| Video shows Black man pinned to tree in what he calls 'attempted lynching' at Indiana lake Posted: 06 Jul 2020 03:22 PM PDT  Indiana authorities are investigating a report by a Black man who said he was pinned to a tree by a group of white men, an attack he likened to an "attempted lynching."
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| White House defends Trump's claim that 99 percent of COVID-19 cases are 'harmless' with chart showing 5 percent are fatal Posted: 06 Jul 2020 12:17 PM PDT  Press secretary Kayleigh McEnany came to her press briefing on Monday prepared to defend President Trump's assertion that "99 percent" of U.S. coronavirus cases are "totally harmless" with two charts that inadvertently disproved his claim.
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| FBI chief says China threatens families to coerce overseas critics to return to China Posted: 07 Jul 2020 08:03 AM PDT  FBI Director Christopher Wray on Tuesday urged China-born people in the United States to contact the FBI if Chinese officials try to force them to return to China under a program of coercion that he said is led by Chinese President Xi Jinping. Wray issued the unusual appeal in an address to the Hudson Institute think tank in which he reiterated U.S. charges that China is using espionage, cyber theft, blackmail and other means as part of a strategy to replace the United States as the world's dominant economic and technological power.
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| Black Lives Matter protesters face rare leak charge in Iowa Posted: 07 Jul 2020 01:00 PM PDT  Prosecutors in Iowa have filed a rarely used leak charge against Black Lives Matter protesters accused of stealing a confidential police document and displaying it during a television news broadcast. Two protesters are charged with unauthorized dissemination of intelligence data, a felony that carries up to five years in prison. The Iowa Judicial Branch says it's only the second time that the charge has been filed since 2010.
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| Another Confederate statue in Richmond, Va., comes down along Monument Avenue Posted: 07 Jul 2020 09:50 AM PDT  The bronze monument to Confederate Gen. J.E.B. Stuart on horseback was hoisted from its granite base as crowds cheered early Tuesday.
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| Kremlin vows to retaliate against fresh UK sanctions against Russians Posted: 07 Jul 2020 04:08 AM PDT  The Kremlin spokesman says that Moscow will respond to new UK sanctions against Russian citizens including a senior investigator and prison officials. Britain on Monday used a new legislation drafted in the memory of a killed Russian tax adviser to sanction 25 Russian nationals linked to prosecution and mistreatment of tax adviser Sergei Magnitsky as well as 20 Saudis involved in the murder of a journalist in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, told reporters on Tuesday that Moscow "can only lament such hostile steps." "We will certainly rely on reciprocity and respond in the way that fits Russia's interests," he said. Alexander Bastrykin, Russia's top investigator and a university friend of Vladimir Putin, is arguably the most senior official to have been slapped by the new sanctions and his name is likely to anger the Kremlin. As the head of the Investigative Committee, Mr Bastrykin is accused of covering up the mistreatment of Mr Magnitsky who died in prison after a year in pre-trial detention in 2009. A tax lawyer, Mr Magnitsky discovered a massive tax scam involving Russian tax authorities and ended up jailed by the same officials he had exposed. A Russian presidential commission concluded that he was beaten to death in prison. Most of the people on the sanctions list are lower-level officials and prison staff including two prison doctors who faced charges of negligence but were never convicted. All of them will now be subject to travel bans and asset freezes but it is not immediately clear if they have any property in Britain. The United States adopted the Magnitsky Act in 2012, targeting money of senior Russian officials kept in Western banks. Russia then responded with travel bans as well as a ban on American adoptions of Russian children. The Kremlin has outlawed institutions such as the British Council during previous diplomatic spats between the two countries, which does not leave Moscow much British property to target this time.
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| Exonerated Central Park Five members speak out: ‘Not too many things have changed since 30 years ago’ Posted: 06 Jul 2020 02:20 PM PDT  In 1989, five Black and Hispanic teens were falsely accused of raping and nearly killing Trisha Meili, a white woman jogging in Central Park. Known collectively as the Central Park Five, Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise were convicted in two trials despite a lack of eyewitness testimony or DNA evidence and spent between six and 13 years in prison. Exonerated in 2002 after an investigation confirmed that a convicted murderer and rapist had committed the crime, the Central Park Five sued the city and state of New York, settling for millions.
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| The Lincoln Project continues anti-Trump ad campaign Posted: 07 Jul 2020 09:04 AM PDT  On Tuesday, the Lincoln Project, a conservative political action committee formed in late 2019, released an ad titled "Whispers," which suggests those in President Trump's inner circle are secretly mocking him. This is the latest in a series of attack ads produced and distributed by the committee, whose members include George Conway, Steve Schmidt and other prominent Republicans who oppose Trump. Yahoo News has assembled a compilation of some of the Lincoln Project's most controversial advertisements.
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| Australia warns of 'arbitrary detention' risk in China Posted: 07 Jul 2020 02:21 AM PDT |
| Prioritize COVID aid for child care and schools to help parents and the economy: GOP leader Posted: 07 Jul 2020 02:00 AM PDT  The economic crisis will get worse if we don't reopen schools and child care. We must educate our kids safely and help our communities return to work.
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| Former Nazi camp guard, 93, faces German court reckoning Posted: 05 Jul 2020 10:12 PM PDT  The prosecution's closing arguments will be heard on Monday in the trial of a 93-year-old former Nazi concentration camp guard for complicity in the murder of more than 5,000 people during World War II. In what could be one of the last such cases of surviving Nazi guards, Bruno Dey stands accused of complicity in the murder of 5,230 people when he worked at the Stutthof camp near what was then Danzig, now Gdansk in Poland. Dey, who has appeared in court in a wheelchair, denies bearing any guilt for what happened at the camp.
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| Opinion: As colleges try to navigate coronavirus, Trump already has a cruel plan for foreign students Posted: 07 Jul 2020 11:36 AM PDT  The Trump administration will demand foreign students attend in-person college classes or leave the country.
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| North Korea Would Use Lethal 'Swarm' Attacks to Fight Posted: 06 Jul 2020 03:30 PM PDT  How is South Korea is preparing to defeat them?
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| Did Doxxing of an Oklahoma Councilwoman Lead to a Neighbor Being Raped? Posted: 07 Jul 2020 01:36 AM PDT  A city council member in Norman, Oklahoma, proposed a police budget cut. Then officers for that department posted her address online. Days later, a woman who lived in the other half of her duplex was raped by an assailant who allegedly made a political threat.The attack was a case of retaliation and mistaken identity, the council member alleges.Alexandra Scott, a Norman council member who won the Democratic nomination for her state Senate seat last month, is an outspoken critic of her city's police force. When racial justice protests swept the nation in June, Scott proposed slashing the Norman Police budget by $4.5 million. During a city council meeting about defunding, she also discussed a stalking incident she experienced, which she said police handled improperly. Now a pair of Norman Police officers are under investigation for allegedly posting Scott's personal information online, which Scott says may have led to the sexual assault of her neighbor.These 911 Emergency Dispatchers Are Ready to Defund the PoliceDefunding the police is a fraught issue across the country, but especially in Norman, where police have made their disagreements with elected officials well known. Amid calls to slash the city's police budget by millions, council members voted to reallocate $865,000 from the department. The move didn't cut the police's overall budget (it mostly vetoes the department's requested raise, but keeps the department's coffers at slightly above last year's budget) but it was enough for the city's police union to file a lawsuit against city council this month. Scott's criticism of Norman Police has made her a favorite villain in some pro-police circles in the city. A recent Facebook post shared by a Norman Police officer called her "another AOC," in reference to the New York representative who has become a boogeyperson for conservatives. That same police officer, John Barbour, is one of two under investigation for sharing Scott's personal details shortly after her testimony on police defunding. In posts first reported by the Norman Transcript, Barbour made a Facebook post sharing an unredacted video of police responding to Scott's 911 call in May. (Although details of the video remain unconfirmed, they align with Scott's own testimony about calling 911 on a stalker that month.)Neither Scott nor Norman Police returned The Daily Beast's requests for comment. Barbour declined to comment, referring The Daily Beast to the Norman Police public information officer, as his case was under investigation. A spokesperson for the group Norman Citizens for Racial Justice said Scott's address was identifiable in the post. "After Alex shared her story of solidarity during that [city council] study session, an officer released an unredacted report and some footage of her making a police report fairly recently," the spokesperson told The Daily Beast. "Those items that the officer uploaded to Facebook had her home address on there."This Utah Police Chief Was Promoted Even After His Racist Posts Were Exposed. Now Residents Want Him Out.When Barbour was met with criticism online for the video, he responded sarcastically. "So what I am getting is that if the issue was the officer let everyone see, but when someone slanders the fine officers on open record meeting it's not ok to find out the proof," he posted, apparently accusing Scott of being dishonest in her testimony.Barbour removed the video but shared a recent police report (from when Scott was arrested at a recent protest) that contained her address. In comments viewed by The Daily Beast, Barbour accused Scott of participating in a riot. When commenters noted that "you can't just call protesters rioters … There was no riot," Barbour responded, "If you say so….but I bet state law says different."Another Norman Police officer, Michael Lauderback, appears to have also shared Scott's personal information using the Facebook handle "Tired Ofthehate," which was linked to his legal name. Lauderback posted a picture of a sexual assault report Scott made in 2015. Lauderback could not be reached for comment and appears to have since deleted his Facebook account.Both officers are now under investigation for posting Scott's personal information, the Norman Record reported. The police department noted that since Barbour claimed to have obtained the video from a third party who obtained it through a public records request, the officers' posts appear to be legal.But Scott and Norman Citizens for Racial Justice said the posts play into a larger culture of harassment that has emerged on Norman-centric social media. "Most of the targeting happened after we started advocating for defunding the police," the Racial Justice spokesperson told The Daily Beast, noting that many people in her group were experiencing harassment from a "ReOpen Norman" Facebook page.In a since-deleted Facebook post, Scott said that social media activity had led to real-world horror for her and a neighbor."People were passing around my address on social media (and wherever else) for 2 weeks & making light of my experiences with assault and stalking," she wrote. "I've received threatening messages and voicemails from men stating they, 'hoped I didn't need the police' when something happened."Scott claims those threats came to a head late last month. Her address, which was shared publicly, is in a duplex building. On June 27, someone broke into the other half of the duplex and assaulted Scott's neighbor."She was raped by [a] stranger who broke into her side of our duplex last night. She had been out with her father, he dropped her off around Midnight and left. Then she was assaulted in her hallway," Scott wrote in the now-deleted post. "Her rapist dug his elbow into her neck, pushed her into the wall, and told her 'Maybe next time you'll learn your lesson.' He threw her on the ground and raped her."The attack, she said, was intended for her. "They got the wrong woman," she wrote. Norman Police released a statement acknowledging the incident and the prior publication of the address on social media although, in a heavily redacted police report obtained by the Transcript, the incident is described as a burglary.Since Norman Police officers posted Scott's address, it has circulated on right-wing Oklahoma pages, where it remains online. Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Biden campaign rolls out new fonts from typeface powerhouse Hoefler & Co. Posted: 06 Jul 2020 01:24 PM PDT  The fonts are from the same company behind typefaces for the Obamas, Rolling Stone, Twitter, Tiffany & Co., the Guggenheim, Condé Nast and Nike.
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| Giffords group takes aim at key U.S. Senate races in new push for gun limits Posted: 07 Jul 2020 03:23 AM PDT  With Democrats' chances of flipping the Senate improving as Republican President Donald Trump's poll numbers slide ahead of the Nov. 3 election, the group said background checks were a wedge issue that could win support from critical voting blocs in close races and beyond. "This issue helps Democrats in every single state and every single congressional district," Senator Chris Murphy said in an interview, citing opinion polls that show background checks are popular even among Republican voters.
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| Retired Air National Guard colonel apologizes for comments about Vanessa Guillen Posted: 06 Jul 2020 10:07 AM PDT  Betsy Schoeller wrote: "Sexual harassment is the price of admission for women" in the military and "If you're gonna cry like a snowflake about it, you're gonna pay the price."
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| A rare case of brain-eating amoeba has been confirmed in Florida. Officials are telling residents to avoid tap water, and to swim with nose clips. Posted: 06 Jul 2020 07:38 AM PDT  The Florida Department of Health had to issue a warning for residents to avoid nasal contact with tap water.
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| U.S. Sends Major Military Muscle to the South China Sea Posted: 06 Jul 2020 02:22 PM PDT  The joint exercise included a B-52 bomber that flew all the way from Louisiana on a 28-hour-long mission.
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| Russia, China veto UN extension of cross-border aid in Syria Posted: 07 Jul 2020 04:06 PM PDT  Russia and China on Tuesday vetoed a UN Security Council resolution that would have extended authorization for cross-border humanitarian aid in Syria for a year. Germany and Belgium, two of the council's non-permanent members, had drafted the resolution, which would have allowed aid to continue to pass through two points on the Turkish border without interference from Damascus. Beyond Russia and China, the other 13 members of the council voted to approve the draft, the diplomats said.
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| Supreme Court hands victory to school voucher lobby – will religious minorities, nonbelievers and state autonomy lose out? Posted: 07 Jul 2020 05:15 AM PDT  The Supreme Court's recent decision that Montana cannot exclude donations that go to religious schools from a small tax credit program could have consequences felt far beyond the state.The 5-4 ruling in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, which came down June 30, follows on from recent cases that have expanded what counts as discrimination against religion under the U.S. Constitution, making it harder for states to deny grants to faith-based institutions.From my perspective as a scholar of law and religion, this latest ruling could massively limit states' ability to exclude religious schools from all sorts of funding, including controversial voucher programs which allow state funds to be used by parents to send children to a private school. And rather than preventing religious discrimination, the court's decision may actually support a system that discriminates against religious minorities and those of no faith. A win for voucher advocatesThe Espinoza decision was quickly hailed as a major win by supporters of school vouchers, including Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. It isn't the first time they have cheered the court.In 2002, the Supreme Court, in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris, ruled in favor of a voucher program in Ohio which overwhelmingly benefited religious schools. The court held that the program did not violate the U.S. Constitution's Establishment Clause which limits government support for, and promotion of, religion.That decision broke with a long line of previous cases, which held that government could not use taxpayer dollars to fund religious education. In the years following the Zelman decision, public support for school voucher programs has grown. The election of President Donald Trump and appointment of DeVos as education secretary gave the pro-voucher lobby powerful advocates in the administration. The White House has made vouchers a central plank of their schools policy, with Trump likening "school choice" – a term that includes the use of vouchers – as the "civil rights statement" of the decade.Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has paved the way for religious schools to benefit from vouchers through a series of rulings.In addition to Zelman, and as a precursor to Espinoza, the justices ruled in 2017 that a Missouri program that provided free playground chips for resurfacing, could not deny access to a religious school seeking to resurface its playground. In that case, Trinity Lutheran v. Comer, the justices held that refusing the grant contravened the Constitution's Free Exercise Clause, which prohibits discrimination against religion, among other things.Until then, the doctrine had been limited to situations in which a government discriminated against a religion through hostility toward that faith, such as when the City of Hialeah, Florida, created a series of ordinances to discriminate against the practice of Santeria. In a footnote in the Trinity Lutheran case, the justices specifically noted that the decision was limited and did "not address religious uses of funding" such as for attendance at religious schools. But in Espinoza, the Supreme Court has essentially ignored that narrower reading. Instead, the court held that exclusion of donations to religious schools from the state tax credit program discriminates against religion. Siphoning fundsThis has significant implications for school vouchers. It could force states to include religious schools in any program that is open to private nonreligious schools. So if a state allows for parents to use vouchers to take a child out of the public school system, then religious schools must be allowed to benefit from those funds.But rather than preventing religious discrimination, the expansion of voucher plans, in my view, may actually encourage it.The majority of private schools are religious – and in some areas with voucher programs, religious schools make up more than 90% of private schools.In most districts, religious schools that can afford to take voucher students represent only a few larger denominations that are able to highly subsidize religious education. For example, in the Cleveland School District involved in the Zelman case, 96% of voucher recipients went to religious schools representing just one or two denominations. But vouchers strip money from public education – every voucher going to a private school means a loss of per student funding for public schools.This would force the parents of religious minorities, agnostics and atheists to choose between sending their children to a school that may provide religious teaching that goes against their wishes or leave their children in public schools that will be further drained of funding and students.The Espinoza ruling did leave the door ajar a little when it comes to limiting vouchers to religious private schools. The court draws a tightrope-like line between discrimination based on religious status – the fact that a school is religious – and situations where the denial of funding is based on concerns the funds will support religious functions.But precedent suggests walking this tightrope might be difficult for states and school districts. The Supreme Court's decision in Zelman upheld vouchers for religious schools including those which proselytize. It is hard to imagine how a state might prevent funds from going to a faith-based school without it being seen as denying funding based on that school's religious status. Of course, states can simply not have voucher or tax credit programs for private schools – the Espinoza decision makes it clear that this is acceptable. And some states already do this. For example, Michigan explicitly prevents taxpayer money going to private schools regardless of whether those schools are religious or not.But even these bans on taxpayer funding for private education are increasingly being challenged by school voucher enthusiasts and religious groups. Put on noticeIn Espinoza, the Supreme Court has put states and school districts on notice that if they have voucher programs they can not prevent taxpayer money from being used at religious private schools. That could leave some parents with an uncomfortable choice between sending a child to a public school that is losing funding as a result of vouchers or a religious private school that may proselytize their children.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * An old debate over religion in school is opening up again * Are yoga and mindfulness in schools religious?Frank S. Ravitch does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| More than 100 earthquakes rattled Yellowstone in June — but that’s OK, experts say Posted: 06 Jul 2020 02:41 PM PDT  There's nothing to fear at Yellowstone unless a person wandered off the path and fell into a hot spring, USGS said.
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| Texas Education Agency Issues Guidelines For Reopening Schools During Coronavirus Pandemic Posted: 07 Jul 2020 02:15 PM PDT  The TEA said parents and teachers should expect to see some campuses close for brief periods during the upcoming school year, due to COVID-19 infections.
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| What unites young people against Obama and Trump Posted: 07 Jul 2020 02:33 PM PDT  The push to bring down memorials has renewed criticisms of "cancel culture" from current and past presidents.
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| ‘Let me borrow your bike’: Atlanta police officer takes passing man’s bicycle to chase fleeing murder suspect Posted: 07 Jul 2020 06:27 AM PDT  Police in Atlanta were able to apprehend a murder suspect thanks to a passerby's bicycle.The Atlanta Police Department said in a statement that the suspect had been seen around the Old Fourth Ward area last Tuesday when one cop commandeered a bicycle to chase the man down.
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| Turkey warns it will respond if EU takes fresh measures against it Posted: 06 Jul 2020 09:58 AM PDT  Turkey will respond with its own steps if the European Union imposes further sanctions on Ankara, Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Monday after meeting the EU's top diplomat. France's foreign minister said last week EU ministers would discuss Turkey on July 13 and said new sanctions on Ankara could be considered in addition to steps taken over Turkey's drilling in the Cyprus economic zone.
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| China blackmailing dissenters in US to return home – FBI chief Posted: 07 Jul 2020 05:30 PM PDT  * Christopher Wray condemns Operation Fox Hunt campaign * 'A sweeping bid to target Chinese nationals Xi sees as threats'Chinese agents have been pursuing hundreds of Chinese nationals living in the US in an effort to force their return, as part of a global campaign against the country's diaspora, known as Operation Fox Hunt, the FBI director has said.In a speech about the security threat posed by China, during which he said Beijing's counterintelligence work was "greatest long-term threat to our nation's information and intellectual property and to our economic vitality", Christopher Wray gave the example of one Fox Hunt target who was given a choice of going back to China or killing themselves.Fox Hunt was launched six years ago by President Xi Jinping, ostensibly to pursue corrupt officials and business executives who had fled abroad. Beijing has celebrated its claimed successes, publicising the return of hundreds of economic fugitives, and issuing wanted lists of those still at large. The Obama administration complained about the activities of undercover agents in 2015.Wray said the operation's principal aim now was to suppress dissent among the diaspora.He told the Hudson Institute in Washington: "China describes Fox Hunt as some kind of international anti-corruption campaign. It is not. Instead, Fox Hunt is a sweeping bid by Xi to target Chinese nationals who he sees as threats and who live outside of China, across the world."We're talking about political rivals, dissidents and critics seeking to expose China's extensive human rights violations."The FBI director said: "Hundreds of these Fox Hunt victims that they target live right here in the United States, and many are American citizens or green card holders. The Chinese government wants to force them to return to China, and China's tactics to accomplish that are shocking."For example, when it couldn't locate one Fox Hunt target, the Chinese government sent an emissary to visit the target's family here in the US. The message they said to pass on: the target had two options, returned to China promptly or commit suicide."Wray said that Fox Hunt operations, directed by China's ministry of public security, were also under way in other countries, and the FBI had been cooperating with its partners to foil Chinese efforts at intimidation. He said Chinese nationals in the US were often coerced by thinly veiled threats against their families back in China.Asked about other coercive tactics used, he replied: "Use your imagination. You're not going to be far off."He appealed to anyone in the US who thought they were a Fox Hunt target to "please reach out to your local FBI field office".Wray portrayed China as an aggressive rival with little or no regard for international or national laws. He said that nearly half the FBI's 5,000 active counter-intelligence cases were China-related.China was using leverage, pressure or persuasion through intermediaries on federal, state and local officials, as well as US corporations and media, to win support for Chinese foreign policy positions. Wray said such efforts had been stepped up during the coronavirus outbreak, aimed at generating praise for Beijing's handling of the pandemic.Although he did not say whether China backed either Donald Trump or his presumptive Democratic rival, Joe Biden, he claimed China was pushing its preferences for the outcome of the 2020 presidential election."China's malign foreign influence campaign targets our policies, our positions, 24/7, 365 days a year," Wray said. "So it's not an election-specific threat; it's really more of an all-year, all-the-time threat. But certainly that has implications for elections and they certainly have preferences that go along with that."The FBI director said that China was also involved in mass hacking, identity theft and intellectual property espionage, and there are 1,000 investigations into "China's actual and attempted theft of technology" in all the bureau's 56 field offices."The people of the United States are the victims of what amounts to Chinese theft on a scale so massive that it represents one of the largest transfers of wealth in human history," Wray said.In an interview on Tuesday, the US secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, said that the US was considering banning the social media platform TikTok and other Chinese-made apps.India banned TikTok and over 50 other Chinese apps last week, in the wake of clashes on the China-India border in which 20 Indian soldiers were killed."We're certainly looking at it," Pompeo told Fox News. "With respect to Chinese apps on people's cellphones, I can assure you the United States will get this one right. I don't want to get out in front of the president, but it's something we're looking at."
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| Nearly half of Brits back plan to give 3m people from Hong Kong path to citizenship Posted: 07 Jul 2020 11:30 AM PDT  Nearly half of British adults support the Government's proposal to welcome Hong Kongers, a poll has revealed. The Savanta ComRes survey found just one in four oppose the proposal to offer Hong Kongers that hold British National Overseas (BNO) Passports and their dependents a bespoke five-year visa, with the pathway to later apply for full UK citizenship. Over two in five Brits (42 per cent) expressed support for Boris Johnson having made this offer, with just one in four (25 per cent) expressing any opposition. Support is higher among those who say they are familiar with recent events in Hong Kong, with half (50 per cent) expressing outright support. Not since 1997 and the handover of Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China has the UK ever been involved in such a heated clash over the territory's future.
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| Brit Hume says criticism of Trump's Mount Rushmore speech 'could be a turning point' for the president Posted: 06 Jul 2020 08:50 PM PDT  I've rarely seen such biased and misleading coverage, says Fox News senior political analyst Brit Hume on 'Fox News @ Night.'
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| Germany lambasts 'shameful' handling of migration by EU Posted: 07 Jul 2020 06:13 AM PDT  It is "shameful" that the European Union has still not found a solution for the care of asylum seekers five years after the migration crisis, German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, whose country holds the EU Presidency, said Tuesday. "Each boat requires painstaking efforts to achieve a distribution (of migrants) among member states," said Seehofer. Seehofer is counting on persuasion to get more member states involved, but acknowledged that the task was "very, very difficult".
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| Prosecutors: gunmen in Mexico massacre of 27 had a target Posted: 06 Jul 2020 12:21 PM PDT  The gunmen who killed at least 27 people in an unregistered drug rehabilitation center in the central Mexican state of Guanajuato last week were looking for someone in particular, state prosecutors said Monday. In a statement, the Guanajuato state prosecutor's office said that three suspected gunmen were in custody and allegedly belong to a criminal organization operating in the area, though the agency did not specify which group. The men arrived at the two-story rehabilitation center in Irapuato Wednesday evening and forced their way past women on the ground floor.
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| Trump 'going with his gut' in fanning racism, frustrating some White House aides Posted: 07 Jul 2020 01:19 PM PDT  Aides prefer him to focus on his wins and offer sharp criticism of his opponent, Joe Biden.
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| Seven men arrested after shouting racist insults and doing Nazi salutes at black family on Oregon beach, police say Posted: 06 Jul 2020 11:37 AM PDT  Seven men have been arrested after an alleged racist incident on the Fourth of July in an Oregon beach town.Police said that the men allegedly yelled racial slurs at a black family and used Nazi salutes while people spent Independence Day on the beach in Lincoln City, southwest of Portland.
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| Dozens of Florida hospitals out of available ICU beds, state data shows Posted: 07 Jul 2020 09:55 AM PDT  Hospital ICUs were full at 54 hospitals across 25 of Florida's 67 counties, according to data published on Tuesday morning by the state's Agency for Health Care Administration. More than 300 hospitals were included in the report, but not all had adult ICUs. Thirty hospitals reported that their ICUs were more than 90% full.
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| What the top 25 colleges and universities in the US have said about their plans to reopen in fall 2020, from postponing the semester to offering more remote coursework Posted: 06 Jul 2020 01:54 PM PDT  The spread of the coronavirus led many major US colleges to switch to remote coursework. Now, universities are discussing how they'll reopen.
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| Gun violence kills 160 as holiday weekend exposes tale of 'two Americas' Posted: 07 Jul 2020 02:00 AM PDT  With more than 500 wounded across the US, local leaders see racism and under-investment at the root of the crisisA six-year-old in Philadelphia, a seven-year-old in Chicago, an eight-year-old in Atlanta, a 15-year-old in New York, all shot. Community cries of "enough is enough".Neighborhoods in some of the largest US cities erupted in gun violence over the Fourth of July weekend, killing an estimated 160 people and leaving more than 500 wounded from Friday night to Sunday.Georgia's governor, Brian Kemp, declared a state of emergency on Monday after 31 people were shot and five killed over the weekend in Atlanta. He authorized 1,000 national guard troops to "protect state property and patrol our streets".But Chicago saw the worst violence in one of the bloodiest holiday weekends in recent memory, ending with 17 people fatally shot including a seven-year-old girl and a 14-year-old boy and 63 more wounded, an increase of five shootings on the high figures that had marred the holiday weekend the previous year.Despite an effort that included an additional 1,200 officers on the streets and pleas from the city's mayor, Lori Lightfoot, for residents not to reverse limited progress that had been made against the epidemic of gun violence, Lightfoot lamented the children whose "hopes and dreams were ended by the barrel of a gun".The city's south and west sides have seen worse weekends this year, however, and a one-year-old and a three-year-old were killed during recent shootings. The rising violence prompted Donald Trump to write to Lightfoot and the Illinois governor, JB Priztker, both Democrats, accusing them of receiving more than $1bn in special federal funding for anti-crime measures and coronavirus relief that was "not being turned into results"."Your lack of leadership … continues to fail the people you have sworn to protect," the letter said.Lightfoot dismissed Trump's letter as "all talk, little action".The shooting death of an eight-year-old girl, Secoriea Turner, in Atlanta, prompted the mayor, Keisha Lance Bottoms, to call for justice while noting the shadow such street violence casts over the huge and largely peaceful Black Lives Matter protests against racism and police brutality."Enough is enough," Bottoms said. "If you want people to take us seriously and you don't want us to lose this movement, we can't lose each other."The shooting happened near the Wendy's restaurant where a Black man, Rayshard Brooks, was killed by a white police officer in June."She was only eight years old," Charmaine Turner said of her daughter Secoriea. "Right now, she would have been on TikTok, dancing on her phone."Atlanta police said two other people were killed and more than 20 injured in gunfire during the holiday weekend.In New York, a series of shootings on Saturday and Sunday claimed at least nine lives and wounded 41 others in a rise in incidents in some neighborhoods. A 15-year-old boy was wounded in the Bronx.And in Philadelphia, a six-year-old boy died of a gunshot wound amid five fatal shootings in about five hours on Sunday afternoon, police said.The Trace, a non-profit news website covering gun violence in the US, which tallied the weekend toll of shootings in the US, reported that preliminary research from the University of California, Davis, has found a potential link between the rise in violence and a surge in gun-buying during the coronavirus pandemic, of more than 2.1 million more guns than usual between March and May.> Chicago is, woefully, a tale of two cities and across the country it's a tale of two Americas> > Rev Gregory LivingstonThe Rev Gregory Livingston, a pastor and civil rights leader who moved to New York last summer after many years running an anti-violence community organization in his native Chicago, spoke of Chicago "going through absolute madness".But he warned that nationwide systemic racism that is not being addressed, and the "violent history" of America that has not been reckoned with were dividing people and causing some communities to break down."Chicago is, woefully, a tale of two cities, and across the country it's a tale of two Americas. Chicago is a very segregated city, and that legacy is part of what's fueling this horrific violence," Livingston told the Guardian.He condemned "corruption and racism" and said the pandemic and economic fallout had exacerbated inequality. The pandemic has been disproportionately hard on Black Americans already suffering economic and healthcare deprivations.Livingston campaigned strongly to vote out the previous Chicago mayor, Rahm Emanuel. Lightfoot has been in the position since May 2019, and has just appointed a new police chief.Lightfoot agreed with Livingston's point that a long history of segregation in Chicago and under-investment were "at the root" of the "explosion" of violence."You have to give a sense of hope. You have to reach out to those young men on the corners who are the shooters, but it can't just be on the police and the city government. It's all hands on deck," Lightfoot said.She said of Trump: "We are leading. He needs to take our lead and follow it."Livingston called on Lightfoot to tackle racism and policing problems "head on"."There is an individual responsibility [among those shooting], but there are also conditions that create a climate of violence," he said.He accused the New York mayor, Bill de Blasio, of being "scared" of confronting racism in the New York police department. "There is no courage in city hall," he said.And he warned mayors across the US that Chicago was the "control" for what would happen elsewhere this summer if inequality and the demands of protesters coast to coast since George Floyd, an African American, was killed in Minneapolis by a white police officer did not spur change.The White House press secretary, Kayleigh McEnany, declared herself dismayed that she was not asked about the weekend shootings at her briefing on Monday, despite citing "a doubling of shootings in New York City for the third straight week".> Multiple shootings in multiple Democrat-run cities such as New York and Chicago. Tragic loss of life. > > But not one question during the briefing... pic.twitter.com/krdPbmyr1w> > — Kayleigh McEnany (@PressSec) July 6, 2020Journalists at the briefing responded that she had ended the 22-minute briefing and departed while many were still waiting, hands raised, to ask questions.
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| Mysterious damage to Iran nuclear site: what we know Posted: 07 Jul 2020 03:05 AM PDT  A mysterious incident in the early hours of Thursday, July 2, badly damaged a building at Iran's Natanz nuclear complex and sparked speculation over the cause. The incident came at the end of a week marked by two explosions in Tehran, including one near a military site. Israel and the United States accuse their arch foe Iran of trying to build an atomic bomb -- a charge the Islamic Republic has always denied.
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| Arctic Siberia's record high temperatures a 'warning cry', EU warns Posted: 07 Jul 2020 12:57 AM PDT  Temperatures in Arctic Siberia soared to a record average for June amid a heat wave that is stoking some of the worst wildfires the region has ever known, European Union (EU) data showed on Tuesday. Global temperatures last month were on par with a 2019 record, and "exceptional warmth" was recorded over Arctic Siberia, the EU's earth observation programme Copernicus said, part of a trend scientists are calling a "warning cry". Average temperatures in the region were more than five degrees Celsius (about 9°F) above normal and more than a degree higher than the two previous warmest Junes, in 2018 and 2019, the data showed. The World Meteorological Organization is also seeking to confirm reports of a temperature reading of more than 100°F (38°C) in Siberia, which would be the highest temperature recorded north of the Arctic Circle. "What is worrisome is that the Arctic is warming faster than the rest of the world," said Carlo Buontempo, director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service. The exceptional heat has sapped moisture from the earth across the region's vast boreal forests and tundra, fanning wildfires that have intensified since mid-June. The Russian forestry agency said that, as of July 6, there were 246 forest fires covering 140,073 hectares and an emergency situation has been declared in seven regions. Russian state TV footage this week showed planes dumping water near huge columns of white smoke. Copernicus says the fires have surpassed the record number of blazes seen in the region in the same month of last year. "Higher temperatures and drier surface conditions are providing ideal conditions for these fires to burn and to persist for so long over such a large area," said Mark Parrington, senior scientist at Copernicus. Wildfire carbon dioxide emissions from the region last month were an estimated 59 megatonnes, compared with 53 megatonnes last year, the EU said.
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| Trump approval divides Democrats, Republicans like no president has before, poll finds Posted: 06 Jul 2020 09:13 AM PDT  The approval gap between voters of both parties is the biggest ever recorded by Gallup.
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| Georgia Gov. authorizes Guard troops after 8-year-old killed Posted: 06 Jul 2020 12:00 AM PDT  Georgia's governor on Monday declared a state of emergency and authorized the activation of up to 1,000 National Guard troops after a weekend of violence in Atlanta left five people dead, including an 8-year-old girl. A statement from Gov. Brian Kemp's office says troops will provide support at certain locations including the Capitol and governor's mansion, freeing up state law enforcement resources to patrol other areas. Saturday night's fatal shooting of Secoriea Turner, 8, prompted a $10,000 reward for information as authorities searched for at least two people who opened fire on the car she was riding in near a flashpoint of recent protests.
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| Three Mars missions poised to launch to the Red Planet in July Posted: 07 Jul 2020 08:23 AM PDT  The busy schedule begins July 14 with the United Arab Emirates' first-ever interplanetary effort.
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