July 24, 2023

Late Morning/Afternoon Update:

Seung Min Kim of the AP: "President Joe Biden is tapping Shuwanza Goff -- a veteran congressional aide who also served as his main point of contact to the House at the start of the administration -- as his new director of legislative affairs, making her the first Black woman to be the White House's chief emissary to Capitol Hill. Goff succeeds Louisa Terrell in the role, a position that is especially vital for a president who spent more than three decades in Congress and takes pride in his connections to lawmakers. Goff comes into the job with deep relationships not just with Democrats but with Republicans, including House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., that were honed over more than a decade on Capitol Hill. In a statement announcing the hire, Biden called Goff a 'proven leader and trusted voice on both sides of the aisle' who played a key role in the biggest legislative accomplishments from the first two years of his presidency ... as well as the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson."

Texas. Chris Boyette & Priscilla Alvarez of CNN: "Texas Gov. Greg Abbott will not be ordering floating barriers to be removed from the Rio Grande, in defiance of the US Department of Justice. 'Texas will fully utilize its constitutional authority to deal with the crisis you have caused,' Abbott wrote in a letter to President Joe Biden following last week's DOJ request to remove the barriers. He added, 'Texas will see you in court, Mr. President.' The showdown between Abbott and the federal government comes as Texas' treatment of migrants who attempt to cross into the US illegally faces increased scrutiny. Biden administration officials have grown increasingly concerned in recent months about Abbott's measures, which have disrupted US Border Patrol operations in the region and put migrants at risk."

Tia Goldenberg & Isaac Scharf of the AP: "Israeli lawmakers on Monday approved a key portion of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's divisive plan to reshape the country's justice system despite massive protests that have exposed unprecedented fissures in Israeli society. The vote came after a stormy session in which opposition lawmakers chanted 'shame' and then stormed out of the chamber. It reflected the determination of Netanyahu and his far-right allies to move ahead with the plan, which has tested the delicate social ties that bind the country, rattled the cohesion of its powerful military and repeatedly drawn concern from its closest ally, the United States.... In Monday's vote, lawmakers approved a measure that prevents judges from striking down government decisions on the basis that they are 'unreasonable.' With the opposition out of the hall, the measure passed by a 64-0 margin." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I couldn't figure out precisely why the opposition "stormed out of the chamber" and was "out of the hall" for the vote, but according to the NYT liveblog, also linked below, "... members of the opposition left the chamber, boycotting the vote they had no chance of winning."

Twitter Isn't Twitter Anymore. Noam Scheiber & Ryan Mac of the New York Times: "Elon Musk has made one of the most visible changes to Twitter since he took control of the social media company last fall: replacing its widely recognized bird logo.... A stylized, black-and-white X appeared on the company's website in place of the blue bird logo. Twitter's corporate accounts also adopted the new branding, which was projected onto the side of the company's headquarters in San Francisco overnight.... 'X' is a term for what Mr. Musk has described as an 'everything app' that could combine social media, instant messaging and payment services, akin to the popular Chinese app WeChat." This is an update of a story linked below. The NBC News story is here. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Wikipedia already is referring to Twitter in the past tense.

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The "Trump Tax." Glenn Thrush, et al., of the New York Times: "Jack Smith, the special counsel overseeing criminal investigations into ... Donald J. Trump, employs 40 to 60 career prosecutors, paralegals and support staff, augmented by a rotating cast of F.B.I. agents and technical specialists.... In his first four months on the job, starting in November, Mr. Smith's investigation incurred expenses of $9.2 million. That included $1.9 million to pay the U.S. Marshals Service to protect Mr. Smith, his family and other investigators who have faced threats after the former president and his allies singled them out on social media. At this rate, the special counsel is on track to spend about $25 million a year.... Even the $25 million figure only begins to capture the full scale of the resources dedicated by federal, state and local officials to address Mr. Trump's behavior before, during and after his presidency.... Justice Department officials have long said that the effort alone to prosecute the members of the pro-Trump mob who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, is the largest investigation in its history....

"The main driver of all these efforts and their concurrent expenses is Mr. Trump's own behavior -- his unwillingness to accept the results of an election as every one of his predecessors has done, his refusal to heed his own lawyers' advice and a grand jury's order to return government documents and his lashing out at prosecutors in personal terms." Emphasis added. ~~~

~~~ It turns out Trump is reading his bad press. Phillip Nieto of Mediaite reports that Trump took to Liars' Social Sunday night to write about the "coordinated Hoax" designed "to STEAL ANOTHER ELECTION through PROSECUTORIAL MISCONDUCT at levels never seen before in the U.S. Deranged Jack Smith has already spent over $25,000,000!" In a later post, he wrote, "Just think of it! Between Mueller, Deranged Jack Smith, and Congressional Committees, over 100 Million Dollars has been spent investigating me since I came down the escalator in Trump Tower. Biden is a criminal, and almost no money, by comparison, has been spent investigating him. Get smart, Republicans, they are trying to steal the Election from you!" An hour later he wrote, "Merrick Garland, Deranged Jack Smith, and coordinating Democrat 'Prosecutors' in New York and Atlanta, have become the Campaign Managers for the most corrupt and incompetent President in United States history, Joe Biden! Who would have thought this could happen in our once great Country?" MB: Who, indeed? And funny how Trump seemed to skip the part of the story that said out how the expenditures were the result of his own bad acts.

Jennifer Rubin of the Washington Post: "The twice-indicted Donald Trump has a perfect record: He has lost every important challenge in the multiple, major legal cases swirling around him. Sometimes, this has happened at the trial court level; sometimes, it's been on appeal. But eventually, he has lost on every significant issue, civil or criminal, to come up. That ought to tell us something about the former president's ability to navigate the rough legal waters ahead of him -- and how dramatically the excuses his team serves up for the right-wing media zombies fall short in courts of law.... What passes for an argument on right-wing media or for MAGA cult members and lawmakers carries no weight in courts of law." MB: I dunno. "I declassified it in my mind" and "It was a perfect phone call" convinced me.

Marquise Francis & Andrew Romano of Yahoo! News cite the results of a new Yahoo News/You-Gov poll: "Asked how much of a problem racism currently is, just 19% of Trump voters describe racism against Black Americans as a 'big problem.' Twice as many (37%) say racism against white Americans is a big problem. Trump voters and self-identified Republicans -- overlapping but not identical cohorts -- are the only demographic groups identified by Yahoo News and YouGov who are more likely to say racism against white Americans is a problem than to say the same about racism against Black Americans." Via Mediaite.

Presidential Race 2024

Even Ron DeSantis Thinks Ron DeSantis is Bizarre. Tommy Christoper of Mediaite: "New York Times correspondent ... Maggie Haberman revealed that the much-derided anti-LGBTQ video attacking ex-President Donald Trump was produced by a Ron DeSantis staffer and 'passed off' to a supporter for publication. 'To wrap up "Pride Month," let's hear from the politician who did more than any other Republican to celebrate it....' the DeSantis War Room tweeted on June 30, along with a video that would be derided near-universally as bizarre and rabidly homophobic -- yet also oddly homoerotic. The video appeared in the tweet to originate from another account, and merely retweeted and commented on by the official DeSantis campaign account[.] But according to a deep dive on the DeSantis campaign 'reboot' published by Haberman and Shane Goldmacher, the retweet was a subterfuge to conceal the fact that the video was produced in-house[.]"

Report from the Dark Side. Philip Bump of the Washington Post explores how Donald Trump has been able to convince "his base that his indictments were aimed at them: ... [by exploiting] misinformation in the right-wing media, eight years of identifying as the base's voice, claims that the elites are worried about his imminent reelection...."

Kelly Garrity of Politico: "Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. blamed the media for dragging his campaign Sunday, saying he has been slammed 'even more than President Trump was slammed' by mainstream media outlets. 'I've been really, you know, slammed in a way that I think is unprecedented,' Kennedy said during an interview on Fox News" 'Sunday Morning Futures.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

This Should Fix Everything. Noam Scheiber & Ryan Mac of the New York Times: "Elon Musk said he was about to make one of the most visible changes to Twitter since he took control of the social media company last fall: replacing its widely recognized bird logo. In a tweet early Sunday morning Eastern time, Mr. Musk said that 'soon we shall bid adieu to the twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.'" Maybe he could rename Twitter "Muskville" or "Das Muskenhangers." At the top of today's Comments, Akhilleus has some much better ideas.

Beyond the Beltway

Florida. Washington Post Editors: "Florida public schools will now teach students that the once constitutionally protected system under which enslavers bought and sold human beings had an apparent upside.... Enslaved Black people 'developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.' The state's public school curriculum developed by the administration of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis ... will now also teach that the race massacres of the 19th and 20th centuries were 'perpetuated by' both Black and White Americans.... The revised curriculum follows the governor's rejection of a new Advanced Placement African American studies course, which his administration claimed 'lacks educational value.'... There is no historical counterargument to the atrocities of slavery or the racial violence that resulted from its abolition. Florida's plan to teach otherwise should alarm Americans everywhere." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I'm convinced that one of the purposes of DeSantis' dis-education campaign is to undermine Americans' faith in another fundamental American institution: public education. The entire right-wing project is to destabilize the country's institutions: the "deep-state" bureaucrats of the executive branch, Congress, the entire judicial system, the "liberal-elite" media, public libraries, whatever. While there is no question that each of the institutions within our system has plenty of room for improvement, together they form the network upon which the country runs. This also of course requires the destabilization and misinterpretation of our basic values as expressed in documents like the Constitution and its amendments and laws that enhance human rights, health and social security.

Way Beyond

Cambodia. Seth Mydans of the New York Times: "The party of the Cambodian prime minister, Hun Sen, declared victory on Sunday in stage-managed parliamentary elections that prepared the way for the first change in leadership since he took office nearly four decades ago. Although the official results will not be confirmed until Monday, the suppression of all meaningful opposition -- often by violence -- meant that Mr. Hun Sen's party was always a virtual lock to sweep the election."

Israel. The New York Times is liveblogging developments in the protests in Israel against PM Netanyahu's efforts to limit judicial oversight. "Labor and business leaders threatened to shut down the nation's economy as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition tries to push a proposal to limit judicial power through Parliament."

Spain. Jason Horowitz of the New York Times: "Spain was thrust into political uncertainty on Sunday after national elections left no party with enough support to form a government, most likely resulting in weeks of horse trading or potentially a new vote later this year. Returns showed most votes were divided between the center right and center left. But neither the governing Socialist Party of Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez nor his conservative opponents won enough ballots to govern alone in the 350-seat Parliament." CNN's report is here.

Ukraine, et al. The New York Times' live updates of developments Monday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here. ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Monday is here: "A drone struck a skyscraper in Moscow early Monday, shattering glass on its 17th and 18th floors, Russian officials reported. The wreckage of a second drone was found on Komsomolsky Prospect, a thoroughfare in central Moscow. Mayor Sergey Sobyanin said two nonresidential buildings were struck but there were no casualties.... Moscow downed the drones by electronic means, the Russian Defense Ministry said, blaming Ukraine for the attack.... The incident comes after another night of attacks on Ukraine's Odessa region. Drones targeted port infrastructure along the Danube River, injuring six people and destroying a grain hangar, said Oleh Kiper, the regional governor.... Ukraine attacked an ammunition depot in Crimea with drones overnight, the Russian-backed head of the peninsula said.... Ukraine has taken back about half of the land that Russia initially seized in the invasion, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said during an interview with CNN. However, he tempered Kyiv's inroads with warnings of a tough path ahead.... Ukrainian pilots will begin training with F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft developed by the U.S. Air Force next month, Ukrainian Defense Minister ​​Oleksii Reznikov told CNN, adding that training sessions would take place across several European countries."

News Ledes

Alabama. New York Times: "An Alabama woman whose brief disappearance this month drew national attention and prompted sprawling search efforts across the state said through a lawyer on Monday that she had faked the entire ordeal -- including her abduction and her claim of seeing a toddler on the side of a road. The woman, Carlee Russell, 25, said through her lawyer, Emory Anthony, that she had not been kidnapped on July 13 in Hoover, Ala., and that she had not seen a baby on the side of an interstate that night -- a detail that she had shared with a 911 dispatcher before being reported missing." The AP's report is here.

Florida. New York Times: "The chief of public safety for Miami-Dade County, Fla., suffered serious head injuries from a self-inflicted gunshot late on Sunday and was hospitalized in Tampa, the authorities said on Monday. Alfredo Ramirez III, who serves in a dual role as the public safety chief and the director of the Miami-Dade Police Department, the largest police department in the Southeast, was in stable condition after undergoing surgery on Monday, officials from Miami-Dade County and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement said."

July 23, 2023

Afternoon Update:

Kelly Garrity of Politico: "Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. blamed the media for dragging his campaign Sunday, saying he has been slammed 'even more than President Trump was slammed' by mainstream media outlets. 'I've been really, you know, slammed in a way that I think is unprecedented,' Kennedy said during an interview on Fox News" 'Sunday Morning Futures.'"

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Kevin Liptak of CNN: "President Joe Biden plans to name a new national monument next week after Emmett Till, a White House official told CNN, honoring the Black teenager whose murder in 1955 helped galvanize the civil rights movement. Biden will designate the monument on Tuesday, which would have been Till's 82nd birthday. 'The new monument will protect places that tell the story of Emmett Till's too-short life and racially-motivated murder, the unjust acquittal of his murderers, and the activism of his mother, Mamie Till-Mobley, who courageously brought the world's attention to the brutal injustices and racism of the time, catalyzing the civil rights movement,' a White House official said. The Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument will be centered in Illinois and Mississippi, the states where Till was from and killed, respectively."

WWJD? Shera Avi-Yonah of the Washington Post: "A three-star Air Force general said the U.S. military's approach to artificial intelligence is more ethical than adversaries' because it is a 'Judeo-Christian society.'... Lt. Gen. Richard G. Moore Jr. made the comment at a Hudson Institute event Thursday while answering a question.... 'Regardless of what your beliefs are, our society is a Judeo-Christian society, and we have a moral compass. Not everybody does,' Moore said." MB: I hope Moore is one of the general officers whose promotion Tommy Tuberville is sitting on.

Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: "In a text message [sent before January 6, 2021,] that has been scrutinized by federal prosecutors, [Trump Chief-of-Staff Mark] Meadows wrote to a White House lawyer that his son, Atlanta-area attorney Blake Meadows, had been probing possible fraud and had found only a handful of possible votes cast in dead voters' names, far short of what Trump was alleging.... [At the time, numerous] Trump aides and other Republican officials expressed deep skepticism or even openly mocked the election claims being made publicly by Trump.... Days after Meadows sent the text, he organized the [Jan. 3 call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad] Raffensperger..., in which Trump pressed to 'find' the votes in the state necessary to overturn Biden's win.... A person close to Meadows said he knows his relationship with Trump is permanently ruptured and has told others he does not seek to antagonize Trump and his supporters but concluded he had to cooperate with Smith's office as required by law." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times: "A man is running to run the government he tried to overthrow while he was running it, even as he is running to stay ahead of the law.... On an Iowa radio show on Tuesday, Trump warned it would be 'very dangerous' if [Jack] Smith jailed him, since his supporters have 'much more passion than they had in 2020.'... Meanwhile, Ron DeSantis, Trump's closest Republican challenger, defended Trump on Russell Brand's podcast Friday, dismissing the idea that there was an overt effort to upend the 2020 election. 'The idea that this was a plan to somehow overthrow the government of the United States is not true,' DeSantis said, 'and it's something that the media had spun up just to try to basically get as much mileage out of it and use it for partisan and political aims.' DeSantis seems almost as delusional as Trump...." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

I Can't Believe I Read It on Fox "News": "In an article for the Bulletin of Applied Transgender Studies, academics from Oregon State University wrote about their shock at receiving sarcasm and mockery in response to their research into undergraduate LGBTQ students studying in STEM fields. The team claimed 50 of 349 responses to their questionnaire on the topic contained 'slurs, hate speech, or direct targeting of the research team.' Labeling them 'malicious respondents,' they adapted their project to examine how the joke responses 'relate to engineering culture by framing them within larger social contexts -- namely, the rise of online fascism.'... Several answers contained profanity and other offensive and obscene language and many referenced memes. 'Online memes associated with white nationalist and fascist movements were present throughout the data, alongside memes and content referencing gaming and "nerd" culture,' the researchers further claimed." MB: The one tell that this is a Fox story is that the writer repeatedly reports that researchers "claimed" this and that; an MSM report would likely says researchers "found" those results. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.)

Presidential Race 2024

How to Lose Younger Voters. Jeff Stein of the Washington Post: "Three of Donald Trump's rivals for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination are pushing for cuts to Social Security benefits that would only affect younger Americans, as the party's leaders grapple with the explosive politics of the retirement program. In comments on Sunday as well as in interviews earlier this year, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said Social Security will need to be revamped -- but not for people who are near or in retirement. Former vice president Mike Pence and former South Carolina governor Nikki Haley have taken similar positions since launching their presidential campaigns. From the earliest days of his 2016 run, Trump has vowed not to touch either Social Security or Medicare -- a break from GOP orthodoxy that has shifted the party's views...."

The Killer Governor. Sharon LaFraniere, et al., of the New York Times: "Once a vaccine advocate, [Gov. Ron DeSantis] lost his enthusiasm for the shot before the Delta wave sent Covid hospitalizations and deaths soaring. It's a grim chapter he now leaves out of his rosy retelling of his pandemic response.... The governor now presents his Covid strategy not only as his biggest accomplishment, but as the foundation for his presidential campaign. Mr. DeSantis argues that 'Florida got it right' because he was willing to stand up for the rights of individuals despite pressure from health 'bureaucrats.'... On the single factor that ... experts say mattered most in fighting Covid -- widespread vaccinations -- Mr. DeSantis's approach proved deeply flawed. While the governor personally crusaded for Floridians 65 and older to get shots, he laid off once younger age groups became eligible. Tapping into suspicion of public health authorities, which the Republican right was fanning, he effectively stopped preaching the virtues of Covid vaccines. Instead, he emphasized his opposition to requiring anyone to get shots, from hospital workers to cruise ship guests.... Floridians died at a higher rate, adjusted for age, than residents of almost any other state during the Delta wave, according to the Times analysis." MB: People died because Ron DeSantis of Ron DeSantis' personal vanity project. And it appears that the project itself has failed. It doesn't seem this cruel, creepy opportunist will become president*. ~~~

     ~~~ OR, as Paul Campos put it in LG&$, "Ron DeSantis killed tens of thousand of Floridians because he thought opposing vaccines would help make him president. I mean 'killed' is such a harsh word -- maybe 'helped kill via reckless indifference to their potential deaths' would be fairer." Campos also notes that DeSantis is unlikely to win the GOP presidential nomination, unless a recent Michigan poll, ferinstance, has "a margin of error of 56 points."

Kevin Sullivan & Lori Rozsa of the Washington Post: "Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is intensifying his efforts to de-emphasize racism in his state's public school curriculum by arguing that some Black people benefited from being enslaved and defending his state's new African American history standards.... 'They're probably going to show that some of the folks that eventually parlayed, you know, being a blacksmith into doing things later in life,' DeSantis said on Friday in response to reporters' questions while standing in front of a nearly all-White crowd of supporters.... Civil rights leaders, educators and others have expressed revulsion at the idea that enslaved people benefited from the experience.... DeSantis said he 'wasn't involved in writing the new teaching materials, which took effect this week. But he credited 'a lot of scholars' with creating 'the most robust standards in African American history probably anywhere in the country.'" MB: I wonder if DeSantis wishes he were a slave so he too could learn blacksmithing or how to pick cotton in the noonday sun. He should try it out. Sure hope the master doesn't beat DeSantis with a whip or sell his children at the St. Augustine slave market.

Hannah Natanson of the Washington Post: "For many educational publishing companies and book sellers, sales are plunging as districts shy from purchasing content they fear might fall afoul of state laws restricting education on race, sex and gender -- or draw complaints amid a historic surge in book challenges. Meanwhile, frazzled firms are spending months negotiating with education departments, politicians and school officials to ensure the books they sell won't leave them imprisoned, slapped with onerous fines or banned from doing business in a state under the raft of new legislation." MB: I don't see what the problem is. The publishing companies could just copy the books they printed when I was a schoolgirl; those sanitized "histories" were so Rah-Rah-You-Ess-Ay and devoid of meaningful social content that they would not offend any white evangelical nationalists. I'm not sure they even mentioned slavery, for instance, although that would mean they didn't tout the benefits slaves enjoyed as a result of forced servitude.

Rebecca Robbins & Sheryl Stolberg of the New York Times: "In 2004, Gilead Sciences decided to stop pursuing a new H.I.V. drug. The public explanation was that it wasn't sufficiently different from an existing treatment to warrant further development. In private, though..., Gilead had devised a plan to delay the new drug's release to maximize profits, even though executives had reason to believe it might turn out to be safer for patients, according to a trove of internal documents made public in litigation against the company. Gilead, one of the world's largest drugmakers, appeared to be embracing a well-worn industry tactic: gaming the U.S. patent system to protect lucrative monopolies on best-selling drugs.... The 'patent extension strategy,' as the Gilead documents repeatedly called it, would allow the company to keep prices high for its tenofovir-based drugs.... The [decade-long] delayed release of the new treatment is now the subject of state and federal lawsuits in which some 26,000 patients who took Gilead's older H.I.V. drugs claim that the company unnecessarily exposed them to kidney and bone problems.... Gilead's apparent maneuver ... is so common in the pharmaceutical industry that it has a name: product hopping." MB: I hope those greedy bastards have to pay a high cruelty premium.

Dave Kindy of the Washington Post: On Thanksgiving Day 1945, Tony Bennett was stationed in Mannheim, Germany, when he bumped into a high school friend. The two young men were delighted to see each other and decided to spend the day together. It didn't work out. "An Army officer blasted the two soldiers -- one Black and the other White -- with a hate-filled rant for being together in public. In the segregated military of the day, the two men were not allowed to socialize. Back then, the punishment for Black and White soldiers associating with one another was more severe than if they fraternized with civilians in occupied Germany.... The 19-year-old corporal -- who also survived the horrors of combat and witnessed unspeakable atrocities while liberating Nazi death camps -- vowed to become a pacifist and to work for racial harmony." And he did. ~~~

     ~~~ At least a decade later and long after President Harry Truman desegregated the armed services in 1948, my uncle was a SAC pilot who, with three other officers, had to stop in some town in Florida. The Air Force chose their hotels: one for the three white guys and a different one for the Black officer, who was not permitted to stay in the nice white folks' hotel. Later, my uncle told his C.O. he wasn't going on any jaunts where AF personnel didn't receive equal accommodations. So put these stories in your school books, Ron DeSantis. Oh wait, your anti-woke legislation does not permit any text that might make some white students "feel uncomfortable."

Beyond the Beltway

California. A Bigoted Protest Backfires. Jill Cowan of the New York Times: Adrianne "Peterson, who has run [a San Diego L]ibrary branch since 2012 and highlighted books for Pride Month for the better part of a decade, was taken aback when she read an email last month from two neighborhood residents. They informed her that they had gotten nearly all of the books in the Pride display checked out and would not return them unless the library permanently removed what they considered 'inappropriate content.'... The text of their email was identical to a template posted online by a right-wing group called CatholicVote, which has an office in Indiana and is not affiliated with the Catholic church.... Soon..., stacks of Amazon boxes containing new copies of the books the protesters checked out started to arrive at the library after The San Diego Union-Tribune reported on the protest."

Florida Voter Suppression. Jane Timm of NBC News: "Florida Democrats say they're spending and organizing to chase down people who vote by mail after election officials across the state canceled all standing mail ballot requests this year. The mass cancellations were to comply with a 2021 election law that added new restrictions to mail-in voting. The legislation -- which was celebrated by Gov. Ron DeSantis and slammed by voting rights advocates as discriminatory -- cut the duration of mail-in ballot requests in half from four years to two. It also required that existing requests for mail ballots be canceled at the end of 2022, forcing election workers to cancel millions of requests and start their lists of vote-by-mail voters from scratch."

Way Beyond

Reuters: "The G20 bloc of wealthy economies meeting in India failed to reach a consensus on phasing down fossil fuels on Saturday after objections by some producer nations. Scientists and campaigners are exasperated by international bodies' foot-dragging on action to curb global heating even as extreme weather across the northern hemisphere underlined the climate crisis facing the world. The G20 member countries together account for more than three-quarters of global emissions and gross domestic product, so a cumulative effort by the group to decarbonise is crucial in the global fight against climate breakdown.... Saudi Arabia, Russia, China, South Africa and Indonesia are all known to oppose the goal of tripling renewable energy capacity this decade."

Israel. Patrick Kingsley & Isabel Kershner of the New York Times:"Thousands of demonstrators were camped outside Israel's Parliament on Sunday as lawmakers debated a key part of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's plan to overhaul the judiciary, a proposal that has sparked perhaps the country's gravest domestic crisis since its founding 75 years ago. Talks were ongoing to reach an 11th-hour compromise over the judicial dispute, which centers on Mr. Netanyahu's plan to limit the ways in which the Supreme Court can overturn government decisions. But for now, lawmakers are expected to hold a binding vote on the law on Monday in Parliament, where Mr. Netanyahu's far-right and religiously conservative ruling coalition holds a four-seat majority." This is a liveblog. ~~~

~~~ Tia Goldenberg of the AP: "Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was recovering in a hospital on Sunday after an emergency heart procedure while opposition to his government's contentious judicial overhaul plan reached a fever pitch and unrest gripped the country. Netanyahu's doctors said on Sunday the heart pacemaker implantation went smoothly and that Netanyahu, 73, felt fine. According to his office, he was expected to be discharged later in the day."

Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Sunday in Russia's war on Ukraine is here: "Russia struck Odessa with a barrage of missiles overnight == the fifth day of attacks in a week for the embattled port city -- killing one civilian and injuring 19 others, including four children, Ukrainian officials said early Sunday. The strikes destroyed a historic cathedral in the city and damaged residential buildings, officials added. Russia has continuously bombed Odessa, home to Ukraine's biggest port, since backing out of a deal to allow the export of Ukrainian grain to the rest of the world.... The U.S. ambassador to Ukraine said the Odessa attack had 'terrible costs.' Bridget A. Brink said that the city, 'a world heritage site and a vital port for global food security,' was left with 'a destroyed cathedral, ruined homes, and burning grain silos.'... [President] Zelensky discussed steps with NATO's secretary general to unblock grain export routes outlined in the Black Sea Grain Initiative..., [he] said in his evening address.... 'Many may die' from starvation without an active Black Sea grain deal in place, said U.N. aid chief Martin Griffiths." ~~~

     ~~~ The Guardian's live updates for Sunday are here. The Guardian's summary report is here.

News Lede

CNN: "A large wildfire tearing through the Greek island of Rhodes forced thousands of tourists to flee their hotels in what Greek officials said was the largest evacuation effort in the country's history. Those caught up in the blaze described chaotic and frightening scenes, with some having to leave on foot or find their own transport after being told to leave.The wildfire in the central and south part of Rhodes -- a hugely popular island for holidaymakers -- has been burning since Tuesday. It is the largest of a number of blazes in Greece, which is sweltering due to a heat wave that experts say is likely to become the country's longest on record."

July 22, 2023

Afternoon Update:

Josh Dawsey, et al., of the Washington Post: "In a text message [sent before January 6, 2021,] that has been scrutinized by federal prosecutors, [Trump Chief-of-Staff Mark] Meadows wrote to a White House lawyer that his son, Atlanta-area attorney Blake Meadows, had been probing possible fraud and had found only a handful of possible votes cast in dead voters' names, far short of what Trump was alleging. The lawyer teasingly responded that perhaps Meadows's son could locate the thousands of votes Trump would need to win the election. [Marie: according to MSNBC, Meadows texted back, "LOL."]... [At the time, numerous] Trump aides and other Republican officials expressed deep skepticism or even openly mocked the election claims being made publicly by Trump.... Days after Meadows sent the text, he organized the [Jan. 3 call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad] Raffensperger..., in which Trump pressed to 'find' the votes in the state necessary to overturn Biden's win.... A person close to Meadows said he knows his relationship with Trump is permanently ruptured and has told others he does not seek to antagonize Trump and his supporters but concluded he had to cooperate with Smith's office as required by law." ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: That is, Meadows thought it was ludicrous to pretend there were some 12,000 missing Trump votes in Georgia. Yet days later he arranged a call in which Trump told the Georgia secretary of state to find him 11,780 votes. And on that same call, Meadows claimed -- in response to the secretary's assertion that they had found only two dead voters, "That may be what your investigation shows, but I can promise you there are more than that."

Maureen Dowd of the New York Times: "A man is running to run the government he tried to overthrow while he was running it, even as he is running to stay ahead of the law.... On an Iowa radio show on Tuesday, Trump warned it would be 'very dangerous' if [Jack] Smith jailed him, since his supporters have 'much more passion than they had in 2020.'... Meanwhile, Ron DeSantis, Trump's closest Republican challenger, defended Trump on Russell Brand's podcast Friday, dismissing the idea that there was an overt effort to upend the 2020 election. 'The idea that this was a plan to somehow overthrow the government of the United States is not true,' DeSantis said, 'and it's something that the media had spun up just to try to basically get as much mileage out of it and use it for partisan and political aims.' DeSantis seems almost as delusional as Trump...."

I Can't Believe I Read It on Fox "News": "In an article for the Bulletin of Applied Transgender Studies, academics from Oregon State University wrote about their shock at receiving sarcasm and mockery in response to their research into undergraduate LGBTQ students studying in STEM fields. The team claimed 50 of 349 responses to their questionnaire on the topic contained 'slurs, hate speech, or direct targeting of the research team.' Labeling them 'malicious respondents,' they adapted their project to examine how the joke responses 'relate to engineering culture by framing them within larger social contexts -- namely, the rise of online fascism.'... Several answers contained profanity and other offensive and obscene language and many referenced memes. 'Online memes associated with white nationalist and fascist movements were present throughout the data, alongside memes and content referencing gaming and "nerd" culture,' the researchers further claimed." MB: The one tell that this is a Fox story is that the writer repeatedly reports that researchers "claimed" this and that; an MSM report would likely says researchers "found" those results.

~~~~~~~~~~

Christina Wilkie of CNBC: "Morgan Stanley is crediting President Joe Biden's economic policies with driving an unexpected surge in the U.S. economy that is so significant that the bank was forced to make a 'sizable upward revision' to its estimates for U.S. gross domestic product. Biden's Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act is 'driving a boom in large-scale infrastructure,' wrote Ellen Zentner, chief U.S. economist for Morgan Stanley, in a research note released Thursday. In addition to infrastructure, 'manufacturing construction has shown broad strength,' she wrote."

Shane Harris of the Washington Post: "President Biden has asked CIA Director William J. Burns to become a member of his Cabinet, reflecting the central role the veteran diplomat has taken carrying out the administration's foreign policy and his key role as a messenger to Russia. The move, which is largely symbolic, will not give Burns any new authorities. But it underscores the influence Burns has in the administration and will be read as a victory for the CIA, which was among the agencies in the U.S. intelligence community that accurately forecast the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.... Burns, who repeatedly stresses that he is not engaged in diplomacy, has nevertheless emerged as a sort of 'secretary of hard problems,' U.S. officials have said. Since well before Russia invaded Ukraine, Burns has been the White House's key interlocutor to Moscow, having had the most direct interactions with Russian President Vladimir Putin of anyone in the administration.... Burns, who served as U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2005 to 2008, has been one of the sharpest public critics of Putin...." (Also linked yesterday.)

John Ismay of the New York Times: "The White House announced on Friday that President Biden intends to nominate Adm. Lisa Franchetti to become the Navy's highest-ranking officer following the retirement of Adm. Michael M. Gilday this summer.... Currently the Navy's vice chief, Admiral Franchetti will serve in an acting role as the Navy's top officer, awaiting confirmation by the Senate -- a process that Senator Tommy Tuberville, Republican of Alabama, has blocked for hundreds of admirals and generals in an attempt to force the Pentagon to drop a policy offering time off and travel reimbursement to service members who need to go out of state for abortions.... Admiral Franchetti would be the second woman to lead a branch of the armed forces. Adm. Linda L. Fagan became the first to do so when she took the oath of office as commandant of the Coast Guard on June 1, 2022. The White House and Pentagon both noted that Admiral Franchetti would be the first female officer to serve as a permanent member of the Joint Chiefs." The AP's story is here.

Sahil Kapur & Liz Brown-Kaiser of NBC News: "The White House plans to use a little-known law to keep acting Labor Secretary Julie Su in the job even if she fails to win Senate approval, a White House official told NBC News. 'Upon Secretary [Marty] Walsh's departure, Acting Secretary Su automatically became Acting Secretary under its organic statute, not under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act,' the White House official said in an email.... 'As a result, Su is not subject to the time limits of the Federal Vacancies Reform Act and she can serve as Acting Secretary indefinitely.'... A law dating back to 1946 allows the deputy labor secretary, to which Su was confirmed by the Senate in 2021, to 'perform the duties of the Secretary until a successor is appointed.'... After Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., came out against her, the White House called on him and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., who hasn't publicly taken a stance, to 'reconsider' their positions, implying that she also opposes the Su nomination." ~~~

~~~ Burgess Everett of Politico writes about the many ways in which Manchin & Sinema are "bedeviling" the White House & other Democrats.

Matt Viser of the Washington Post: "Hunter Biden's attorney on Friday requested that a congressional ethics panel take action against Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), citing her use of sexually explicit images of the president's son that she displayed during a congressional hearing earlier this week. 'Your colleague has lowered herself, and by extension the entire House of Representatives, to a new level of abhorrent behavior that blatantly violates House Ethics rules and standards of official conduct,' Abbe Lowell wrote in a four-page letter sent to the Office of Congressional Ethics." (Also linked yesterday.)

Alan Feuer of the New York Times: "The federal judge overseeing ... Donald J. Trump's prosecution on charges of illegally retaining dozens of classified documents set a trial date on Friday for May 2024, taking a middle position between the government's request to go to trial in December and Mr. Trump's desire to push the proceeding until after the 2024 election. In her order, Judge Aileen M. Cannon said the trial was to be held in her home courthouse in Fort Pierce, Fla., a coastal city two-and-a-half hours north of Miami that will draw its jury pool from several counties that Mr. Trump won handily in his two previous presidential campaigns. Judge Cannon also laid out a calendar of hearings, throughout the remainder of this year and into next year.... The date Judge Cannon chose to start the trial -- May 20, 2024 -- falls after the bulk of the primary contests. But it is less than two months before the start of the Republican National Convention in July and the formal start of the general election season." (Also linked yesterday.)

Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: "Special counsel Jack Smith recently asked Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp for information about efforts by ... President Donald Trump and his allies to overturn the election results in Georgia in 2020, the governor's spokesman confirmed Friday afternoon.... Trump also pressured Kemp and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) to help him overturn the results in Georgia after the 2020 election, calling both men, publicly attacking them when they declined to join his effort and sending advisers and emissaries to the state. Kemp has also been questioned by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis (D) as part of her investigation of efforts to overturn Georgia's 2020 election results...."

Vaughn Hillyard, et al., of NBC News: "Prosecutors from special counsel Jack Smith's office questioned former White House aide William Russell about ... Donald Trump's state of mind during and after the 2020 election period, a source familiar with the matter told NBC News. Russell -- who was with Trump for some of the day on Jan. 6, 2021 -- testified for hours Thursday before the federal grand jury deciding whether to indict the former president over his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.... A source familiar with [Russell's] work at the White House told NBC News that he would often informally engage in conversations with Trump and key staff, including Mark Meadows who served as chief of staff, in the West Wing and Oval Office."

Danny Hakim of the New York Times: "... a long-running investigation into election interference by prosecutors in Atlanta has cast a ... broad net, with nearly 20 people already warned that they could face charges.... A special grand jury that heard evidence for roughly seven months recommended more than a dozen people for indictments, and its forewoman strongly hinted in an interview in February that [Donald] Trump was among them. The Trump aides and allies whose conduct has been closely scrutinized in the inquiry include Rudolph W. Giuliani, Mr. Trump's former personal lawyer; Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff; John Eastman, a legal architect of Mr. Trump's efforts to stay in power; and Jeffrey Clark, a former high-ranking official at the Department of Justice who sought to intervene in Georgia after the 2020 election.... The Trump team filed an amended petition [Friday] seeking to have [Fulton County D.A. Fani] Willis disqualified and the work of the special grand jury thrown out. Ural Glanville, the chief judge of the Fulton County Superior Court, issued an order recusing all of the judges in Fulton County from deciding the question and referred it to another court. Earlier this week, the Georgia Supreme Court unanimously rejected a similar request by Mr. Trump's lawyers." ~~~

~~~ ** Hugo Lowell of the Guardian: "The Fulton county district attorney investigating Donald Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the state of Georgia has developed evidence to charge a sprawling racketeering indictment next month, according to two people briefed on the matter.... In the Trump investigation, the Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis, has evidence to pursue a racketeering indictment predicated on statutes related to influencing witnesses and computer trespass, the people said." MB: We don't know what's happening the grand jury Willis has convened, and we don't know that the grand jury will direct Willis to bring any charges. But treating Trump as a dirty mob boss seems entirely appropriate to me. (Also linked yesterday.)

Ben Protess, et al., of the New York Times: "Michael D. Cohen, the longtime fixer to Donald J. Trump, who was set to go to trial next week against his former boss's company in a dispute over legal fees, has agreed to settle his lawsuit with the Trump Organization, lawyers for both parties said at a brief court hearing on Friday. Mr. Cohen's lawsuit, filed in 2019, accused the Trump Organization of failing to abide by the terms of a deal and refusing to pay more than $1 million in legal costs. Jury selection for the trial began earlier this week, and opening arguments were scheduled for Monday." (Also linked yesterday.) An AP story is here.

Spencer Hsu of the Washington Post: U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta "on Friday sentenced a Jan. 6 'operations coordinator' for Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes to two years' probation and 60 hours of community service, rejecting federal prosecutors' requests for prison time. Michael Greene, 40, of Indianapolis, was a paid contractor known as 'Whip' who helped the extremist group run security details for Republican VIPs at events leading up to and including the pro-Donald Trump rally before the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. Greene, who did not enter the Capitol, was convicted at trial in May on one count of trespassing on restricted grounds. Greene's defense argued he was not a core follower, and a jury acquitted him of three felony counts, including conspiring with Rhodes and others and tampering with evidence. A judge declared a mistrial on a fifth count after a jury hung on a charge of conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding."

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "Over a forceful dissent from its three liberal members, the Supreme Court early Friday morning refused to halt the execution of a death row inmate in Alabama who said that the state's history of botched executions made it likely that he would suffer intense pain as he was put to death. The inmate, James Barber, was executed about two hours after the court's 1 a.m. order. Early news reports did not note major flaws in the procedure. Mr. Barber was convicted in 2003 of beating Dorothy Epps, 75, to death with his fists and a claw hammer. The Supreme Court's brief order gave no reasons for denying the stay.... In an 11-page dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson, said the majority had empowered 'Alabama to experiment again with a human life.'" (Also linked yesterday.)

Michael Shear of the New York Times: "After pressure from the White House..., seven leading A.I. companies in the United States have agreed to voluntary safeguards on the technology's development, the White House announced on Friday, pledging to strive for safety, security and trust even as they compete over the potential of artificial intelligence. The seven companies -- Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft and OpenAI -- will formally announce their commitment to the new standards at a meeting with President Biden at the White House on Friday afternoon. The announcement comes as the companies are racing to outdo each other with versions of A.I. that offer powerful new tools to create text, photos, music and video without human input. But the technological leaps have prompted fears that the tools will facilitate the spread of disinformation and dire warnings of a 'risk of extinction' as self-aware computers evolve." (Also linked yesterday.) The story has been updated. ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: President* Trump could not get such an agreement because he thought "A.I." stood for "Article I" of the Constitution, which covers the powers of Congress, powers that under Trump's thumb are themselves already under a "risk of extinction." (See today's "My Kevin" news, for instance.)

Presidential Race 2024

I didn't know practically what a subpoena was and grand juries and all of this -- now I'm like becoming an expert. -- Donald Trump, in a speech Tuesday to the Linn County Republican Party in Cedar Rapids, Iowa

From the 1980s until he was elected president in 2016, Donald Trump and his businesses were involved in over 4,000 legal cases in U.S. federal and state courts. -- Wikipedia

I'm not sure how many -- if any -- grand juries investigated Trump before he became president*, but he and his companies surely received thousands of subpoenas and many a lawyer probably explained to Trump what a subpoena was. -- Marie~~~

~~~ Isaac Arnsdorf & Josh Dawsey of the Washington Post: "Any distinction between [Donald Trump]'s White House bid and his criminal defense is vanishing as the charges against him mount. Fighting those prosecutions is increasingly dominating his time, resources and messaging, making the centerpiece of his candidacy an appeal to stay out of prison. As he forges ahead, much of the Republican base appears to be cheering him at each turn. What is likely to come is a campaign like the country has never seen before: A candidate juggling multiple criminal indictments while slashing the Department of Justice and his opponents, shuttling between early primary states for rallies and courtrooms for hearings, and spending his supporters' money on both millions of dollars' worth of campaign ads and burgeoning legal bills.... Just over half of the money he raised last quarter went not to the campaign itself but to an affiliated PAC that is footing the legal bills."

Marie: As reasonable as it is to blame White dummkopf, nationalist, evangelical, cultist voters for Donald Trump's likely victory in the nominating process, I place the responsibility on Republican "leaders" who have led the march behind him. How different the nominating process would be if Senate Republicans had convicted Trump in his second impeachment and rendered him ineligible for public office. How different the process would be if, failing that, Republican elected officials had uniformly, or almost uniformly, turned their backs on him and condemned him as unfit for office. It was not the voters, but the leaders who rid us of this corrupt president. "Days before he resigned, [and after the Watergate tapes were published] a Gallup poll found that only 31 percent of Republican [voter]s thought Nixon should no longer be president."

Those who ended Nixon's presidency were Congressional Republicans, who sent a delegation led by Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Az.) to the White House to tell Nixon he should resign or face impeachment and conviction. This was the same Barry Goldwater who had said in his 1964 acceptance of the Republican nomination for president that "Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice." That is, in 1974, Nixon resigned because even the most extreme elements of the party's leadership were among those who forced him out. Today, almost all Republican "leaders," including most of those running against Trump in the primary, either applaud him or refuse to condemn him.

Sarah Mervosh of the New York Times:"After an overhaul to Florida's African American history standards, Gov. Ron DeSantis ... is facing a barrage of criticism this week from politicians, educators and historians.... Vice President Kamala Harris directed her staffers to immediately plan a trip to Florida to respond, according to one White House official. 'How is it that anyone could suggest that in the midst of these atrocities that there was any benefit to being subjected to this level of dehumanization?' Ms. Harris ... said in a speech in Jacksonville on Friday afternoon." MB: Contributor & Floridian Bobby Lee said in yesterday's Comments thread that he would check to see if DeSantis and the GOP had changed the historical markers at St. Augustine's Old Slave Market to read "Immigrant Welcome Center." ~~~

~~~ Cleve Wootson of the Washington Post: "Vice President Harris, taking aim at Gov. Ron DeSantis's 'war on woke' on Friday in his home state, blasted Florida politicians for making changes to the public school curriculum that she said amounted to little more than a 'purposeful and intentional policy to mislead our children,' especially when it comes to slavery. Harris never mentioned DeSantis (R) by name, referring only to 'extremists' and people who 'want to be talked about as American leaders.' But her fiery speech in Jacksonville focused squarely on [DeSantis'] policies..., as well as on the state's Board of Education and its Republican-controlled legislature.... 'Come on -- adults know what slavery really involved,' Harris said. 'It involved rape. It involved torture. It involved taking a baby from their mother. It involved some of the worst examples of depriving people of humanity in our world.' She added, 'How is it that anyone could suggest that in the midst of these atrocities, that there was any benefit to being subjected to this level of dehumanization?'" An ABC News story is here.

Beyond the Beltway

Alabama. Jim Crow Forever. Emily Cochrane of the New York Times: "Alabama Republicans pushed through a new congressional map on Friday that will test the bounds of a judicial mandate to create a second majority-Black district in the state or something 'close to it,' incensing plaintiffs in the court case and Democrats who predicted the plan would never pass muster with a judicial panel charged with approving it. A month after a surprise Supreme Court ruling that found the state's existing map violated a landmark civil rights law by diluting the power of Black voters, the Republican supermajority in the Alabama Legislature backed a plan that would increase the share of Black voters in one of the state's six majority-white congressional districts to about 40 percent, from about 30 percent. The map also dropped the percentage of Black voters in the existing majority-Black district to about 51 percent from about 55 percent. In Alabama, more than one in four residents are Black. Notably, the redrawing ensures that none of the state's six white Republican incumbents would have to face one another in a primary to keep their seat. The proposal will have to be approved by a federal court, which will hold a hearing on it next month." The NBC News story is here.

Nebraska. Michael Levenson of the New York Times: "A Nebraska teenager who used abortion pills to terminate her pregnancy was sentenced on Thursday to 90 days in jail after she pleaded guilty earlier this year to illegally concealing human remains. The teenager, Celeste Burgess, 19, and her mother, Jessica Burgess, 42, were charged last year after the police obtained their private Facebook messages, which showed them discussing plans to end the pregnancy and 'burn the evidence.' Prosecutors said the mother had ordered abortion pills online and had given them to her daughter in April 2022, when Celeste Burgess was 17 and in the beginning of the third trimester of her pregnancy. The two then buried the fetal remains themselves, the police said. Jessica Burgess pleaded guilty in July to violating Nebraska's abortion law, furnishing false information to a law enforcement officer and removing or concealing human skeletal remains. She faces up to five years in prison at her sentencing on Sept. 22.... The police investigation into the Burgesses began before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022."

Texas. Priscilla Alvarez & Shimon Prokupecz of CNN: "The Justice Department told Texas [Gov. Greg Abbott] Thursday that it intends to file legal action against the placement of floating barriers in the Rio Grande as part of the state's operation along the Texas-Mexico border.... 'The State of Texas's actions violate federal law, raise humanitarian concerns, present serious risks to public safety and the environment, and may interfere with the federal government's ability to carry out its official duties,' the letter stated, citing a clause in the law that 'prohibits the creation of any obstruction to the navigable capacity of waters of the United States, and further prohibits building any structure in such waters without authorization from the United States Army Corps of Engineers....' This is separate from the ongoing assessment of mistreatment of migrants, which the Justice Department described as 'troubling reports.'... The letter ... detail[s] 'sharp razor wire' in the Rio Grande, which is 'creating death traps for migrants and violating U.S. treaty commitments with Mexico.'"

Texas. Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs & Remy Tumin of the New York Times: "Texas A&M University said on Friday that its president was resigning 'immediately' following a conflict over the school's shifting offers to a candidate who appeared set to lead its journalism school but ultimately declined the position after facing pushback over her work promoting diversity. The president, M. Katherine Banks, submitted a letter of retirement late on Thursday, in which she said that the negative attention over the journalism director, Kathleen McElroy, was a distraction for Texas A&M...." The Texas Tribune's story is here.

Way Beyond

Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Saturday in Russia's war on Ukraine is here: "Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan it was an 'absolute priority' to restore the Black Sea corridor, where ships carry Ukrainian grain to the world, according to the Ukrainian leader's office.... Brokered by Turkey and the United Nations last year, the agreement allowed the safe passage of ships carrying grain from Ukraine, a major exporter.... UNESCO condemned Russian attacks on the 'historic center of Odessa,' which is protected under the World Heritage Convention.... Radar imagery appears to show newly arrived vehicles and equipment in Belarus, at a rumored base for fighters from the Wagner Group.... The United States is planning to announce a new $400 million military assistance package for Ukraine, Reuters reported, citing three unidentified American officials.... Zelensky has dismissed Ukraine's ambassador to Britain, according to the BBC. Kyiv did not announce a reason for the removal of Vadym Prystaiko, who criticized the president's response after British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace suggested Ukraine should show gratitude for security assistance." ~~~

     ~~~ The Guardian's live updates for Saturday are here. The Guardian's summary report is here.