d hate like hell to see you as my enemy.’ Because I ended the pipeline, right? Do you remember? Nord Stream 2.” He continued, “I ended it. It was dead.”

    Facts First: Trump did not kill Nord Stream 2. While he did approve sanctions on companies working on the project, that move came nearly three years into his presidency, when the pipeline was already around an estimated 90% complete – and the state-owned Russian gas company behind the project said shortly after the sanctions that it would complete the pipeline itself. The company announced in December 2020 that construction was resuming. And with days left in Trump’s term in January 2021, Germany announced that it had renewed permission for construction in its waters.

    The pipeline never began operations; Germany ended up halting the project as Russia was about to invade Ukraine early last year. The pipeline was damaged later in the year in what has been described as an act of sabotage.

    The Obama administration and Ukraine

    Trump claimed that while he provided lethal assistance to Ukraine, the Obama administration “didn’t want to get involved” and merely “supplied the bedsheets.” He said, “Do you remember? They supplied the bedsheets. And maybe even some pillows from [pillow businessman] Mike [Lindell], who’s sitting right over here. … But they supplied the bedsheets.”

    Facts First: This is inaccurate. While it’s true that the Obama administration declined to provide weapons to Ukraine, it provided more than $600 million in security assistance to Ukraine between 2014 and 2016 that involved far more than bedsheets. The aid included counter-artillery and counter-mortar radars, armored Humvees, tactical drones, night vision devices and medical supplies.

    Biden and a Ukrainian prosecutor

    Trump claimed that Biden, as vice president, held back a billion dollars from Ukraine until the country fired a prosecutor who was “after Hunter” and a company that was paying him. Trump was referring to Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son, who sat on the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma Holdings.

    Facts First: This is baseless. There has never been any evidence that Hunter Biden was under investigation by the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, who had been widely faulted by Ukrainian anti-corruption activists and European countries for failing to investigate corruption. A former Ukrainian deputy prosecutor and a top anti-corruption activist have both said the Burisma-related investigation was dormant at the time Joe Biden pressured Ukraine to fire Shokin.

    Daria Kaleniuk, executive director of Ukraine’s Anti-Corruption Action Center, told The Washington Post in 2019: “Shokin was not investigating. He didn’t want to investigate Burisma. And Shokin was fired not because he wanted to do that investigation, but quite to the contrary, because he failed that investigation.” In addition, Shokin’s successor as prosecutor general, Yuriy Lutsenko, told Bloomberg in 2019: “Hunter Biden did not violate any Ukrainian laws – at least as of now, we do not see any wrongdoing.”

    Biden, as vice president, was carrying out the policy of the US and its allies, not pursuing his own agenda, in threatening to withhold a billion-dollar US loan guarantee if the Ukrainian government did not sack Shokin. CNN fact-checked Trump’s claims on this subject at length in 2019.

    Trump and job creation

    Promising to save Americans’ jobs if he is elected again, Trump claimed, “We had the greatest job history of any president ever.”

    Facts First: This is false. The US lost about 2.7 million jobs during Trump’s presidency, the worst overall jobs record for any president. The net loss was largely because of the Covid-19 pandemic, but even Trump’s pre-pandemic jobs record – about 6.7 million jobs added – was far from the greatest of any president ever. The economy added more than 11.5 million jobs in the first term of Democratic President Bill Clinton in the 1990s.

    Tariffs on China

    Trump repeated a trade claim he made frequently during his presidency. Speaking of China, he said he “charged them” with tariffs that had the effect of “bringing in hundreds of billions of dollars pouring into our Treasury from China. Thank you very much, China.” He claimed that he did this even though “no other president had gotten even 10 cents – not one president got anything from them.”

    Facts First: As we have written repeatedly, it’s not true that no president before Trump had generated any revenue through tariffs on goods from China. In reality, the US has had tariffs on China for more than two centuries, and FactCheck.org reported in 2019 that the US generated an “average of $12.3 billion in custom duties a year from 2007 to 2016, according to the U.S. International Trade Commission DataWeb.” Also, American importers, not Chinese exporters, make the actual tariff payments – and study after study during Trump’s presidency found that Americans were bearing most of the cost of the tariffs.

    The trade deficit with China

    Trump went on to repeat a false claim he made more than 100 times as president – that the US used to have a trade deficit with China of more than $500 billion. He claimed it was “five-, six-, seven-hundred billion dollars a year.”

    Facts First: The US has never had a $500 billion, $600 billion or $700 billion trade deficit with China even if you only count trade in goods and ignore the services trade in which the US runs a surplus with China. The pre-Trump record for a goods deficit with China was about $367 billion in 2015. The goods deficit hit a new record of about $418 billion under Trump in 2018 before falling back under $400 billion in subsequent years.

    Trump and the 2020 election

    Trump said people claim they want to run against him even though, he claimed, he won the 2020 election. He said, “I won the second election, OK, won it by a lot. You know, when they say, when they say Biden won, the smart people know that didn’t [happen].”

    Facts First: This is Trump’s regular lie. He lost the 2020 election to Biden fair and square, 306 to 232 in the Electoral College. Biden earned more than 7 million more votes than Trump did.

    Democrats and elections

    Trump said Democrats are only good at “disinformation” and “cheating on elections.”

    Facts First: This is nonsense. There is just no basis for a broad claim that Democrats are election cheaters. Election fraud and voter fraud are exceedingly rare in US elections, though such crimes are occasionally committed by officials and supporters of both parties. (We’ll ignore Trump’s subjective claim about “disinformation.”)

    The liberation of the ISIS caliphate

    Trump repeated his familiar story about how he had supposedly liberated the “caliphate” of terror group ISIS in “three weeks.” This time, he said, “In fact, with the ISIS caliphate, a certain general said it could only be done in three years, ‘and probably it can’t be done at all, sir.’ And I did it in three weeks. I went over to Iraq, met a great general. ‘Sir, I can do it in three weeks.’ You’ve heard that story. ‘I can do it in three weeks, sir.’ ‘How are you going to do that?’ They explained it. I did it in three weeks. I was told it couldn’t be done at all, that it would take at least three years. Did it in three weeks. Knocked out 100% of the ISIS caliphate.”

    Facts First: Trump’s claim of eliminating the ISIS caliphate in “three weeks” isn’t true; the ISIS “caliphate” was declared fully liberated more than two years into Trump’s presidency, in 2019. Even if Trump was starting the clock at the time of his visit to Iraq, in late December 2018, the liberation was proclaimed more than two and a half months later. In addition, Trump gave himself far too much credit for the defeat of the caliphate, as he has in the past, when he said “I did it”: Kurdish forces did much of the ground fighting, and there was major progress against the caliphate under President Barack Obama in 2015 and 2016.

    IHS Markit, an information company that studied the changing size of the caliphate, reported two days before Trump’s 2017 inauguration that the caliphate shrunk by 23% in 2016 after shrinking by 14% in 2015. “The Islamic State suffered unprecedented territorial losses in 2016, including key areas vital for the group’s governance project,” an analyst there said in a statement at the time.

    Military equipment left in Afghanistan

    Trump claimed, as he has before, that the US left behind $85 billion worth of military equipment when it withdrew from Afghanistan in 2021. He said of the leader of the Taliban: “Now he’s got $85 billion worth of our equipment that I bought – $85 billion.” He added later: “The thing that nobody ever talks about, we lost 13 [soldiers], we lost $85 billion worth of the greatest military equipment in the world.”

    Facts First: Trump’s $85 billion figure is false. While a significant quantity of military equipment that had been provided by the US to Afghan government forces was indeed abandoned to the Taliban upon the US withdrawal, the Defense Department has estimated that this equipment had been worth about $7.1 billion – a chunk of about $18.6 billion worth of equipment provided to Afghan forces between 2005 and 2021. And some of the equipment left behind was rendered inoperable before US forces withdrew.

    As other fact-checkers have previously explained, the “$85 billion” is a rounded-up figure (it’s closer to $83 billion) for the total amount of money Congress has appropriated during the war to a fund supporting the Afghan security forces. A minority of this funding was for equipment.

    The Afghanistan withdrawal and the F-16

    Trump claimed that the Taliban acquired F-16 fighter planes because of the US withdrawal, saying: “They feared the F-16s. And now they own them. Think of it.”

    Facts First: This is false. F-16s were not among the equipment abandoned upon the US withdrawal and the collapse of the Afghan armed forces, since the Afghan armed forces did not fly F-16s.

    The border wall

    Trump claimed that he had kept his promise to complete a wall on the border with Mexico: “As you know, I built hundreds of miles of wall and completed that task as promised. And then I began to add even more in areas that seemed to be allowing a lot of people to come in.”

    Facts First: It’s not true that Trump “completed” the border wall. According to an official “Border Wall Status” report written by US Customs and Border Protection two days after Trump left office, about 458 miles of wall had been completed under Trump – but about 280 more miles that had been identified for wall construction had not been completed.

    The report, provided to CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez, said that, of those 280 miles left to go, about 74 miles were “in the pre-construction phase and have not yet been awarded, in locations where no barriers currently exist,” and that 206 miles were “currently under contract, in place of dilapidated and outdated designs and in locations where no barriers previously existed.”

    Latin America and deportations

    Trump told his familiar story about how, until he was president, the US was unable to deport MS-13 gang members to other countries, “especially” Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras because those countries “didn’t want them.”

    Facts First: It’s not true that, as a rule, Guatemala and Honduras wouldn’t take back migrants being deported from the US during Obama’s administration, though there were some individual exceptions.

    In 2016, just prior to Trump’s presidency, neither Guatemala nor Honduras was on the list of countries that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) considered “recalcitrant,” or uncooperative, in accepting the return of their nationals.

    For the 2016 fiscal year, Obama’s last full fiscal year in office, ICE reported that Guatemala and Honduras ranked second and third, behind only Mexico, in terms of the country of citizenship of people being removed from the US. You can read a longer fact check, from 2019, here.

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  • House Democratic whip’s daughter arrested at protest and charged with assaulting police officer | CNN Politics

    House Democratic whip’s daughter arrested at protest and charged with assaulting police officer | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    House Democratic Whip Katherine Clark’s daughter was arrested during a protest in Boston and has been arraigned on charges including assault on a police officer.

    Riley Dowell, 23, was found by police tagging the Parkman Bandstand monument “NO COP CITY” and “ACAB,” according to a press release from the Boston Police Department. “ACAB” is commonly known as an acronym for the anti-police slogan “All Cops Are Bastards.”

    While police tried to arrest Dowell, protesters surrounded officers and one was hit in the face and bleeding, according to the press release. The release referred to Dowell by her birth name.

    Dowell has now been arraigned and charged with assault of a police officer, according to a news release from Suffolk County District Attorney Kevin Hayden’s office.

    “Riley Dowell, 23, was arraigned in the Central Division of Boston Municipal Court today on charges of assault and battery on a police officer, vandalizing property, tagging property, vandalizing a historic marker/monument, and resisting arrest,” the release obtained by CNN affiliate WCVB said. “Judge James Coffey set bail at $500 and ordered Dowell to stay away from Boston Common.”

    Dowell is represented by attorney Chris Dearborn, according to the release. Dearborn had no comment when reached by CNN. Dowell’s next court appearance is scheduled for April 19, the release said.

    Dowell posted bail and is no longer in police custody, the Boston Municipal Court told CNN in an email Tuesday.

    Clark commented on the news in a tweet Sunday.

    “Last night, my daughter was arrested in Boston, Massachusetts. I love Riley, and this is a very difficult time in the cycle of joy and pain in parenting,” Clark wrote. “This will be evaluated by the legal system, and I am confident in that process.”

    Clark began serving as minority whip in the 118th session of Congress after House Democrats elevated her to the position.

    Clark is only the second woman after former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to serve in one of the top two party leadership positions in Congress.

    Previously, the congresswoman served in the leadership role of assistant speaker.

    This story is breaking and has been updated.

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  • Iraqis celebrate their comeback with soccer tournament after decades of isolation | CNN

    Iraqis celebrate their comeback with soccer tournament after decades of isolation | CNN

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    Editor’s Note: A version of this story appears in today’s Meanwhile in the Middle East newsletter, CNN’s three-times-a-week look inside the region’s biggest stories. Sign up here.


    Baghdad and Abu Dhabi
    CNN
     — 

    Iraq is holding its first international soccer tournament in more than four decades, hosting its Gulf Arab neighbors for a two-week competition as it emerges from its worst and longest political deadlock in years.

    The tournament, analysts say, is a glimmer of hope for a struggling population, but also holds a political message – Iraq is signaling to its neighbors and the world that it is ready to move past decades of turmoil.

    After more than 30 years of global isolation due to wars and sanctions, for many Iraqis the Arabian Gulf Cup – the tournament started on Friday and will run until January 19 – is something of a tonic.

    “Iraq is a football-mad country that has been lobbying for years for the right to host competitive international games,” said Patrick Osgood, associate director of the Control Risks consultancy firm in Dubai.

    This is the first time Iraq has hosted the Gulf Cup since 1979, when it was held in the capital Baghdad. This time, the tournament is being held in the southern port city of Basra, with teams from Saudi Arabia, Oman, UAE, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Yemen also competing.

    Since it last hosted the Gulf Cup, the nation has faced two devastating wars, a regime change, an occupation and a militant insurgency that impacted the once thriving Basra as it did the rest of the country. Of late, the city’s residents have encountered severe energy and food shortages that have led to unrest.

    “The practical effect in a city in dire need of investment is likely to be small,” Osgood told CNN. “But Iraqis deserve nice things, to participate with others, to be able to exercise hospitality.”

    There is excitement and fervor in Basra about the tournament. Murals adorn the city’s walls and fans were seen joining long queues for tickets. Flags flutter from every participating nation in streets and there are welcoming posters reading, “Basra welcomes you” and “Basra is your home.”

    “We’ve been waiting for this moment for 40 years,” said 29-year-old Mohammed Ali, a taxi driver in Basra, adding that the city feels very secure and its residents are filled with joy for the occasion.

    “We have experienced problems, but we always say that sport unites people,” he told CNN. “We are seeing many people from the Gulf, and we can tell that they too have missed Basra.”

    The last Gulf Cup was held in Qatar in 2019, with Bahrain emerging as the winner.

    Gulf Arabs rarely travel to Iraq for tourism. Of all the Gulf states, only the travel hubs of Doha and Dubai have direct flights to the country, catering largely to connecting passengers and Shiite Muslim pilgrims. Gulf states’ ties with the Iraqi government have warmed over the past few years, but that hasn’t trickled down to the public level. In Saudi Arabia, government permission is required for travel to Iraq, which is only given to men above 40.

    Major General Saad Maan, head of public relations at the Iraqi interior ministry, told CNN that he expects “tens of thousands of fans to arrive in Basra” and that all security measures have been taken to assure the safety of both residents and fans.

    “Iraq is saying that there is great political stability,” said Ihsan Al-Shammari, a politics professor at Baghdad University and head of the Iraqi Centre for Political Thought. “It also speaks to the security situation, especially if the tournament is successfully completed without any security incidents.”

    Iraq also hopes that the event will bolster its image to investors and political partners, said Al-Shammari, as well as bring it closer to its Gulf Arab neighbors with whom it has had frosty relations since Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

    The opening ceremony on Friday started with a spectacular fireworks display and a theatrical performance chronicling the nation’s 5,000-year history, though the showpiece occasion wasn’t without controversy.

    The Iraqi Football Association apologized to Kuwait for a brawl that took place in the Basra International Stadium’s VIP section that prevented the Kuwaiti ruler’s representative from entering. That prompted the rest of the delegation to leave the event. The Kuwait FA said it will continue participation in the tournament after being given security guarantees from Iraq.

    Iraq drifted into chaos after a 2003 US-led invasion toppled longtime ruler Saddam Hussein, and around the end of 2021 fell into its longest political stalemate as the country’s various political factions – divided mainly between Shiite blocs and their Iran-backed rivals – failed to form a government.

    The deadlock was only broken last October with the election of a new president and premier, but experts remain skeptical about whether the new government can prevent further stability and instill serious reforms.

    The country’s economy is still in crisis, much of its infrastructure is in ruins and its ties with neighboring states are strained as Iran continues to support prominent political factions and their armed militias.

    While not the center of most violence, Basra has its own issues.

    “Basra city experiences security issues around crime and protest activity,” said Osgood, “but neither issue is prohibitive, and the government has surged security provision to mitigate threats.”

    “On balance, there’s unlikely to be major security disruption during the tournament,” he said, adding that “there are significant socio-economic issues in Basra that drive unrest, but there’s also significant goodwill around the tournament – no one wants to spoil it.”

    The tournament is not on the international soccer radar but it is a heated topic in the Gulf region and has often been reflective of the region’s geopolitical scene.

    Iraq last hosted the Gulf Cup 44 years ago, when it won the tournament. The nation was banned from it for about a decade after Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait and was prevented from hosting it since due to security reasons.

    Despite the hiccups, residents of Basra are optimistic about the tournament in their city.

    “The whole of Basra is joyous, opening its doors to the Gulf and other provinces (of Iraq),” said 46-year-old Ali Salman of Basra.

    “We want to say to visitors from the Gulf and other provinces of Iraq: don’t rent hotels, the doors of our homes are open.”

    Iran executes two more men amid crackdown on protests

    Iran executed two men – one a karate champion, the other a volunteer children’s coach – in connection with nationwide protests, sparking outrage around the world. The European Union said in a statement Saturday that it was “appalled” by the executions, calling it “yet another sign of the Iranian authorities’ violent repression of civilian demonstrations.”

    • Background: The pair were alleged to have participated in anti-regime protests and were convicted of killing a member of the country’s Basij paramilitary force, were hanged early Saturday morning, according to state-affiliated media.
    • Why it matters: The total number of people now known to have been executed in connection with the protests has reached four. As many as 41 more protesters have received death sentences in recent months, according to statements from both Iranian officials and in Iranian media reviewed by CNN and 1500Tasvir, but the number could be much higher.

    Sweden says it can’t meet all of Turkey’s NATO demands

    Sweden is confident that Turkey will approve its application to join the NATO military alliance, but will not meet all the conditions Ankara has set for its support, Reuters cited Sweden’s prime minister as saying on Sunday. “Turkey both confirms that we have done what we said we would do, but they also say that they want things that we cannot or do not want to give them,” Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson told a defence think-tank conference in Sweden.

    • Background: Finland and Sweden signed a three-way agreement with Turkey in 2022 aimed at overcoming Ankara’s objections to their membership of the alliance. They applied to join NATO in response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but Turkey objected and accused the countries of harboring militants. New entrants require the consensus of all existing members.
    • Why it matters: It is unclear if the steps taken by the two candidates will satisfy Turkey, which has delayed the accession of the two countries to extract concessions from them. The move has been seen as benefiting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ahead of elections this year.

    Israel arrests two teens over Jerusalem Christian cemetery vandalism

    Israel Police arrested two teenagers suspected of vandalizing at least 28 tombstones and damaging a Protestant cemetery near Jerusalem’s Mount Zion, they announced on Friday. The suspects, aged 18 and 14, from central Israel, will be brought before a judge to decide on an extension of their detention following their arrest late on Thursday. “The investigation continues with the aim of bringing them to justice,” a statement from Israel’s police spokesperson in Jerusalem said.

    • Background: The Episcopal Church in Jerusalem and the Middle East said in a statement earlier last week that “vandals” had “purposely and relentlessly smashed more than thirty gravestones, many of them historic,” in the cemetery. The church said there was clear indication that “these criminal acts were motivated by religious bigotry and hatred against Christians.” Israel Police said the vandalism took place on Sunday, January 1.
    • Why it matters: The attack on the cemetery and Israel’s handling of it is likely to be in the spotlight after the country swore in the most right-wing government in its history last month. Police did not name the suspects or comment on a possible motive, but Chief Superintendent Assaf Harel said: “Any damage to religious institutions and sites is serious and damages the unique and delicate fabric of life that exists in the city for members of all religions and denominations.”

    London’s first Arabic bookstore bid farewell as it closed its doors in 2023, marking the end of a 44-year-old era for Arabic literature in Europe.

    Citing economic difficulties, the advent of electronic reading and logistical challenges brought on by Brexit, the founders of Al Saqi Bookstore found the burden of keeping its doors open too heavy.

    Regarded as Europe’s leading Arabic bookstore, Al Saqi, which means water seller in Arabic, was founded in 1978 by lifelong friends André Gaspard and Mai Ghoussoub. They opened the store after fleeing the Lebanese Civil War that started in 1975 and lasted until 1990.

    The shop at first only carried books in Arabic, later expanding its collection to English, for Europeans who wanted to learn about Arabic culture. It also runs a publishing house in London and Beirut, which will continue to operate.

    “It was home for us misfits” the founder’s daughter and publisher Lynn Gaspard told the BBC in an interview.

    London is home to a large Arab diaspora. For decades, the city has been a refuge for Arabs fleeing war, economic turmoil and political persecution. But it is also a major hub for tourists, with many Gulf Arabs keeping summer homes in the city.

    For many, Al Saqi was the place to find books banned in the Middle East, with Arab travelers to Europe often making a stop in London to stock up.

    But as Al Saqi’s door closes, another one may open as the store’s legacy has inspired one of its own employees to carry the torch.

    Mohammad Masoud, a bookseller at the store, is now crowdfunding for a new initiative called “Maqam” that aims to open a similar shop.

    “This is what Maqam is about. It exists for people who are in need of Arabic content and are searching for belonging,” he told Al Jazeera.

    By Mohammed Abdelbary

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  • Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

    Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

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    JERUSALEM — More than 30 graves at a historic Christian cemetery in Jerusalem were found toppled and vandalized, the diocese said Wednesday, jolting the Christian minority in the contested city.

    Israel’s Foreign Ministry called the attack an “immoral act” and “an affront to religion.” Jerusalem’s Anglican Archbishop Hosam Naoum called it a “clear hate crime.” The British consulate said it was just the latest in a string of assaults on the Christian community in the holy city of Jerusalem.

    Police officers were sent to the Protestant Cemetery on Jerusalem’s Mount Zion to investigate the profanation. Mount Zion, associated in Christian tradition with the site of the Last Supper that Jesus shared with his disciples the night before his crucifixion, is also sacred to Jews and Muslims and has been at the center of competing religious claims throughout the decadeslong Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

    Widely shared security camera footage on Sunday showed two young men — both wearing a Jewish skullcap and tzitzit, the knotted ritual fringes worn by observant Jews — breaking into the cemetery, knocking over stone crosses and smashing and stomping on tombstones, leaving a trail of debris and broken headstones.

    Among the destroyed tombs was one containing a 19th century bust of Samuel Gobat, the second Protestant Bishop in Jerusalem who died in 1879, the Episcopal diocese said. The graves of three police officers, British citizens serving in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine, were also vandalized.

    The diocese cautioned that the desecration of the cemetery should be seen as an ominous warning about “hatred against Christians.”

    “Many stone crosses were the targets of the vandals, clearly indicating that these criminal acts were motivated by religious bigotry,” it said, urging authorities to redouble efforts to find the perpetrators.

    The Protestant Cemetery on the venerated Mount Zion just outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls was established in 1848 and was part of territory that Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war. The cemetery houses the graves of dozens of Palestinian police officers killed during the First and Second World Wars as well as Christian leaders who died in the 19th and 20th centuries.

    Jewish extremists have defaced church property on Mount Zion in the past years. Jews consider Mount Zion the traditional burial place of the biblical King David and some ultra-Orthodox and nationalist activists have opposed Christian prayer rights at the site. A Jewish seminary known as the Diaspora Yeshiva has taken over many buildings in the Mount Zion compound.

    Some 16,000 Christians live in Jerusalem, the majority of whom are Palestinian. Israel claims Jerusalem as its eternal capital, while Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital for their hoped-for independent state.

    ___

    This story has been clarified to show the three police officers whose graves were also vandalized were British citizens in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine.

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  • Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

    Christian graves desecrated in historic Jerusalem cemetery

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    JERUSALEM — More than 30 graves at a historic Christian cemetery in Jerusalem were found toppled and vandalized, the diocese said Wednesday, jolting the Christian minority in the contested city.

    Israel’s Foreign Ministry called the attack an “immoral act” and “an affront to religion.” Jerusalem’s Anglican Archbishop Hosam Naoum called it a “clear hate crime.” The British consulate said it was just the latest in a string of assaults on the Christian community in the holy city of Jerusalem.

    Police officers were sent to the Protestant Cemetery on Jerusalem’s Mount Zion to investigate the profanation. Mount Zion, associated in Christian tradition with the site of the Last Supper that Jesus shared with his disciples the night before his crucifixion, is also sacred to Jews and Muslims and has been at the center of competing religious claims throughout the decadeslong Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

    Widely shared security camera footage on Sunday showed two young men — both wearing a Jewish skullcap and tzitzit, the knotted ritual fringes worn by observant Jews — breaking into the cemetery, knocking over stone crosses and smashing and stomping on tombstones, leaving a trail of debris and broken headstones.

    Among the destroyed tombs was one containing a 19th century bust of Samuel Gobat, the second Protestant Bishop in Jerusalem who died in 1879, the Episcopal diocese said. The graves of three police officers, British citizens serving in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine, were also vandalized.

    The diocese cautioned that the desecration of the cemetery should be seen as an ominous warning about “hatred against Christians.”

    “Many stone crosses were the targets of the vandals, clearly indicating that these criminal acts were motivated by religious bigotry,” it said, urging authorities to redouble efforts to find the perpetrators.

    The Protestant Cemetery on the venerated Mount Zion just outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls was established in 1848 and was part of territory that Israel seized in the 1967 Mideast war. The cemetery houses the graves of dozens of Palestinian police officers killed during the First and Second World Wars as well as Christian leaders who died in the 19th and 20th centuries.

    Jewish extremists have defaced church property on Mount Zion in the past years. Jews consider Mount Zion the traditional burial place of the biblical King David and some ultra-Orthodox and nationalist activists have opposed Christian prayer rights at the site. A Jewish seminary known as the Diaspora Yeshiva has taken over many buildings in the Mount Zion compound.

    Some 16,000 Christians live in Jerusalem, the majority of whom are Palestinian. Israel claims Jerusalem as its eternal capital, while Palestinians want east Jerusalem as the capital for their hoped-for independent state.

    ___

    This story has been clarified to show the three police officers whose graves were also vandalized were British citizens in the police force of what was then British-ruled Palestine.

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  • 2 arrested in power substation vandalism in Washington state

    2 arrested in power substation vandalism in Washington state

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    SEATTLE — Two men have been arrested and charged with vandalizing electrical substations in Washington state, attacks that left thousands without power over the holidays, and one suspect told authorities they did it so they could break into a business and steal money, U.S. authorities said Tuesday.

    Matthew Greenwood, 32, and Jeremy Crahan, 40, both of Puyallup, were arrested Saturday and set to appear in U.S. District Court in Tacoma on Tuesday.

    A newly unsealed complaint charged both with conspiracy to damage energy facilities, and it charged Greenwood with possession of a short-barreled rifle and a short-barreled shotgun. Cellphone location data and other evidence tied them to the attacks on the four substations in Pierce County, the complaint said.

    The attacks on Dec. 25 left more than 15,000 customers without power. Officials have warned that the U.S. power grid needs better security to prevent domestic terrorism and after a large outage in North Carolina last month took days to repair.

    According to the complaint, Greenwood told investigators after his arrest that the two knocked out power so they could burglarize a business and steal from the cash register. The business was not identified in the complaint.

    “We have seen attacks such as these increase in Western Washington and throughout the country and must treat each incident seriously,” Seattle U.S. Attorney Nick Brown said in a news release. “The outages on Christmas left thousands in the dark and cold and put some who need power for medical devices at extreme risk.”

    It was not immediately clear if the men had attorneys who might speak on their behalf.

    The four substations targeted were the Graham and Elk Plain substations operated by Tacoma Power and the Kapowsin and Hemlock substations operated by Puget Sound Energy. The complaint said transformers at the Tacoma Power substations would have to be replaced and damage was estimated to be at least $3 million.

    According to the complaint, the pair hit the first three substations early on Christmas Day, then struck the last — the Kapowsin substation — that evening. In each case, they used bolt cutters to access the properties and manipulated switches to knock out power. At the Kapowsin substation, their actions cause arcing and sparking, the complaint said.

    Greenwood and Crahan were identified as suspects because location data showed cellphones linked to them to be in the vicinity of all four incidents, FBI Special Agent Mark Tucher wrote in the complaint. Agents surveilled them from Dec. 27 to Jan. 3 and they appeared to be sharing a home in Puyallup, he said.

    “The substations are spread out over dozens of miles; the attacks occurred early in the morning and in the evening; and the first and fourth attacks were separated by over twelve hours,” the complaint said. “This makes it at least unlikely that an individual would simply happen to be at all four locations around the times they were each vandalized.”

    When he was arrested, Greenwood had several articles of clothing that matched images of one of the suspects in surveillance images, and agents found him to have two unregistered short-barreled weapons, the complaint said.

    Conspiracy to attack energy facilities is punishable by up to 20 years in prison. Possession of an unregistered firearm is punishable by up to 10 years.

    At least four electrical substations were targeted in earlier attacks in Oregon and Washington beginning in late November. Attackers used firearms in at least some of the incidents and some power customers in Oregon temporarily lost service. In one of the attacks, two people cut through a fence surrounding a high-voltage substation and then shot several pieces of equipment.

    The utilities affected in those cases — Portland General Electric, the Bonneville Power Administration and Puget Sound Energy — said they were working with the FBI.

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  • Hackers stole data from multiple electric utilities in recent ransomware attack | CNN Politics

    Hackers stole data from multiple electric utilities in recent ransomware attack | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Hackers stole data belonging to multiple electric utilities in an October ransomware attack on a US government contractor that handles critical infrastructure projects across the country, according to a memo describing the hack obtained by CNN.

    Federal officials have closely monitored the incident for any potential broader impact on the US power sector while private investigators have combed the dark web for the stolen data, according to the memo sent this month to power company executives by the North American grid regulator’s cyberthreat sharing center.

    The previously unreported incident is a window into how ransomware attacks on critical US companies are handled behind the scenes as lawyers and federal investigators quietly spring into action to determine the extent of the damage.

    The ransomware attack hit Chicago-based Sargent & Lundy, an engineering firm that has designed more than 900 power stations and thousands of miles of power systems and that holds sensitive data on those projects.

    The firm also handles nuclear security issues, working with the departments of Defense, Energy and other agencies “to strengthen nuclear deterrence” and keep weapons of mass destruction out of terrorists’ hands, according to its website.

    Two people familiar with the investigation of the Sargent & Lundy hack told CNN that the incident was contained and remediated, and didn’t appear to have a broader impact on other power-sector firms.

    There is no sign that data stolen from Sargent & Lundy, which includes “model files” and “transmission data” the firm uses for utility projects, is on the dark web, according to the memo from the Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center.

    But security experts have long been concerned that schematics held by electric and nuclear power contractors could be dumped online and used for follow-on physical or cyberattacks on those facilities.

    “These are literally the configurations for your programmable logic controllers, your relays,” said longtime security consultant Patrick Miller, referring to critical electric equipment that keeps the lights on. “We’re really concerned about the data that’s in those organizations.”

    Those concerns are particularly acute following a spate of physical attacks and vandalism at electric utilities in multiple states. Tens of thousands of people lost power in Moore County, North Carolina, this month after Duke Energy substations were damaged by gunfire. On Christmas, thousands of people lost power in a Washington county after someone vandalized multiple substations there.

    “We’re fully recovered from the incident, which had minimal impact on our normal business operations,” Brenda Romero, a spokesperson for Sargent & Lundy, said in a statement to CNN. Romero said the firm “notified law enforcement” of the hack.

    Romero declined to answer further questions on the ransomware attack, including whether the hackers had tried to extort Sargent & Lundy, citing an ongoing investigation.

    The Biden administration has urged companies to share data on such hacks as US officials have tried to get a grip on the epidemic of ransomware, which has cost critical infrastructure firms many millions of dollars.

    The hackers that hit Sargent & Lundy used a strain of ransomware known as Black Basta that first surfaced early this year, according to two people familiar with the investigation. Scores of Black Basta attacks have been reported since April, according to cybersecurity firm Palo Alto Networks. The hackers steal data from their victims to give them added leverage in ransom negotiations.

    Sargent & Lundy is one of several engineering firms whose work on critical infrastructure projects cuts across different sectors of the economy. For US cybersecurity officials, this engineering work can be harder to evaluate in terms of its risk to supply chain security than a firm that only makes software.

    Federal regulations require electric utilities to maintain certain cybersecurity standards for protecting their systems from hacks. Companies that contract with those utilities, such as Sargent & Lundy, aren’t necessarily held to the same standard and are instead bound by the security requirements in the contract, experts told CNN.

    “Utilities are effectively allowed to accept as much risk as they want,” said Miller, who is CEO of Oregon-based Ampere Industrial Security, a consulting firm. “Is it perfect? No, but [the contractors] are being assessed [for their security] in some ways through the utilities.”

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  • 4th Washington state electrical substation vandalized

    4th Washington state electrical substation vandalized

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    TACOMA, Wash. — A fourth electrical substation was vandalized late on Christmas Day in Washington state, leaving homes in Kapowsin and Graham temporarily without power, according to the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office.

    By 7 a.m. Monday, more than 10,500 Puget Sound Energy customers were without electricity across the region, KOMO-TV reported.

    The suspects broke into a fenced area and vandalized equipment, causing a fire, officials said. The fire was extinguished and power was later restored, but no suspects are in custody, officials said.

    The attacks come as federal officials are warning that the U.S. power grid needs better security to prevent domestic terrorism and after a large outage in North Carolina earlier this month that took days to repair.

    The first substation was vandalized at about 5:30 a.m. Sunday, followed by a second substation, according to Tacoma Public Utilities. The outages affected about 7,300 customers in an area southeast of Tacoma. Just before noon, the utility had restored power to all but 2,700 customers whose power was estimated to be restored at about 6:30 p.m. Sunday.

    Meanwhile, just before noon, Puget Sound Energy reported vandalism that had happened at about 2:30 a.m. Sunday caused a power outage at one of its substations. The nearly 7,700 customers who lost power had it restored by 5 a.m., Puget Sound spokesperson Andrew Padula said. The company is investigating, along with authorities, and declined to comment further, according to Padula.

    In all four cases, the sheriff’s office says someone forced their way into the fenced area surrounding the substations and damaged equipment to cause a power outage.

    Power stations have been hit in Washington and Oregon in the last month.

    Portland General Electric, the Bonneville Power Administration, Cowlitz County Public Utility District and Puget Sound Energy confirmed six separate attacks on electrical substations in Washington and Oregon in the previous weeks, according to Oregon Public Broadcasting and KUOW-FM in Seattle.

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  • Power substations vandalized in Washington state weeks after North Carolina electricity attack and FBI warning | CNN

    Power substations vandalized in Washington state weeks after North Carolina electricity attack and FBI warning | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    After thousands of customers in Pierce County, Washington, were affected Sunday when burglars vandalized three energy substations, power was then knocked out for even more homes after a suspect or suspects gained access to a fourth substation, vandalizing the equipment and causing a fire, according to an update from the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department.

    The damaged equipment cut power to around 14,000 customers, police said, weeks after an attack in North Carolina left thousands in the dark for days amid federal warnings of extremist threats to electricity infrastructure.

    The Christmas Day vandalism near Tacoma marked more such incidents in the state, where two November attacks on Puget Sound Energy substations were investigated by the FBI. Vandalism and deliberate damage were reported last month at substations in southern Washington and Oregon.

    No suspects are in custody in the latest case affecting Puyallup and Graham, Washington, and it “is unknown if there are any motives or if this was a coordinated attack on the power systems,” the Pierce County Sheriff’s Department said Sunday in a statement.

    The FBI’s Seattle Division was aware of the vandalism reports but would not confirm or deny its role in any investigation, adding, “We do take threats against our infrastructure seriously and urge anyone with information to contact law enforcement,” it told CNN on Sunday.

    The bureau in a November 22 bulletin warned of reports of threats to electricity infrastructure by people espousing racially or ethnically motivated extremist ideology “to create civil disorder and inspire further violence,” according to the alert sent to private industry.

    The first report of a burglary at a Tacoma Public Utilities substation came at 5:26 a.m. PT, the sheriff’s office said.

    “Deputies arrived on scene and saw there was forced entry into the fenced area,” according to its statement. “Nothing had been taken from the substation, but the suspect vandalized the equipment causing a power outage in the area.”

    Then, a second burglary was reported at another Tacoma Public Utilities substation, with forced entry and damage to equipment, the statement said. Similarly, nothing was taken.

    “At 11:25 we were notified by Puget Sound Energy that they too had a power outage this morning at 02:39 a.m. Deputies are currently on scene at this facility where the fenced area was broken into and the equipment vandalized,” the statement continued.

    Dispatchers received a call about a fire at another substation at 7:21 p.m. local time Sunday, the sheriff’s department said. Firefighters and Puget Sound Energy employees responded to the scene and were able to extinguish the fire and secure and the substation.

    Power has since been restored to most of the affected homes, the update said.

    Anti-government groups over the past two years have used online forums to urge followers to attack critical infrastructure, including the power grid. They have posted documents and even instructions outlining vulnerabilities and suggesting the use of high-powered rifles.

    Investigators probing the attacks last month at substations in Moore County, North Carolina, zeroed in on two possible threads: extremists’ writings in online forums encouraging attacks on critical infrastructure, and recent disruptions of LGBTQ+ events across the nation by domestic extremists, law enforcement sources told CNN.

    The attackers “knew exactly what they were doing,” Moore County Sheriff Ronnie Fields said at the time.

    The resulting outages left some 40,000 customers scrambling as temperatures dipped to the mid-40s, with schools and businesses forced to close for days before power was restored.

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  • 3 Washington state electric substations vandalized

    3 Washington state electric substations vandalized

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    TACOMA, Wash. — Vandalism at three power substations in western Washington early Sunday initially cut power to about 14,000 utility customers, the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office said.

    The attacks come as federal officials are warning that the U.S. power grid needs better security to prevent domestic terrorism and after a large outage in North Carolina earlier this month that took days to repair.

    In January, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security report warned that domestic extremists have been developing “credible, specific plans” to attack electricity infrastructure since at least 2020.

    Tacoma Public Utilities reported vandalism at about 5:30 a.m. Sunday at one substation, followed by vandalism at a second substation, the sheriff’s office said. The outages affected about 7,300 customers in an area southeast of Tacoma. Just before noon, the utility had restored power to all but 2,700 customers whose power was estimated to be restored late Sunday.

    Meanwhile, just before noon, Puget Sound Energy reported vandalism that had happened at about 2:30 a.m. Sunday caused a power outage at one of its substations. PSE officials did not immediately respond to a phone message seeking comment on who was affected by the outage and how long it lasted.

    In all three cases, the sheriff’s office says someone forced their way into the fenced area surrounding the substations and damaged equipment to cause a power outage.

    Officials have not said how the substations were damaged. No suspects are in custody and officials don’t know if it was a coordinated attack.

    Oregon Public Broadcasting and KUOW-FM in Seattle reported earlier this month that Portland General Electric, the Bonneville Power Administration, Cowlitz County Public Utility District and Puget Sound Energy confirmed six separate attacks on electrical substations in Washington and Oregon in the previous weeks.

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  • Nazi symbols carved into menorah in Beverly Hills; man held

    Nazi symbols carved into menorah in Beverly Hills; man held

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    BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — A man was arrested after Nazi symbols were carved into a menorah in Beverly Hills, police said.

    Officers responded Sunday night to reports that a menorah on private property was being vandalized, police said in a statement.

    Use of surveillance video led to the arrest of Eric Brian King, of Dallas, Texas, for investigation of felony vandalism and a hate crime, police said.

    It was not immediately known if King had an attorney. Online Los Angeles County jail information showed that King, 47, was scheduled for a court appearance on Tuesday.

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  • North Carolina power cut by shooting could come back earlier

    North Carolina power cut by shooting could come back earlier

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    RALEIGH, N.C. — Duke Energy said it expects to restore power ahead of schedule to thousands of homes in a central North Carolina county that have been without electricity for several days after an attack on the electric grid.

    Duke Energy spokesman Jeff Brooks said the company expects to have power back Wednesday just before midnight in Moore County. The company had previously estimated it would be restored Thursday morning.

    About 35,000 Duke energy customers were still without power Tuesday, down from more than 45,000 at the height of the outage Saturday.

    The outages began shortly after 7 p.m. Saturday night after one or more people drove up to two substations, breached the gates and opened fire on them, authorities have said. Police have not released a motive or said what kind of firearm was used.

    Sam Stephenson, a power delivery specialist for Duke Energy, said the company has been able to implement “rolling power-ups” in the northern part of the county, giving some customers power in 2- to 3-hour waves.

    North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper called for a thorough assessment of the state’s critical infrastructure Tuesday morning at the monthly Council of State meeting — a collective body of elected officials comprising the executive branch. He said this will likely include discussions with federal regulators, lawmakers and utility companies about how to bolster security and prevent future attacks.

    In the short-term, the state has sent generators to Moore County and is helping feed residents. Law enforcement in surrounding counties has been more vigilant about monitoring nearby substations since the attack, he said.

    “This seemed to be too easy,” Cooper told reporters after the meeting. “People knew what they were doing to disable the substation, and for that much damage to be caused — causing so much problem, economic loss, safety challenges to so many people for so long — I think we have to look at what we might need to do to harden that infrastructure.”

    Mike Causey, the North Carolina insurance commissioner and state fire marshal, called the attack “a wakeup call to provide better security at our power substations.”

    Many businesses around the county that is about 60 miles (95 kilometers) southwest of the state capital of Raleigh are closed at a normally busy time of year for tourism and holiday shopping. Schools are also closed through Thursday, and traffic lights are out around the area. A curfew remains in place from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m.

    County officials said 54 people spent Monday night at an emergency shelter at the county sports complex in Carthage, up from 19 people the night before, as temperatures dropped below freezing after sundown. Many more residents have stopped by the shelter for food, warmth, showers or to charge their devices.

    Republican state Sen. Tom McInnis, who represents Moore County, said the General Assembly is awaiting updates on how the perpetrators of this attack might be charged and may consider new legislation related to the punishment when the legislature returns in January.

    “I’m reasonably confident there will be new legislation that will be brought forward in the long session to address the potential that, again, that the crime and the penalty need to be leveled and evened out,” McInnis said at a news conference Tuesday.

    Brian Harrell, former assistant secretary for infrastructure protection at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said a determined adversary with insider knowledge of how to cripple key components of critical infrastructure is difficult to stop and requires an industry-wide collective defense.

    DHS and energy companies have been monitoring what Harrell, who now leads security for an energy company servicing multiple states, identified as a significant uptick in nefarious online discussions about sabotaging distribution and transmission substations.

    Investigators have said whoever shot up the substations knew what they were doing. But they have not released further information about how much inside knowledge they may have had.

    “What impacts you can impact me, so threat information-sharing is absolutely essential,” Harrell told The Associated Press. “Over 85% of all critical infrastructure is owned by the private sector, so we need to have more regular conversations amongst security partners to identify, disrupt and mitigate” threats to infrastructure.

    ———

    Hannah Schoenbaum is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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  • Vandalism at Missouri elementary school includes a swastika

    Vandalism at Missouri elementary school includes a swastika

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    Police in Springfield, Missouri, are investigating after vandals spray-painted a swastika during a vandalism spree at an elementary school that is under construction

    SPRINGFIELD, Mo. — Police in Springfield, Missouri, are investigating after a swastika was sprayed on an elementary school during a vandalism spree.

    The vandalism at York Elementary School, which is under construction, was found on Saturday morning, police spokeswoman Cris Waters said.

    Stephen Hall, spokesman for Springfield Public Schools, said the district immediately replaced the window where the swastika was found and removed the graffiti. He declined to say how much damage was found but said it will require the district to file an insurance claim to recover the costs, the Springfield News-Leader reported.

    Hall said the vandalism will not delay the opening of the new York Elementary School in January.

    The vandalism comes amid a surge of anti-Jewish incidents across the country, including antisemitic comments from some celebrities such as the rapper Ye.

    In April, the Anti-Defamation League reported a record number of antisemitic reports in 2021. The organization said the 2,717 incidents of assault, harassment and vandalism was a 34% increase over the previous year and the highest number since the ADL began tracking the events in 1979.

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