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Source: http://www.commondreams.org/feed/headlines_rss

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<rss version="2.0" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/"><channel><title>Common Dreams</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/</link><description>Common Dreams</description><atom:link href="https://www.commondreams.org/feeds/news.rss" rel="self"></atom:link><language>en-us</language><lastBuildDate>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 15:09:17 -0000</lastBuildDate><image><url>https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8zMjEwMDM4OS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTc0OTE0ODI1N30.nWE-dO3LpGCfrP6HKKrgMGYA-9xT8aazabGiQTfcsrM/image.png?width=210</url><link>https://www.commondreams.org/</link><title>Common Dreams</title></image><item><title>Sabreen, Baby Girl Rescued From Mother's Womb After Israeli Airstrike, Dies</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-baby-dies</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/a-medic-cares-for-sabreen-alrouh-joudeh.jpg?id=52112820&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C1571%2C0%2C253"/> A grieving family and a team of medical providers in Rafah, Gaza were desperate this week for a miracle, hoping that newborn <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/4/26/israels-war-on-gaza-live-un-says-preserve-evidence-of-gaza-mass-graves" target="_blank">Sabreen al-Rouh Jouda</a> would survive after being delivered prematurely moments after her mother died of injuries sustained in an Israeli airstrike.On Friday, it became clear that the family's hopes would not be realized as doctors announced Sabreen's death.Dr. Muhammad Salama, head of the emergency neonatal department at Emirati Hospital, where Sabreen was born last week via a Caesarean section that was caught on film and widely <a href="https://twitter.com/nikcam12/status/1782676632852943015" target="_blank">reported</a> as outlets searched for any bit of hopeful news out of Gaza, said the baby's lungs were not able to fully absorb oxygen because she was born at just 30 weeks' gestation."Every day we have a sad story; every day we have a horrible story," Salama <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/israel-hamas-war-gaza-baby-saved-womb-mother-killed-airstrike-rafah-rcna148772" target="_blank">told </a>NBC News, gesturing to other babies whom doctors and nurses are struggling to care for amid Israel's destruction of the territory's healthcare system.. "This baby right here, his father has died. This baby's mother has died. Another two babies in the ICU, one of them came and we cannot know, sadly, if his mother or father is alive."Sabreen is now one of 16 children killed in two airstrikes last weekend at a housing complex in Rafah, where Israeli officials have said they plan to move forward with a planned ground invasion. Sabreen's parents and their three-year-old daughter, Malak, were also killed. Her mother, Sabreen al-Sakani, was rushed to the hospital on Saturday night with extensive injuries that she succumbed to just before doctors performed the emergency Caesarean section. Sabreen weighed just 3.1 pounds at birth and was in severe respiratory distress, but doctors were able to temporarily stabilize her condition. Her grandmother was filmed speaking to her as she lay in an incubator earlier this week."I swear I will lock you inside my heart," she said. "You will live in blessing."<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783116441396380057">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/MiddleEastEye/status/1783116441396380057"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
At least two-thirds of the 34,356 Palestinians who have been killed in Gaza by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) since last October have been women and children, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68903591" target="_blank">according to</a> the local health ministry. Israel and the U.S., which has contributed billions of dollars in weapons to the IDF, have repeatedly claimed the military is precisely targeting Hamas fighters. As Common Dreams <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-ai-targets" target="_blank">reported</a> earlier this month, the IDF has relied on an AI targeting system to identify Hamas targets, but considers bombing suspected militants in their homes "a first option," and has officially considered the killing of up to 100 civilians for every Hamas target an acceptable level of precision. Israel has also claimed it has designated so-called safe zones, but Palestinians have been <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/mass-deportation-israel-gaza" target="_blank">killed</a> after moving to areas where the IDF said it wouldn't carry out bombings. "There are no safe places at all, they are liars, liars," Sabreen's uncle, Rami Jouda, <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/israel-hamas-war-gaza-baby-saved-womb-mother-killed-airstrike-rafah-rcna148772" target="_blank">told </a>NBC News. "There is no safe place in Gaza. We are all living under the menace of death."]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 15:02:50 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-baby-dies</guid><category>Children</category><category>Emirati hospital</category><category>Israel</category><category>Israel defense forces</category><category>Rafah</category><category>Sabreen al-rouh jouda</category><category>Gaza</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/a-medic-cares-for-sabreen-alrouh-joudeh.jpg?id=52112820&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>ACLU Sues to Uncover 'What the NSA Is Hiding' About Its Use of Artificial Intelligence</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/aclu-sues-nsa-artificial-intelligence</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/facial-recognition.jpg?id=52112786&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C516%2C0%2C1076"/> 
The ACLU on Thursday sued the National Security Agency in an effort to uncover how the federal body is integrating rapidly advancing artificial intelligence technology into its mass spying operations—information that the agency has kept under wraps despite the dire implications for civil liberties.
 


Filed in a federal court in New York, the
<a href="https://www.aclu.org/documents/nsa-ai-foia-complaint" target="_blank">lawsuit</a> comes over a month after the ACLU submitted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking details on the kinds of AI tools the NSA is using and whether it is taking any steps to prevent large-scale privacy abuses of the kind the agency is <a href="https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN25T3CJ/" target="_blank">notorious for</a>.


The ACLU said in its new complaint that the NSA and other federal agencies have yet to release "any responsive records, notwithstanding the FOIA's requirement that agencies respond to requests within twenty working days."


"Timely disclosure of the requested records [is] vitally necessary to an informed debate about the NSA's rapid deployment of novel AI systems in its surveillance activities and the safeguards for privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties that should apply," the complaint states, asking the court for an injunction requiring the NSA to immediately process the ACLU's FOIA request.


In a blog post on Thursday, the ACLU's Shaiba Rather and Patrick Toomey noted that AI "has transformed many of the NSA's daily operations" in recent years, with the agency utilizing AI tools to "help
<a href="https://perma.cc/97GE-4ULZ" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">gather</a> information on foreign governments, <a href="https://fedtechmagazine.com/article/2022/10/intelligence-community-developing-new-uses-ai-perfcon" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">augment</a> human language processing, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/ai-helps-u-s-intelligence-track-hackers-targeting-critical-infrastructure-944553fa" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">comb</a> through networks for cybersecurity threats, and even monitor its own analysts as they do their jobs."


"Unfortunately, that's about all we know," the pair wrote. "As the NSA
<a href="https://perma.cc/97GE-4ULZ" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">integrates</a> AI into some of its most profound decisions, it's left us in the dark about how it uses AI and what safeguards, if any, are in place to protect everyday Americans and others around the globe whose privacy hangs in the balance."


"That's why we're suing to find out what the NSA is hiding," they added.

<div align="center" class="rm-embed embed-media">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
BREAKING: We just filed a FOIA lawsuit to find out how the NSA — one of America's biggest spy agencies — is using artificial intelligence.
 
 
These are dangerous, powerful tools and the public deserves to know how the government is using them.
 
— ACLU (@ACLU)
<a href="https://twitter.com/ACLU/status/1783527713480847423?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 25, 2024</a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js">
</script>
</div>

The ACLU filed its lawsuit less than a week after Congress
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/warrantless-spying-expansion-senate" target="_blank">approved</a> a massive expansion of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), warrantless spying authority that the NSA has heavily abused to sweep up the communications of American journalists, activists, and lawmakers.


With their newly broadened authority, the NSA and other intelligence agencies will <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/wyden-says-spying-bill-would-force-americans-to-become-an-agent-for-big-brother" target="_blank">have the power</a> to enlist a wide range of businesses and individuals to participate in their warrantless spying operations—a <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/spying-expansion-trump" target="_blank">potential catastrophe</a> for privacy rights. 


Rather and Toomey warned Thursday that the growing, secretive use of artificial intelligence tools has "the potential to expand the NSA's surveillance dragnet more than ever before, expose private facts about our lives through vast data-mining activities, and automate decisions that once relied on human expertise and judgment."


"The government's lack of transparency is especially concerning given the dangers that AI systems pose for people's civil rights and civil liberties," Rather and Toomey wrote. "As we've already seen in areas like <a href="https://www.aclu.org/news/privacy-technology/how-face-recognition-fuels-racist-systems-of-policing-and-immigration-and-why-congress-must-act-now" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">law enforcement</a> and <a href="https://www.aclu.org/news/racial-justice/how-artificial-intelligence-might-prevent-you-from-getting-hired" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">employment</a>, using algorithmic systems to gather and analyze intelligence can compound privacy intrusions and perpetuate discrimination."
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 13:42:18 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/aclu-sues-nsa-artificial-intelligence</guid><category>Aclu</category><category>Civil liberties</category><category>Fisa</category><category>Mass surveillance</category><category>National security agency</category><category>Section 702</category><category>Artificial intelligence</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/facial-recognition.jpg?id=52112786&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Right-Wingers Plot to Give Trump Control Over Federal Reserve If Reelected</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-federal-reserve</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/donald-trump-and-jerome-powell.jpg?id=52110376&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C377%2C0%2C835"/> 
Right-wing allies of former U.S. President Donald Trump are reportedly crafting a plan to give the executive branch control over Federal Reserve policy decisions, an effort that comes as the presumptive GOP nominee continues to signal his <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-dictator-day-one" target="_blank">authoritarian intentions</a> for a potential second term. 

The Wall Street Journal <a href="https://www.wsj.com/economy/central-banking/trump-allies-federal-reserve-independence-54423c2f" target="_blank">reported</a> Thursday that former Trump administration officials and other supporters of the ex-president "have in recent months discussed a range of proposals, from incremental policy changes to a long-shot assertion that the president himself should play a role in setting interest rates."

"A small group of the president's allies—whose work is so secretive that even some prominent former Trump economic aides weren't aware of it—has produced a roughly 10-page document outlining a policy vision for the central bank," the Journal reported. "The group of Trump allies argues that he should be consulted on interest-rate decisions, and the draft document recommends subjecting Fed regulations to White House review and more forcefully using the Treasury Department as a check on the central bank. The group also contends that Trump, if he returns to the White House, would have the authority to oust Jerome Powell as Fed chair before his four-year term ends in 2026."

During his first four years in the White House, Trump <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/trump-says-he-never-threatened-demote-fed-head-jerome-powell-n1020876" target="_blank">repeatedly criticized</a> Powell—whom the former president appointed in 2017—over the central bank's interest rate policy and insisted he had the authority to oust the Fed chair before the end of his term. The Fed is an independent body subject to limited congressional oversight.

"I have the right to do that," Trump said in 2019 of ousting Powell. "I'm not happy with his actions, I don't think he's done a good job."

The Fed, <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/11/22/extremely-disappointed-biden-blasted-renominating-powell-federal-reserve-chair" target="_blank">still under Powell's leadership</a>, has since jacked up interest rates to their highest level in decades in an attempt to combat inflation—an approach that <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/progressives-in-congress-tell-fed-to-end-this-squeeze-on-working-families-and-cut-rates" target="_blank">progressive lawmakers</a> and economists have criticized as misguided, arguing that prices were elevated primarily by pandemic-related supply chain disruptions and <a href="https://groundworkcollaborative.org/news/new-groundwork-report-finds-corporate-profits-driving-more-than-half-of-inflation/" target="_blank">corporate profiteering</a> and that hiking rates would harm workers. (Progressives have historically <a href="https://www.populardemocracy.org/news-and-publications/what-federal-reserve-would-look-if-progressives-had-their-way" target="_blank">pushed for Fed reforms</a> that would make the powerful central bank more accountable to the public.)
Late last year, Trump <a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2023/09/15/trump-bemoans-high-interest-rates-and-indicates-he-might-pressure-fed-to-lower.html" target="_blank">said</a> interest rates were "too high" but did not say he would pressure the central bank to lower them, saying: "Depends where inflation is. But I would get inflation down."

More recently, Trump suggested the Fed's indication that rate cuts are coming in the near future as inflation cools is a political ploy to "help the Democrats."

"It looks to me like he's trying to lower interest rates for the sake of maybe getting people elected, I don't know," Trump <a href="https://thehill.com/business/4444150-trump-blasts-powell-as-political-as-fed-weighs-rate-cuts/" target="_blank">said</a> in a Fox Business appearance in February.

Economist Paul Krugman predicted in his New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/08/opinion/trump-federal-reserve-interest-rates.html" target="_blank">column</a> earlier this year that "Trumpist attacks on the Fed for cutting interest rates are coming."

"What we don't know is how the Fed will react," Krugman wrote. "In a recent <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/31/opinion/economy-presidential-election.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank" title="">dialogue</a> with me about the economy, my colleague Peter Coy suggested that the Fed may be inhibited from cutting rates because it'll fear accusations from Trump that it's trying to help Biden. I hope Fed officials understand that they'll be betraying their responsibilities if they let themselves be intimidated in this way."

"And I hope that forewarned is forearmed," he added. "MAGA attacks on the Fed are coming; they should be treated as the bad-faith bullying they are."

The Journal reported Thursday that "several people who have spoken with Trump about the Fed said he appears to want someone in charge of the institution who will, in effect, treat the president as an ex officio member of the central bank's rate-setting committee."

"Under such an approach, the chair would regularly seek Trump's views on interest-rate policy and then negotiate with the committee to steer policy on the president's behalf," the newspaper continued. "Some of the former president's advisers have discussed requiring that candidates for Fed chair privately agree to consult informally with Trump on the central bank's decisions... Others have made the case that Trump himself could sit on the Fed's board of governors on an acting basis, an option that several people close to the former president described as far-fetched."

According to earlier Journal reporting, Trump's team has discussed several possible replacements for Powell, including former White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett and Arthur Laffer, a former Reagan adviser and notorious <a href="https://itep.org/DebunkingLaffer/" target="_blank">tax-cut enthusiast</a>.

Trump allies' plot to help the former president exert control over Fed policy if he's reelected in November provides further insight into the presumptive Republican nominee's likely approach to a second term.
During his 2024 campaign, Trump—who is <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/trump-charges-jan-6-classified-documents/" target="_blank">facing 88 charges</a> across four criminal cases—has <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-dictator-day-one" target="_blank">vowed</a> to be a dictator on "day one," <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-root-out-leftists" target="_blank">wield federal authority</a> to go after his political opponents, launch the "largest domestic deportation operation in American history," and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/11/05/trump-revenge-second-term/" target="_blank">use the U.S. military</a> to crack down on protests.

"If a president is truly determined to make himself a dictator, the question at the end of the day is whether the military and other force-deploying agencies of the federal government are willing to go along," Josh Chafetz, a constitutional law professor at Georgetown University, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/02/21/how-trump-is-becoming-more-authoritarian/" target="_blank">told</a> The Washington Post in a recent interview. "If they are, there's not much Congress or the courts could do about it."
]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 09:01:59 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-federal-reserve</guid><category>Authoritarianism</category><category>Election 2024</category><category>Federal reserve</category><category>Inflation</category><category>Interest rates</category><category>Jerome powell</category><category>Donald trump</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/donald-trump-and-jerome-powell.jpg?id=52110376&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Supreme Court Urged to 'Rule Quickly' After Trump Immunity Arguments</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/donald-trump-immunity</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/demonstrators-participate-in-a-protest-outside-the-u-s-supreme-court.jpg?id=52108943&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C17%2C0%2C375"/> 
After about three hours of oral arguments Thursday on former President Donald Trump's immunity claims, legal experts and democracy defenders urged the U.S. Supreme Court to rule swiftly, with just over six months until the November election.

Trump—the presumptive Republican candidate to challenge Democratic President Joe Biden, despite his
<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/trump-charges-jan-6-classified-documents/" target="_blank">88 felony charges</a> in four ongoing criminal cases—is <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-immunity-hearing" target="_blank">arguing</a> that presidential immunity should protect him from federal charges for trying to overturn his 2020 loss to Biden, which culminated in the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Justices across the ideological spectrum didn't seem inclined to support Trump's broad immunity claims—which critics have said "reflect a misreading of constitutional text and history as well as this court's precedent." However, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) shared examples of what it would mean if they did.<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783537244000665662">
<div style="margin:1em 0">- Trump could lie on his financial disclosures about his foreign sources of income.\n\n- Trump could order the release of sensitive tax information of business rivals like Meta or Twitter to cripple their operations and benefit Truth Social.</div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/CREWcrew/status/1783537244000665662"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
"Trump could sell pardons, ambassadorships, and other official benefits to his wealthy donors, members of his clubs, or cronies who helped him commit other crimes," CREW warned. "Trump could sell nuclear codes and government secrets to help pay back crippling debts."

"But this isn't just about what Donald Trump could do. It's really about how total immunity for the president would threaten our democratic system of checks and balances," the group continued. "The president could order the military to assassinate activists, political opponents, members of Congress, or even Supreme Court justices, so long as he claimed it related to some official act."
After warning that a president could also order the occupation or closure of the Capitol or high court to prevent actions against him, CREW concluded that "the Supreme Court never should have taken this appeal up in the first place. They should rule quickly and shut these ludicrous claims down for good." <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783561185205375275">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/AOC/status/1783561185205375275"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>The organization was far from alone in demanding a quick decision from the nation's highest court.

"In the name of accountability, the court must not delay its decision," the Brennan Center for Justice
<a href="https://x.com/BrennanCenter/status/1783608628554924061" target="_blank">said</a> Thursday evening. "The Supreme Court's time is up. It needs to let the prosecution move forward. The court decided Bush v. Gore in three days—it should act with similar alacrity in deciding Trump v. U.S."

In
Bush v. Gore, the case that decided the 2000 election, the high court issued a related stay on December 9, heard oral arguments on December 11, and issued a final decision on December 12.

On Thursday, the arguments "got away from the central question: Is a former president immune from criminal prosecution if he tried to overthrow a presidential election, using private means and the power of his office to do so?" the Brennan Center noted. "The answer is simple: No."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783505639697768858">
<div style="margin:1em 0">Trump lawyer concedes some charged acts are private but others are "official," eg meeting w/ DOJ. If he gets Court to describe official act in this broad way w/o taking account of motive or intent, it would be a huge win.</div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/harrylitman/status/1783505639697768858"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
"It is not an 'official act' to try to overthrow the peaceful transfer of power or the Constitution, even if you conspire with other government officials to do it or use the Oval Office phone," the center said. "Trump's attorney was pushing the court to come up with a sea change in the law. That's unnecessary and a delay tactic that will hurt the pursuit of justice in this case."

In a departure from previous claims, Trump's attorney, D. John Sauer, "appeared to agree with Special Counsel Jack Smith, who is leading the prosecution, that there are some allegations in the indictment that do not involve 'official acts' of the president,"
NBC News <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/trump-lawyer-backs-absolute-immunity-argument-supreme-court-rcna149406" target="_blank">reported</a>, noting questions from liberal Justice Elena Kagan and conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump appointee.

Barrett summarized various allegations from the indictment and in three cases—involving dishonest election claims, false allegations of fraud, and fake electors—Sauer conceded that Trump's alleged conduct sounded private, suggesting that a more narrow case against the ex-president that excluded any potential official acts could proceed.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783551183828697348">
<div style="margin:1em 0">Due to Trump attorney's concessions in Supreme Court oral argument, there's now a very clear path for DOJ's case to go forward.\n\nIt'd be a travesty for Justices to delay matters further.\n\nJustice Amy Coney Barrett got Trump attorney to concede core allegations are private acts.\u2b07\ufe0f</div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/rgoodlaw/status/1783551183828697348"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
According to NBC:<blockquote>Matthew Seligman, a lawyer <a href="https://law.stanford.edu/matthew-seligman/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">and a fellow</a> at the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford Law School who filed a brief backing prosecutors, said Sauer's concessions highlight that Trump is "not immune for the vast majority of the conduct alleged in the indictment." Ultimately, he said, the case will go to trial "absent some external intervention—like Trump ordering [the Justice Department] to drop the charges" after having won the election. At the same time, Sauer's backtracking might have little consequence from an electoral perspective. Further delay in a trial, which Sauer is close to achieving, is a form of victory in itself.</blockquote>Slate's Mark Joseph Stern <a href="https://x.com/mjs_DC/status/1783535678363472193" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">pointed out</a> that when Barrett similarly questioned Michael Dreeben, the U.S. Department of Justice lawyer arguing the case for Smith, it seemed like they "were trying to work out some compromise wherein the trial court could distinguish between official and unofficial acts, then instruct the jury not to impose criminal liability on the former." "It was fascinating to watch Barrett nodding along as Dreeben pitched a compromise that would largely preserve Smith's January 6 prosecution but limit what the jury could hear, or at least consider," Stern added. "That, though, would take months to suss out in the trial court. More delays!" Stern and other experts signaled that the decision likely comes down to Barrett and Chief Justice John Roberts, with the three liberals seemingly supporting the prosecution of Trump and the other
<a href="https://x.com/mjs_DC/status/1783539335662276627" target="_blank">four</a> conservatives <a href="https://x.com/mjs_DC/status/1783535386712510732" target="_blank">suggesting</a> it is unconstitutional.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783539214983864568">
<div style="margin:1em 0">With the caveat that Justice Barrett is sometimes less predictable based on argument than her colleagues, this strikes me as most likely to be correct\u2014especially that this likely comes down to Roberts, who was quite coy during today\u2019s arguments.</div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/steve_vladeck/status/1783539214983864568"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
People for the American Way president Svante Myrick said in a statement that "today's argument brought both good and bad news. It was chilling to hear Donald Trump's lawyer say that staging a military coup could be considered part of a president's official duties." "Thankfully, the majority of the court, including conservative justices, did not seem to buy that very broad Trump argument that a former president is absolutely immune from prosecution under any circumstances," Myrick added. "On the other hand, it's not clear that there is a majority on this court that will quickly reject the immunity arguments and let the case go forward in time for a trial before the election. That's a huge concern."Trump was not at the Supreme Court on Thursday; he was at his trial in New York, where he <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-new-york-trial" target="_blank">faces</a> 34 counts for allegedly falsifying business records related to hush money payments to cover up sex scandals during the 2016 election cycle. The are two other cases: a federal one for mishandling classified material and another in Georgia for interfering with the last presidential contest.]]></description><pubDate>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 00:31:41 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/donald-trump-immunity</guid><category>Brennan center for justice</category><category>Citizens for responsibility and ethics in washington</category><category>Election 2024</category><category>Jack smith</category><category>Jan 6 insurrection</category><category>People for the american way</category><category>Presidential immunity</category><category>Us supreme court</category><category>Donald trump</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/demonstrators-participate-in-a-protest-outside-the-u-s-supreme-court.jpg?id=52108943&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>'Just the Beginning': 50+ Arrested for Blockading Citigroup Bank Over Climate Crimes</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/citibank-climate-protest-2667882434</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/climate-protesters-hold-a-banner-reading-summer-of-heat-on-wall-street-while-cops-stand-behind-them.jpg?id=52108607&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C370%2C0%2C338"/> 
Twenty more demonstrators were arrested Thursday, the second day of Earth Week protests targeting Citigroup's Manhattan headquarters in what organizers called "the beginning of a wave of direct actions to take place over the summer targeting big banks for creating climate chaos that is killing our communities and our planet."

Protest organizers—who include Climate Defenders, New York Communities for Change, Planet over Profit, and Stop the Money Pipeline—said 53 activists were arrested over two days of demonstrations, which included blocking the entrance to Citigroup's headquarters, to "demand that the bank stop funding fossil fuels."

Organizers said this week's demonstrations "were just the beginning" of what they're calling a "<a href="https://www.summerofheat.org/" target="_blank">Summer of Heat</a>" targeting big banks for their role in the climate emergency and for "polluting our land, air, and water, and threatening the health of children, families, and our planet." Citigroup is the world's second-largest fossil fuel financier. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783490032323416197">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/nychange/status/1783490032323416197"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
"We're holding Citi accountable for financing dirty fossil fuels from Canada to Latin America and beyond," said Chief Na'moks of the Wet'suwet'en Nation, one of several Indigenous leaders who took part in the action. "Through people-powered resistance, we can give money a conscience and stop Citi's destruction of our planet."

Jonathan Westin, executive director of Climate Defenders, asserted that "Citigroup's racist funding of oil, coal, and gas is creating climate chaos that's devastating communities of color across the country."

"We're taking action to tell Citi that we won't put up with their environmental racism for one more day," Westin continued. "Our communities have reached the boiling point. Our children have asthma, our city's sky was orange, and our air polluted because of the climate crisis caused by Citi and Wall Street."

"We're going to keep organizing and taking direct action until Citi listens to us," he vowed.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783491460836331704">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/StopMoneyPipe/status/1783491460836331704"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
Stop the Money Pipeline co-director Alec Connon said: "To have any chance of reigning in the climate crisis, we must stop investing in fossil fuel expansion. Yet, Citibank is pumping billions of dollars into new coal, oil, and gas projects."

"We're here to make it clear: If they're going to fund the companies disrupting our climate and our lives, we're going to disrupt their business," Connon added.

Activists have <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/citibank-climate-protest" target="_blank">repeatedly targeted</a> Citigroup in recent years as the megabank has pumped more than $300 billion into fossil fuel investments around the world since the Paris climate agreement.<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783262718721442257">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/ThirdActVa/status/1783262718721442257"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
According to the protest organizers:
<blockquote style="margin-left: 20px;">
Citi has provided $668 million in funding to Formosa Plastics between 2001-2021, which is trying to build a $9.4 billion plastics facility in a majority Black community in the heart of Cancer Alley in Louisiana.
 
 
Citigroup is also one of the biggest funders of state-run oil and gas companies in the Amazon basin, pumping in over $40 billion between 2016-2020, and a major backer of Petroperú, which has been involved in oil spills and Indigenous rights violations.
</blockquote>
"From wildfires, heatwaves, and floods to deadly air pollution and mass drought, Citi's fossil fuel financing is killing us," said Alice Hu of New York Communities for Change. "We've sent polite petitions and had pleading meetings with bank representatives, but Citi refuses to stop pouring billions each year into coal, oil, and gas."

"That's why we're fighting for our lives now with the best tool we have left: mass, nonviolent disruptive civil disobedience," Hu added.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 23:53:01 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/citibank-climate-protest-2667882434</guid><category>Citigroup</category><category>Civil disobedience</category><category>Climate defenders</category><category>Environment</category><category>Fossil fuels</category><category>Indigenous</category><category>New york communities for change</category><category>Planet over profit</category><category>Stop the money pipeline</category><category>Wet'suwet'en nation</category><category>Climate emergency</category><dc:creator>Brett Wilkins</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/climate-protesters-hold-a-banner-reading-summer-of-heat-on-wall-street-while-cops-stand-behind-them.jpg?id=52108607&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>No Outside Probe, US Reiterates as Gazans Reportedly Buried Alive in Mass Grave</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/nasser-hospital-buried-alive-mass-graves</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/vedant-patel-speaks.jpg?id=52108276&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C72%2C0%2C271"/> 
A Biden administration spokesperson once again brushed off calls for an independent investigation into how hundreds of Palestinians found in mass graves near Gaza hospitals died when asked Thursday about new reports that many of the victims were tortured, summarily executed—and in some cases, buried alive by Israeli invaders.

During a Thursday U.S. State Department
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYL44hqKbsc" target="_blank">press conference</a> in Washington, D.C., a reporter noted Gaza officials' claim that mass grave victims "including children were tortured before being killed" and that "some even showed signs of being buried alive, along with other crimes against humanity."

"What's wrong with an independent, scientific, forensic investigation?"

Noting
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/un-rights-chief-mass-graves" target="_blank">calls</a> by Palestinian officials and United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk for an independent probe into mass graves, the reporter said that "this administration repeatedly said that it asks... the Israeli government to investigate itself."

"How does it ever make sense that the United States asks the accused party to examine itself and provide reports that you have previously said that you actually trust?" the reporter asked State Department Principal Deputy Spokesperson Vedant Patel. "What's wrong with an independent, scientific, forensic investigation?"

Patel replied: "We continue to find these reports incredibly troubling. And that's why yesterday you saw the national security adviser for this to be thoroughly investigated."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783554457500111194">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/AssalRad/status/1783554457500111194"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
While National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on Wednesday
<a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/searching-dead-mass-graves-exhumed-gaza-mothers-searching/story?id=109540691" target="_blank">called</a> reports of mass grave atrocities "deeply disturbing" and said that "we want answers" from Israel, he did not call for an independent investigation.

When the reporter pressed Patel on the legitimacy of asking Israel to investigate itself, Patel said, "we believe that through a thorough investigation we can get some additional answers."

Thursday's exchange followed <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-mass-grave" target="_blank">a similar back-and-forth</a> on Tuesday between Patel and Said Arikat, a journalist for the Jerusalem-based
 Palestinian news outlet al-Quds who asked about the mass graves. 

At least 392 bodies—including numerous women and children—have been found in mass graves outside Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, where Palestinian Civil Defense and other workers have been exhuming victims for nearly a week. Officials believe there are as many as 700 bodies in three separate mass graves. 
Based on more recent exhumations, local Civil Defense chief Yamen Abu Sulaiman said during a Wednesday press conference that "we believe that the occupation buried alive at least 20 people at the Nasser Medical Complex."

"There are cases of field execution of some patients while undergoing surgeries and wearing surgical gowns," he stated, adding that some victims showed signs of torture and 10 bodies had medical tubes attached to them.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783476584608895010">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/democracynow/status/1783476584608895010"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
Gaza Civil Defense official Mohammed Mughier told reporters that "we need forensic examination" to definitively determine the causes of death for the 20 people believed to have been buried alive.
Previous reporting on the mass graves <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/mass-grave-gaza-nasser-hospital" target="_self">quoted</a> rescue workers who said they found people who were apparently executed while their hands were bound, with some victims missing heads, skin, and internal organs.
Other mass graves have been found in Gaza, most notably on the grounds of al-Shifa Hospital, where Israeli forces last month committed what the Geneva-based Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor
<a href="https://euromedmonitor.org/en/article/6254/Gaza:-Shifa-Medical-Complex-witnesses-one-of-the-largest-massacres-in-Palestinian-history" target="_blank">called</a> "one of the largest massacres in Palestinian history."

It's also not the first time there have been reports of Israeli troops burying victims alive during the current war, in which Palestinian and international officials say Israeli forces have <a href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/" target="_blank">killed or wounded</a> more than 122,000 Gazans, including at least 11,000 people who are missing and feared dead. Israeli forces attacking Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia last December
<a href="https://reliefweb.int/report/occupied-palestinian-territory/urgent-intl-investigation-needed-probe-israeli-war-crimes-after-palestinian-civilians-buried-alive-gazas-kamal-adwan-hospital-enar" target="_blank">reportedly</a> bulldozed and buried alive dozens of injured patients and displaced people.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 22:12:58 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/nasser-hospital-buried-alive-mass-graves</guid><category>Genocide</category><category>Israel</category><category>Jake sullivan</category><category>Journalism</category><category>Mass graves</category><category>Media</category><category>Nasser hospital</category><category>Palestine</category><category>Vedant patel</category><category>War crimes</category><category>Gaza</category><dc:creator>Brett Wilkins</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/vedant-patel-speaks.jpg?id=52108276&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Columbia Students File Civil Rights Complaint After Arrests, National Guard Threat</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/columbia-students-civil-case</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/pro-palestinian-students-and-activists-gather-at-a-protest-encampment.jpg?id=52108124&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C460%2C0%2C1033"/> A day after Columbia University officials warned it may call on the National Guard to remove nonviolent student protesters who have been occupying campus lawns since last week in solidarity with Gaza, advocacy group Palestine Legal on Thursday filed a federal civil rights complaint demanding an investigation into the school's "discriminatory treatment of Palestinian students and their allies."The school discriminated against pro-Palestinian protesters last week when President Minouche Shafik <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/columbia-arrests-palestine-protest" target="_blank">summoned </a>New York Police Department officers in riot gear to arrest more than 100 students, <a href="https://palestinelegal.org/news/2024/4/25/columbia-students-file-civil-rights-complaint-after-nypd-arrests-national-guard-threat" target="_blank">said</a> Palestine Legal. The complaint details how the escalation against students, who have set up an encampment on campus to demand Columbia divest from companies that work with the Israeli government and to support calls for a cease-fire in Gaza, is part of a monthslong pattern of the university's targeting of pro-Palestinian students.<a href="https://palestinelegal.org/news/2024/4/25/columbia-students-file-civil-rights-complaint-after-nypd-arrests-national-guard-threat" target="_blank">According to</a> Palestine Legal, students of all backgrounds who have demanded an end to Israel's U.S.-backed massacre of Palestinians in Gaza "have been the target of extreme anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, and Islamophobic harassment, including receiving multiple death threats, being harassed for wearing keffiyehs or hijab, doxxed, stereotyped, being treated differently by high-ranking administrators including... Shafik, an<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/01/24/columbia-palestinian-gaza-israel-campus/" target="_blank"> attack with a chemical agen</a><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/01/24/columbia-palestinian-gaza-israel-campus/">t</a> that led to at least 10 students requiring hospitalization and dozens of others, including a Palestinian student, seeking medical attention, and more."<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783580028908761432">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/pal_legal/status/1783580028908761432"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
Columbia student Maryam Alwan, who Palestine Legal is representing in the complaint to the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights, said the university has "utterly failed to protect [her] from racism and abuse.""Beyond that, the university has also played a role in this repression by having me arrested and suspended for peacefully protesting Israel's genocide in Gaza," said Alwan. "The violent repression we're facing as peaceful anti-war protesters is appalling. Palestinian students at Columbia deserve justice and accountability, not only for Israel's decadeslong oppression and violence against our people, but for the racism and discrimination we've experienced here on Columbia's campus." Palestine Legal is representing four students in the case, as well as Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine, which was suspended from the campus late last year after holding anti-war protests. The group called Columbia's threat to call in the National Guard "gravely concerning.""Columbia's vicious crackdown on student protests calling for Palestinian freedom amidst an ongoing genocide should alarm us all. Students have always been at the forefront of the most pressing social issues of the day," said Palestine Legal staff attorney Sabiya Ahamed.College campuses have been the sites of frequent pro-Palestinian protests since October, and the NYPD's crackdown on Columbia students last week galvanized students at universities across the country. The Biden administration has said little about the student demonstrations, but President Joe Biden<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-college-protests" target="_blank"> referre</a><a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-college-protests" target="_blank">d</a> to them broadly as "antisemitic protests" this week. "We urge federal civil rights officials to do what Columbia has disgracefully failed to," said Ahamed. "Ensure the rights of Palestinian and allied students are protected at a moment when their voices are most essential." ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 21:26:24 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/columbia-students-civil-case</guid><category>Gaza</category><category>Israel</category><category>National guard</category><category>Police</category><category>Student protest</category><category>Columbia university</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/pro-palestinian-students-and-activists-gather-at-a-protest-encampment.jpg?id=52108124&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Top G20 Ministers Back 2% Wealth Tax for Global Billionaires</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/wealth-tax</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/brazilian-finance-minister-fernando-haddad.jpg?id=52107775&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C43%2C0%2C298"/> 
Ministers from four major economies on Thursday <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2024/apr/25/ministers-of-germany-brazil-south-africa-and-spain-why-we-need-a-global-tax-on-billionaires" target="_blank">called for</a> a 2% wealth tax targeting the world's billionaires—who currently only pay up to 0.5% of their wealth in personal income tax—to "invest in public goods such as health, education, the environment, and infrastructure."

Fernando Haddad, Brazil's finance minister; Svenja Schulze, Germany's minister for economic cooperation and development; Enoch Godongwana, South Africa's finance minister; Carlos Cuerpo, Spain's minister of economy, trade, and business; and María Jesús Montero, Spain's first vice president and finance minister, made their case in an opinion piece for The Guardian.

"The argument behind such tax is straightforward: We need to enhance the ability of our tax systems to fulfill the principle of fairness, such that contributions are in line with the capacity to pay," they explained. "Persisting loopholes in the system imply that high-net-worth individuals can minimize their income taxes."
"What the international community managed to do with the global minimum tax on multinational companies, it can do with billionaires." 

Brazil, Germany, and South Africa are all Group of 20 members while Spain is a <a href="https://www.exteriores.gob.es/en/PoliticaExterior/Paginas/G20OCDE.aspx" target="_blank">permanent guest</a>. The ministers noted that "Brazil has made the fight against hunger, poverty, and inequality a priority of its G20 presidency, a priority that German development policy also pursues and that Spain has ambitiously addressed domestically and globally."

"By directing two-thirds of total expenditure on social services and wage support, as well as by calibrating tax policy administration, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/southafrica" target="_blank">South Africa</a> continues to target a progressive tax and fiscal agenda that confronts the country's legacy of income and wealth inequality," they wrote.

The ministers continued:
<blockquote>
It is time that the international community gets serious about tackling inequality and financing global public goods. One of the key instruments that governments have for promoting more equality is tax policy. Not only does it have the potential to increase the fiscal space governments have to invest in social protection, education, and climate protection. Designed in a progressive way, it also ensures that everyone in society contributes to the common good in line with their ability to pay. A fair share contribution enhances social welfare.
 
With exactly these goals in mind, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/brazil" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Brazil</a> brought a proposal for a global minimum tax on billionaires to the negotiation table of the world's major economies for the first time. It is a necessary third pillar that complements the negotiations on the taxation of the digital economy and on a minimum corporate tax of 15% for multinationals. The renowned economist Gabriel Zucman sketched out how this might work. Currently, there are about 3,000 billionaires worldwide. The tax could be designed as a minimum levy equivalent to 2% of the wealth of the superrich. It would not apply to billionaires who already contribute a fair share in income taxes. However, those who manage to avoid paying income tax would be obliged to contribute more towards the common good.
</blockquote>
The five ministers cited estimates suggesting that "such a tax would potentially unlock an additional $250 billion in annual tax revenues globally—this is roughly the amount of economic damages caused by extreme weather events last year."

"Of course, the argument that billionaires can easily shift their fortunes to low-tax jurisdictions and thus avoid the levy is a strong one. And this is why such a tax reform belongs on the agenda of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/g20" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">G20</a>," they added. "International cooperation and global agreements are key to making such tax effective. What the international community managed to do with the global minimum tax on multinational companies, it can do with billionaires."

Guardian economics editor Larry Elliott <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/inequality/2024/apr/25/billionaires-should-pay-minimum-two-per-cent-wealth-tax-say-g20-ministers" target="_blank">reported</a> Thursday that "Zucman is now fleshing out the technical details of a plan that will again be discussed by the G20 in June. France has indicated support for a wealth tax and Brazil has been encouraged that the U.S., while not backing a global wealth tax, did not oppose it."

The French economist told Elliott that "billionaires have the lowest effective tax rate of any social group. Having people with the highest ability to pay tax paying the least—I don't think anybody supports that."

Except the billionaires, of course. "I don't want to be naive. I know the superrich will fight," Zucman added. "They have a hatred of taxes on wealth. They will lobby governments. They will use the media they own."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783514892965740635">
<div style="margin:1em 0">A few months ago, no one wanted to talk int. taxes, let alone on the super rich. Now we have a process (#G20), finance ministers (\ud83c\udde7\ud83c\uddf7 \ud83c\uddeb\ud83c\uddf7 \ud83c\uddff\ud83c\udde6 \ud83c\uddea\ud83c\uddf8 & others) supporting it, \ud83c\udde9\ud83c\uddea in part & everyone agreeing that proceeds should help fund climate and dev: https://t.co/ZldF557pAL</div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/FredRoder/status/1783514892965740635"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
The ministers' opinion piece follows the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank's Spring Meetings last week, during which anti-poverty campaigners pressured the largest economies to <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/imf-loans-poverty" target="_blank">address</a> inequality with policies like taxing the superrich and to <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/project-everyone-g20" target="_blank">pour</a> resources into the global debt and climate crises.

"The IMF and World Bank say that tackling inequality is a priority but in the same breath back policies that drive up the divide between the rich and the rest," Kate Donald, head of Oxfam International's Washington D.C. office, said last week. "Ordinary people struggle more and more every day to make up for cuts to the public funding of healthcare, education, and transportation. This high-stakes hypocrisy has to end."

Oxfam America policy lead Rebecca Riddell <a href="https://x.com/Rebecca_Riddell/status/1783490945524088951" target="_blank">declared</a> Thursday that "extreme inequality stands in the way of solving our most urgent global challenges. We need to tax the ultrawealthy." 

"Read this brilliant new op-ed on the case for a global tax on billionaires, by ministers from Brazil, Germany, South Africa, and Spain," Riddell added, posting the piece on social media.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 20:24:47 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/wealth-tax</guid><category>Billionaires</category><category>Brazil</category><category>G20</category><category>Gabriel zucman</category><category>Germany</category><category>Oxfam</category><category>South africa</category><category>Spain</category><category>Wealth tax</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/brazilian-finance-minister-fernando-haddad.jpg?id=52107775&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>200 Rights Groups Call On Biden to End 'Cruel' Expansion of Immigrant Detention</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-immigrant-detention</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/migrant-child-detention.jpg?id=32139777&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C247%2C0%2C248"/> 
Citing ample evidence of human rights abuses in U.S. immigration detention centers, 200 advocacy groups on Thursday demanded that the Biden administration reverse course on a planned expansion of detention facilities and said President Joe Biden's "further entrenching" of the government's reliance on detaining migrants marks "an utter betrayal" of his campaign promises.

The president's<a href="https://www.detentionwatchnetwork.org/pressroom/releases/2024/biden-signs-spending-bill-codifying-racist-immoral-right-wing-agenda" target="_blank"> signing</a> of a spending bill last month provided $3.4 billion for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), clearing the way for the agency to make space to jail 41,500 immigrants per day in facilities across the country.

After Biden <a href="https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/promises/biden-promise-tracker/promise/1613/end-profit-detention-centers/" target="_blank">campaigned</a> on ending the use of for-profit detention centers, said the groups, he took office at a time when fewer than 15,000 people were being held in immigration detention facilities—which gave him "a remarkable opportunity to wind down a wasteful and abusive system."

But after the president's 2023 and 2024 budget requests signaled an intention of reducing detention funding—with ICE itself <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/biden-officials-kept-immigration-jails-despite-internal-cost-concerns-2023-09-27/" target="_blank">recommending</a> that numerous facilities be closed due to "critical staffing shortages that have led to safety risks and unsanitary living conditions"—Biden last year requested supplemental detention funding as commentators and Republicans in Congress <a href="https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/politics/2023/02/01/house-republicans-kicks-off-1st-hearing-on-border-security--fentanyl-crisis" target="_blank">hammered</a> the administration for allowing so-called<a href="https://www.texaspolicy.com/bidens-border-chaos-goes-global/" target="_blank"> "chaos"</a> at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"Your FY2025 budget request sought funding for 34,000 beds instead of the 25,000 sought in the two previous cycles," wrote the groups, including Amnesty International USA, the National Immigrant Justice Center (NIJC), and the Texas Civil Rights Project. "The result is unsurprising: the FY2024 spending bill you signed provides ICE $3.4 billion to jail an average of 41,500 immigrants per day, historically high funding surpassing all four years of the Trump administration."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783557398395011167">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/NIPNLG/status/1783557398395011167"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
The groups, which provide legal aid and other assistance to people who have been detained as migrants, said many of their clients "carry lifelong scars from the mistreatment and dehumanization they endured because of the United States' reliance on detention, mostly through private prisons and county jails."

The administration is seeking to expand a system, said the groups, in which the jails and prisons used have been found to "operate under insufficient standards."

The organizations cited <a href="https://www.aclu.org/publications/code-red-fatal-consequences-dangerously-substandard-medical-care-immigration-detention#:~:text=Coauthored%20by%20the%20American%20Civil,with%20medical%20experts'%20commentary%20on" target="_blank">a 2018 ACLU report</a><a href="https://www.aclu.org/publications/code-red-fatal-consequences-dangerously-substandard-medical-care-immigration-detention#:~:text=Coauthored%20by%20the%20American%20Civil,with%20medical%20experts'%20commentary%20on"> </a>that found inadequate medical care contributed to the deaths of more than half of the detained immigrants who died in custody between December 2015-April 2017; a 2021 case in which an LGBTQ+ man <a href="https://immigrantjustice.org/press-releases/lgbtq-asylum-seeker-files-civil-rights-complaint-regarding-abuse-and-discrimination" target="_blank">reported </a>"physical and homophobic verbal abuse" at a facility in Louisiana; and the finding by Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) that the use of solitary confinement in detention centers "regularly meets the United Nations' definition of torture."

Biden signed the spending bill two weeks after Charles Daniel, a 61-year-old migrant from Trinidad and Tobago, <a href="https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/editorials/feds-should-demand-transparency-at-ice-detention-center/" target="_blank">died</a> at a detention center operated by the private contractor GEO Group after being held in solitary confinement for four years. ICE has placed people in solitary confinement over 14,000 times in the last five years,<a href="https://phr.org/our-work/resources/endless-nightmare-solitary-confinement-in-us-immigration-detention/" target="_blank"> according to PHR</a>, for an average of 27 days each; U.N. experts say exceeding 15 days in solitary confinement constitutes torture.

"This suffering does not advance any rational policy goal," said the groups on Thursday. "Detention does not provide an efficient or ethical means of border processing, and it certainly does not indicate to migrants that they are welcome in the United States. It merely exists to further the political goal of deterrence, which is cruel, inhumane, and misguided—as even the most punitive forms of detention have been proven not to deter people from seeking safety or a better life."

Syracuse University's Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, which tracks government data, <a href="https://thehill.com/latino/4621399-immigrant-detention-advocates-border-biden/" target="_blank">found</a> that as of April 7, more than 61% of ICE detainees have no criminal record, while "many more have only minor offenses, including traffic violations."

"Increasing the incarceration of immigrants is a grave mistake," said the groups, "and we urgently implore you to reverse course."
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 20:23:45 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-immigrant-detention</guid><category>Amnesty international</category><category>Human rights</category><category>Immigrant rights</category><category>Immigration detention</category><category>Joe biden</category><category>National immigrant justice center</category><category>Prisons</category><category>U.s. department of homeland security</category><category>Immigration</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/migrant-child-detention.jpg?id=32139777&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Bernie Sanders to Netanyahu: 'It Is Not Antisemitic to Hold You Accountable'</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/sanders-netanyahu-antisemitism</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/sen-bernie-sanders.jpg?id=52107374&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C553%2C0%2C1356"/> 
Jewish U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders issued a scathing statement Thursday pushing back against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's characterization of burgeoning protests on American university campuses as "antisemitic," declaring, "It is not antisemitic to hold you accountable for your actions."

"No, Mr. Netanyahu. It is not antisemitic or pro-Hamas to point out that in a little over six months, your extremist government has killed 34,000 Palestinians and wounded more than 77,000—70% of whom are women and children," said Sanders (I-Vt.). "It is not antisemitic to point out that your bombing has completely destroyed more than 221,000 housing units in Gaza, leaving more than one million people homeless—almost half the population."

"Antisemitism is a vile and disgusting form of bigotry that has done unspeakable harm to many millions of people," continued Sanders, who
<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2020/03/06/bernie-sanders-holocaust-nazis-flag-family/" target="_blank">lost family members</a> to the Nazi Holocaust. "But, please, do not insult the intelligence of the American people by attempting to distract us from the immoral and illegal war policies of your extremist and racist government. Do not use antisemitism to deflect attention from the criminal indictment you are facing in the Israeli courts."
<div align="center" class="rm-embed embed-media"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
No, Mr. Netanyahu. It is not antisemitic or pro-Hamas to point out that in a little over six months your extremist government has killed 34,000 Palestinians and wounded more than 77,000 – 70% of whom are women and children.
 
 
You will not distract us from this immoral war.
<a href="https://t.co/oDaiyU4ipD">pic.twitter.com/oDaiyU4ipD</a> 
— Bernie Sanders (@SenSanders)
<a href="https://twitter.com/SenSanders/status/1783544565539979662?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 25, 2024</a>
</blockquote><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"> </script></div>
Sanders' statement came a day after Netanyahu
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-college-protests" target="_blank">falsely described</a> student protesters speaking out against Israel's catastrophic war on Gaza as "antisemitic mobs" and likened the demonstrations to "what happened in German universities in the 1930s." 

"It has to be stopped," Netanyahu said of the campus protests, which have faced violent police crackdowns.
 

Students at Columbia, Princeton, the City College of New York, the University of Texas at Austin, Northwestern, and other schools nationwide are demanding that the institutions divest from any companies that are participating in or benefiting from Israel's war on Gaza and publicly support an immediate cease-fire.

On Wednesday, hundreds of UT Austin students walked out of their classrooms and marched to the main lawn of the campus before police officers with horses and riot gear
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/ut-austin-police" target="_blank">arrived on the scene</a>, arrested dozens, and assaulted some protesters. 

"One woman said she saw a large police officer place his entire body weight to detain a young woman protesting,"
The Texas Tribune <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2024/04/24/ut-austin-israel-hamas-war-palestine-student-arrests/" target="_blank">reported</a>. "Law enforcement was also seen kneeling on individuals' backs and necks, pulling their hair, and in one case punching a protester in the nose."

Jeremi Suri, a professor of history at UT Austin,
<a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/25/students-arrested-in-california-texas-as-gaza-war-protests-in-us-intensify" target="_blank">told</a> Al Jazeera that contrary to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott's <a href="https://twitter.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/1783237229252346194" target="_blank">claim</a>, there was "nothing antisemitic" about Wednesday's protests.

"These students were shouting 'free Palestine,' that's all," said Suri. "They were saying nothing that was threatening. And as they were standing and shouting, I witnessed the police—the state police, the campus police, the city police—an army of police almost the size [of] the student group... many were carrying guns, many were carrying rifles, and then, within a few minutes, this group of police stormed into the student crowd and started arresting students."

In his statement Thursday, Sanders emphasized that criticism of Israel's massively destructive assault on Gaza cannot be conflated with antisemitism.

"It is not antisemitic to note that your government has obliterated Gaza’s civilian infrastructure—electricity, water, and sewage," said Sanders, who earlier this week <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-israel-aid" target="_blank">voted against</a> a foreign aid package that included $17 billion in additional U.S. military assistance for Israel.

"It is not antisemitic to realize that your government has annihilated Gaza's healthcare system, knocking 26 hospitals out of service and killing more than 400 healthcare workers," he continued. "It is not antisemitic to condemn your government's destruction of all of Gaza's 12 universities and 56 of its schools, with hundreds more damaged, leaving 625,000 students with no education."
 
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 18:56:41 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/sanders-netanyahu-antisemitism</guid><category>Antisemitism</category><category>Benjamin netanyahu</category><category>Campus protests</category><category>Bernie sanders</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/sen-bernie-sanders.jpg?id=52107374&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Holocaust Survivor Tells Student Anti-Genocide Protesters: 'Just Keep Doing It'</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/holocaust-survivors-gaza-genocide</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/holocaust-survivors-condemn-israel-s-gaza-genocide-during-a-london-protest.jpg?id=52105063&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C475%2C0%2C621"/> A Holocaust survivor opposed to Israel's war on Gaza on Wednesday told U.S. student protesters they're on the right side of history, and that the global wave of demonstrations against the slaughter and starvation of Palestinians will soon force Western leaders to face up to their complicity in genocide. Stephen Kapos, 86, was 7 years old in 1944 when he was separated from his family during the Nazi extermination of Jews in his native Hungary. Most of his family was murdered in the Holocaust but Kapos survived and moved to the United Kingdom after the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary.Kapos is part of a small group of Shoah survivors and their descendants who "demonstrate disagreement with the use of the Holocaust experience as a cover by the Zionists and the state of Israel." They attend protests wearing signs around their necks reading, "This Holocaust Survivor Says Stop the Genocide in Gaza!""As a Holocaust survivor, my message to the brave student protesters in America is just keep doing it. Don't give up," Kapos said in video published by Double Down News. "We are doing exactly the same, and in the long term we are going to prevail." <div class="rm-embed embed-media"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">Holocaust Survivor Message to US Campus Protesters: This survivor of the Holocaust is against Genocide in Gaza & conflating Jewishness with Zionism, which does nothing but increase antisemitism. Your protests are so persistent, large and global that eventually the Western… <a href="https://t.co/IDCH0NTO6m">pic.twitter.com/IDCH0NTO6m</a> — Double Down News (@DoubleDownNews) <a href="https://twitter.com/DoubleDownNews/status/1783270524388294756?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script></div>Kapos' comments came amid a growing wave of pro-Palestine student protests—many of them Jewish-led—on dozens of U.S. university and college campuses in response to Israel's U.S.-backed war on Gaza, which the International Court of Justice in January <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/watch-live-international-court-of-justice-delivers-ruling-in-israel-genocide-case" target="_blank">found</a> "plausibly" genocidal and which many Israeli and international experts <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/legal-scholars-israel-genocide" target="_blank">say</a> is <a href="https://jewishcurrents.org/a-textbook-case-of-genocide" target="_blank">undoubtedly</a> a genocide.<a href="https://www.palestinechronicle.com/" target="_blank">According to</a> Gazan and international officials, more than 122,000 Palestinians have been killed or maimed during 202 days of near-relentless Israeli attacks. This figure includes around 11,000 people who are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed-out buildings. Around 90% of Gaza's 2.3 million people have been forcibly displaced. Starvation and dehydration caused by Israel's bombardment and <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-still-blocking-aid" target="_blank">blockade</a> of Gaza are killing children and other vulnerable people. Instead of condemning Israeli leaders, the Biden administration has <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-israel-aid" target="_blank">lavished</a> them with billions of dollars in U.S. military aid while providing <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/us-vetoes-ceasefire" target="_blank">diplomatic cover</a> for Israeli crimes and <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/united-nations-palestine" target="_blank">blocking</a> recognition of Palestinian statehood at the United Nations. As the suffering in Gaza continues, U.S. students have set up encampments or staged other forms of protest, some of which have been <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/ut-austin-police" target="_blank">brutally repressed</a> by police—who have also <a href="https://twitter.com/Faytuks/status/1783263395950580142" target="_blank">attacked</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/Phil_Lewis_/status/1783252918847537374" target="_blank">arrested</a> journalists and bystanders.<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783501882302111996">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/DrRupaMarya/status/1783501882302111996"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
On Wednesday, far-right Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-college-protests" target="_blank">implored</a> U.S. authorities to crack down even harder on the students, whom he called an "antisemitic mob." Highlighting video footage of Netanyahu comparing the student protests to what happened at German universities during the rise of Nazism, Kapos said that "the way that the Israeli government is using the memory of the Holocaust in order to justify what they're doing to the Gazans is a complete insult to the memory of the Holocaust." He said he is also protesting "the conflating of Jewishness with Zionism, which is what the Israeli state is trying to do, which does nothing but increase antisemitism." Kapos predicted that "today's marches are having a very hopeful aspect that is so large, so persistent, so global that eventually the Western leadership—which are trying to deny what is actually going on—will be forced to face up to it, and I think we are not far from that." "Today's marches are having a very hopeful aspect that is so large, so persistent, so global that eventually the Western leadership—which are trying to deny what is actually going on—will be forced to face up to it.""There is a question of historical responsibility towards injustice, genocide, and fascism," Kapos asserted. "If you are indifferent, if you do not take a stand, you acquire a degree of guilt without any doubt and I think it is imperative to assert opposition and even some degree of disadvantage and risk if you want to be guilt-free when history judges what's happening." Kapos and his comrades are part of a long history of Holocaust survivors speaking out against Israeli crimes against Palestinians. Long before today's <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/academics-israeli-apartheid" target="_blank">growing acknowledgment</a> that Israel is an apartheid state, the late Suzanne Weiss—whose parents were murdered in Nazi-occupied France—<a href="https://rabble.ca/anti-racism/holocaust-survivor-why-i-support-palestinian-rights/" target="_blank">said</a> in 2010 that "the Palestinians are victims of ethnic cleansing and apartheid" and that "the Israeli government's actions toward the Palestinians awaken horrific memories of my family's experiences under Hitlerism."Hajo Meyer, who survived 10 months in the Auschwitz death camp in Poland, <a href="https://jcpa.org/article/new-anti-semitism-in-contemporary-german-academia/" target="_blank">argued</a> during his lifetime that "what is happening to the Palestinians every day under the occupation" was "almost identical" to "what was done to the German Jews before the 'Final Solution,'" and that instead of making Jews safer, Israeli policies and practices were stoking the flames of antisemitism. Holocaust survivors who stand up for Palestinian rights have been condemned by critics as "antisemites" and "self-hating Jews" who, in Meyer's case, allegedly abused his status as a Holocaust survivor.Kapos, who has experienced such slurs, is undaunted and says he has no plans to stop protesting. During a recent rally in London he <a href="https://www.facebook.com/reel/457061246846044" target="_blank">vowed</a>, "I'll keep doing it as long as the bombing and apartheid and the injustice is going on." ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 18:20:14 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/holocaust-survivors-gaza-genocide</guid><category>Benjamin netanyahu</category><category>Genocide</category><category>Holocaust</category><category>Israel</category><category>Palestine</category><category>Student protest</category><category>United nations</category><category>Gaza</category><dc:creator>Brett Wilkins</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/holocaust-survivors-condemn-israel-s-gaza-genocide-during-a-london-protest.jpg?id=52105063&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>'A Moral Crisis': Wars Fuel Spike in Global Hunger as Arms Giants Rake in Record Profits</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/global-hunger-spike</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/displaced-palestinian-children-line-up-to-receive-food-in-rafah.jpg?id=52104624&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C531%2C0%2C2203"/> A report published Wednesday found that the number of people around the world suffering acute hunger surged to 282 million last year amid the intensifying climate crisis and military conflicts—including Israel's assault on Gaza—that have further enriched weapons manufacturers.The <a href="https://www.fsinplatform.org/report/global-report-food-crises-2024/" target="_blank">Global Report on Food Crises</a> estimates that 281.6 million people in 59 countries faced high levels of acute food insecurity in 2023, an increase of 24 million compared to the previous year.2023 marked the fifth consecutive year that global hunger has worsened, according to the new report, which found that Gazans account for 80% of the people facing imminent famine globally. Dozens of people in the Gaza Strip, mostly children, have starved to death in recent weeks as Israel continues to bomb the territory and impede the delivery of urgently needed humanitarian aid.The report, a collaborative project of more than a dozen organizations including the World Food Program (WFP), said military conflict was the "primary driver affecting 20 countries with nearly 135 million people in acute food insecurity—almost half of the global number.""The Sudan faced the largest deterioration due to conflict, with 8.6 million more people facing high levels of acute food insecurity as compared with 2022," the report found. Extreme weather events <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/climate-crisis-causes-heatwaves" target="_blank">fueled</a> by the continued burning of oil, gas, and coal "were the primary drivers in 18 countries where over 77 million people faced high levels of acute food insecurity, up from 12 countries with 57 million people in 2022," the document added."When we talk about acute food insecurity, we are talking about hunger so severe that it poses an immediate threat to people's livelihoods and lives," <a href="https://news.un.org/en/story/2024/04/11489260" target="_blank">said</a> Dominique Burgeon, director of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Liaison Office in Geneva. "This is hunger that threatens to slide into famine and cause widespread death." Emily Farr, global food and economic security lead at Oxfam International, said in response to the new figures that "the global hunger crisis is fundamentally a moral crisis.""It is unforgivable that over 281 million people are suffering acute hunger while the world's richest continue to make extraordinary profits, including the same aerospace and defense corporations helping to fuel conflict, the main driver of hunger," said Farr. "The top 100 arms companies have hoarded nearly $600 billion in revenues just in 2022—enough to cover the <a href="https://www.unocha.org/publications/report/world/global-humanitarian-overview-2024-enarfres" target="_blank">U.N. global humanitarian appeal</a> almost 13 times.""States must prioritize justice and peace over politics, and radically reform global peace and security bodies to protect international law rather than perpetuate impunity."Israel's war on Gaza and Russia's assault on Ukraine have been a major boon for the global weapons industry, propelling arms makers to <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/21/bae-systems-profit-ukraine-israel-gaza-wars-ftse-100" target="_blank">record profits</a> as governments <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/arms-trade-2666819054" target="_blank">ramp up orders</a> for tanks, howitzers, missiles, and other lethal military equipment."This is a form of corporate welfare not only for the largest weapons manufacturers, like Lockheed Martin, RTX, Boeing, and General Dynamics, which have seen their <a href="https://www.newsweek.com/military-contractor-stocks-skyrocketed-since-israel-war-started-1834884" target="_blank">stock prices skyrocket</a>, but also for companies that are not typically seen as part of the weapons industry, such as Caterpillar, Ford, and Toyota," the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) noted in a recent analysis.Late last year, AFSC <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/weapons-used-by-israel" target="_blank">created</a> an <a href="https://afsc.org/companies-2023-attack-gaza" target="_blank">online database</a> that allows users to see which companies are profiting from Israel's military assault on the Gaza Strip.WFP's global hunger report was released on the same day U.S. President Joe Biden signed into law a <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-israel-aid" target="_blank">measure</a> containing tens of billions of dollars in additional military assistance for Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan. Reuters <a href="https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/ukraine-israel-bill-bolster-lockheed-rtx-profits-2024-04-25/" target="_blank">reported</a> Thursday that Lockheed Martin and RTX—major arms manufacturers—"stand to profit" from the aid package's "$95 billion of mostly new weapons funding.""The United States needs to buy and restock 'Tomahawk, AMRAAM, Coyote, SM-6,' RTX's CFO Neil Mitchill told Reuters in an interview, listing a long-range cruise missile, an air-to-air missile, a small drone, and a ground-based missile that can be used for air defense," the outlet noted. "In most cases, the U.S. has either sent the munitions to Ukraine or used them to defend Red Sea shipping lanes."Farr said Wednesday that "we cannot drastically change course without a global awakening.""States must prioritize justice and peace over politics, and radically reform global peace and security bodies to protect international law rather than perpetuate impunity," said Farr. "Governments must also rehaul our global food system, tax the rich to invest in the public majority—the small farmers, workers, and vulnerable communities—and support green economies." ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 17:49:18 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/global-hunger-spike</guid><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/displaced-palestinian-children-line-up-to-receive-food-in-rafah.jpg?id=52104624&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>'Everyone Should Celebrate': FCC Restores Net Neutrality Rules</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/what-is-net-neutrality</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/federal-communications-commission-chair-jessica-rosenworcel.jpg?id=52104813&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C141%2C0%2C202"/> 
Open internet advocates on Thursday applauded the Federal Communications Commission's <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/fcc-net-neutrality" target="_blank">long-anticipated</a> vote to revive <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/tag/net-neutrality" target="_self">net neutrality</a> rules and reestablish FCC oversight of broadband.

The 3-2 vote along party lines to reclassify broadband as a public service under Title II of the Communications Act came seven months after FCC Chair Jessica Rosenworcel <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/restore-net-neutrality" target="_self">announced</a> the push in the wake of the U.S. Senate <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/anna-gomez-fcc-confirmed" target="_self">confirming</a> Commissioner Anna Gomez.

Commissioner Geoffrey Starks joined Rosenworcel and Gomez to <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/fcc-restore-net-neutrality" target="_self">launch</a> the rulemaking process last year and finalize the policy change on Thursday. Commissioner Brendan Carr and Nathan Simington both aligned with the powerful telecom industry by opposing the effort to prevent internet service providers from blocking, throttling, or engaging in paid prioritization of lawful online content.

Demand Progress Education Fund senior campaigner Joey DeFrancesco said the revival "has been desperately needed" since former FCC Chair Ajit Pai—an appointee of former Republican President Donald Trump—led the "disastrous decision" in 2017 to gut a 2015 agency policy codifying the principle that has been foundational to the internet since its inception.
"Internet access is not a luxury, but a necessity to participate in society and survive in our modern economy," DeFrancesco stressed. "The FCC's new rule will ensure the commission has the full ability to expand broadband and the authority to ensure access to an open internet."
"The FCC's vote today returns the internet to the American people." 
Free Press co-CEO Craig Aaron <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/in-historic-vote-the-fcc-reasserts-its-authority-to-protect-the-open-internet-and-safeguard-online-users" target="_blank">declared</a> that "everyone should celebrate today's FCC vote."

"Public support for net neutrality is overwhelming, and people understand why we need a federal watchdog to protect everyone's access to the most essential communications platform of our time," he noted. "The FCC heard the outcry and did its job: delivering on promises to stand with internet users and against big telecom companies and their trade groups, which have spent untold millions of dollars to spread lies about net neutrality and thwart any oversight or regulation."

Aaron praised Rosenworcel and her staff for leading the restoration effort, as well as Starks and Gomez for working with her to reverse the Trump FCC's move and ensure "that the agency can once again protect internet users whenever big phone and cable companies like AT&T, Comcast, Spectrum, and Verizon attempt to harm them."

"Big cable and phone companies won't be able to pick and choose what any of us can say or see online. Net neutrality is a guarantee that these companies will carry our data across the internet without undue interference or unreasonable discrimination," he emphasized. "This is what democracy should look like: Public servants responding to public sentiment, taking steps to protect just and reasonable services and free expression, and showing that the government is capable of defending the public interest."
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Michael Copps, a former FCC commissioner and current Common Cause special adviser, was similarly enthusiastic, <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/fcc-votes-to-restore-net-neutrality" target="_blank">saying</a> that "if I weren't out of the country today, I would be personally at the FCC jumping up and down, saluting the majority for reinstituting the network neutrality rules that were so foolishly eliminated by the previous commission."

"Our communications technologies are evolving so swiftly, affecting so many important aspects of our individual lives, that they must be available to all of us on a nondiscriminatory basis. And they must advance the public interest, protecting consumers, fostering competition, and providing us all the news and information we need as we fight to maintain our democracy," he continued. "We still have much to do; but today, let's celebrate a huge step forward."The vote notably comes during an election year—and as Democratic President Joe Biden, a net neutrality supporter, is gearing up for a November rematch against Trump.

"The internet is crucial to civic engagement in the United States today. It functions as a virtual public square where social justice movements organize and garner support," said Common Cause's Ishan Mehta. "The FCC's vote today returns the internet to the American people."

Jenna Leventoff, senior policy counsel at the ACLU, also piled on the praise, proclaiming that "today marks the last day that internet service providers can continue to put profit over people.""We are thrilled that the FCC now has the authority it needs to protect consumers, promote the exercise of First Amendment rights online, and ensure that everyone has access to high-quality, affordable internet," she said. "However, we urge the commission not to exercise its authority to preempt consistent state laws that grant consumers additional protections."<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783531841409937777">
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John Bergmayer, legal director at Public Knowledge, also celebrated the vote while stressing that the commission's work is far from over. In addition to warning of court fights to come, he said that "broadband providers will continue attempting to rebrand their old plans for internet fast and slow lanes, hoping to sneak them through.""The FCC will need to diligently enforce its rules," Bergmayer argued, "including clarifying that discrimination in favor of certain apps or categories of traffic 'impairs' and 'degrades' traffic that is left in the slow lane, and that broadband providers cannot simply take apps that people use on the internet every day and package them as a separate 'nonbroadband' service.""The FCC must also ensure that practices that are not expressly prohibited but still unreasonably interfere with the ability of end users to freely use the internet, or of edge providers to freely compete, are disallowed," he added. "These practices include discriminatory zero-rating and network interconnection practices."Like Leventoff, he also recognized the vital role of states with stricter policies, saying that those "with excellent net neutrality and broadband consumer protection statutes, like <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Internet_Consumer_Protection_and_Net_Neutrality_Act_of_2018" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">California</a>, can be a nationwide model for other states and the FCC to adopt to strengthen their own rules." ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 17:38:34 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/what-is-net-neutrality</guid><category>Aclu</category><category>Common cause</category><category>Demand progress</category><category>Democracy</category><category>Federal communications commission</category><category>Free press</category><category>Internet</category><category>Jessica rosenworcel</category><category>Public knowledge</category><category>Net neutrality</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/federal-communications-commission-chair-jessica-rosenworcel.jpg?id=52104813&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>'We Don't Have Time for This': New Biden Power Sector Rules Spare Existing Gas Plants</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-power-rule-gas-plants</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/smoke-comes-out-of-a-power-plant-chimney.jpg?id=34777902&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C118%2C0%2C224"/> 
President Joe Biden's Environmental Protection Agency
<a href="https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/biden-harris-administration-finalizes-suite-standards-reduce-pollution-fossil-fuel" target="_blank">announced</a> a final quartet of rules on Thursday to limit climate-warming emissions from existing coal and new gas-powered plants, as well as reduce mercury, wastewater, and coal ash pollution from coal facilities.
While several environmental groups and climate advocates praised the new rules, others pointed out that they still
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-epa-gas-plants" target="_blank">exclude</a> emissions from existing gas-powered plants, which are currently the nation's leading source of electricity. A rule on these plants has been pushed into the future, likely until after the November election, which means they may not be regulated for years if pro-fossil fuel Republican Donald Trump retakes the White House.

"We don't have time for this half-assed BS, EPA!" Genevieve Guenther, founding director of End Climate Silence,
<a href="https://twitter.com/DoctorVive/status/1783459879224537471" target="_blank">wrote</a> on social media. "Later is too late."

"As critical as these carbon rules are, the agency's job is not yet done."

The carbon dioxide rule is the first federal rule to limit climate pollution from currently running coal plants,
<a href="https://apnews.com/article/power-plants-coal-natural-gas-biden-epa-5c96ca146e7f70b47806beb4bc3713e6" target="_blank">according to</a> The Associated Press. It mandates that coal plants that intend to operate past 2039 and new gas-powered plants must cut their carbon dioxide emissions by 90% by that date. The EPA calculates that this would cut CO2 emissions by 1.38 billion metric tons by 2047, which is equal to taking 328 million gas-powered cars off the road or cancelling power sector emissions for almost a year. By the same date, it would cost the industry $19 billion to comply, but generate a net $370 billion in economic benefits due to reduced costs from healthcare and extreme weather. It would also prevent as many as 1,200 early deaths and 1,900 new asthma cases in 2035 alone.

The effect of the rule would be to force coal plants to either cease operations or find a way to remove their emissions with carbon, capture, and storage technology, according to the
AP. "The EPA's new rulemaking once again claims that carbon capture is an effective means of reducing climate pollution, even though it has never worked in the real world," said Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch. "The Biden administration must take aggressive actions outside of this rulemaking to rein in fossil fuels—primarily by using existing federal authority to halt new drilling and fracking, and stop new fossil fuel infrastructure like power plants, pipelines, and export terminals. Pretending that carbon capture can dramatically reduce climate pollution is nothing but a dangerous fantasy."The New York Times reported that the rules "could deliver a death blow" to coal, which has already <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/25/climate/biden-power-plants-pollution.html" target="_blank">declined</a> from producing 52% of U.S. electricity in 1990 to 16.2% in 2023.

"EPA's new carbon standards for coal-fired power plants, coupled with parallel rulemakings cracking down on mercury and air toxics, coal ash, and toxic power plant wastewater discharge, rightly force the hand of all coal plants that remain: clean up or make an exit plan," Julie McNamara, a senior analyst and deputy policy director of the Union of Concerned Scientists' (UCS) Climate and Energy Program,
<a href="https://www.ucsusa.org/about/news/epa-finalizes-rules-addressing-power-plant-pollution" target="_blank">said</a> in a statement.

Sunrise Movement communications director Stevie O'Hanlon called the regulations a "game-changer."

"These regulations are the kind of bold action that young people have been fighting for," O'Hanlon added. "President Biden must continue moving us toward ending the fossil fuel era: It's what science demands and what young people want to see from him."
 

The Biden administration has promised to eliminate power sector emissions by 2035; the new regulations, along with the Inflation Reduction Act, put the U.S. on course to slash those emissions by 75% by that date, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

"The age of unbridled climate pollution from power plants is over," NRDC president and CEO Manish Bapna
<a href="https://www.nrdc.org/press-releases/nrdc-epa-issues-power-plant-standards" target="_blank">said</a> in a statement. "These standards cut carbon emissions, at last, from the single largest industrial source. They fit hand-in-glove with the clean energy incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act to make sure we cut our carbon footprint. They will reduce other dangerous pollutants that foul the air we breathe and threaten our health."

"Congressional Republicans are already parroting the oil and gas lobby's talking points criticizing the rules."

Beyond fossil fuel control, the other three rules would strengthen toxic metals standards by 67% and mercury standards by 70%, cut coal wastewater pollution by more than 660 million pounds per year, and establish for the first time regulations on the disposal of coal ash in certain areas.

"The suite of power plant rules announced by EPA Administrator Regan represents a significant step forward in the fight for ambitious climate action and environmental justice," Chitra Kumar, the managing director of UCS' Climate and Energy Program, said in a statement. "Together, these rules help address a long-standing legacy of public health and environmental harms stemming from coal-fired power plants that scientific studies show have disproportionately hurt communities of color and low-income communities."

However, the groups also said the administration must move to regulate existing gas plants.

UCS' McNamara said that "as critical as these carbon rules are, the agency's job is not yet done."

"EPA must tackle carbon emissions from existing gas-fired power plants—soon to be the largest source of power sector carbon emissions—and it must look beyond carbon to reckon with the full suite of health-harming pollution these plants disproportionately and inequitably force on the communities that surround them," McNamara added. "When all the heavy costs of fossil fuel-fired power plants are tallied, it's unequivocally clear that clean energy presents the just and necessary path ahead."

NRDC's Bapna agreed, saying, "Existing gas-fired power plants are massive carbon emitters. They kick out other dangerous pollution that most hurts low-income communities and people of color. The EPA must cut all of that pollution—and soon—in a way that confronts the climate crisis and protects frontline communities."

At the same time, climate campaigners are already mobilizing to defend the new rules from Republican lawmakers who want to reverse them. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.)
<a href="https://www.capito.senate.gov/news/press-releases/capito-to-lead-effort-overturning-bidens-illegal-attempt-to-close-american-power-plants" target="_blank">said</a> she would introduce a Congressional Review Act resolution to "overturn the EPA's job-killing regulations announced today."
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"Congressional Republicans are already parroting the oil and gas lobby's talking points criticizing the rules," Sunrise's O'Hanlon said. "They're making clear whose side they are on. They'd rather please the oil and gas CEOs who back their campaign than save tens of thousands of lives."
"The regulations are clear eyed about the science: To stop the climate crisis and save lives, we must move off fossil fuels," O'Hanlon continued. "Biden can keep building trust with young people by declaring a climate emergency and rejecting new fossil fuel projects in the coming months."
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 17:21:28 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-power-rule-gas-plants</guid><category>Biden administration</category><category>Climate emergency</category><category>Coal</category><category>Coal ash</category><category>Environmental justice</category><category>Fossil fuels</category><category>Gas</category><category>Mercury</category><category>Pollution</category><category>Environmental protection agency</category><dc:creator>Olivia Rosane</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/smoke-comes-out-of-a-power-plant-chimney.jpg?id=34777902&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Netanyahu Demands Harsher Crackdown on US Students as Campus Protests Spread</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-college-protests</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/hundreds-of-activists-gather-for-an-encampment-on-the-university-of-michigan-s-campus.jpg?id=52104410&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C412%2C0%2C1221"/> Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested Wednesday that he was dissatisfied with the arrests of hundreds of U.S. college students—some of whom were violently detained by large groups of police officers—in the last week at a growing number of protests against universities' complicity in Israel's massacre of Palestinians in Gaza. Netanyahu <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/24/us/netanyahu-israel-us-college-protests.html" target="_blank">called</a> the students who have set up encampments in solidarity with Palestinians "antisemitic mobs" and accused them of attacking Jewish students and faculty—despite the fact that Jewish organizers have been among those protesting Israel's bombardment of Gaza and demanding a cease-fire."It's unconscionable. It has to be stopped. It has to be condemned and condemned unequivocally... More has to be done," said Netanyahu shortly after Texas state troopers on horseback arrived at the campus of the University of Texas at Austin and<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/ut-austin-police" target="_blank"> arrested</a> at least 50 people, including a photojournalist. Artist and author Eli Valley said Netanyahu's call for a more forceful response could endanger U.S. college students in the interest of distracting "from the horrors" the Israeli government is inflicting in Gaza. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783216663380299922">
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The prime minister's comments also came as <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/news/pro-palestinian-protests-spread-as-more-than-100-arrested-at-emerson-college-university-of-texas-at-austin-heres-whats-happening-222631375.html" target="_blank">at least 93 people</a> were arrested at the University of Southern California, and hours before more than 100 students were <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/04/25/metro/emerson-encampment-cleared/" target="_blank">detained</a> by Boston police officers at Emerson College. The current surge in student protests comes after months of demonstrations across the country demanding that President Joe Biden push for a permanent cease-fire and end unconditional military aid for Israel, which has received billions of dollars in weapons from the U.S. since it began its latest attack on Gaza—and full-scale obstruction of humanitarian aid—in October. Starting with a solidarity encampment at Columbia University last week, U.S. college students have called on their schools to divest from weapons manufacturers, tech companies, and other entities that work with the Israeli government, and have demanded a cease-fire.More than 100 students were suspended from Columbia and its affiliate, Barnard College, and then <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/columbia-arrests-palestine-protest" target="_blank">arrested</a> last week—but the New York Police Department's response, sanctioned by university president Minouche Shafik, didn't stop protesters from erecting another encampment that was still up on Thursday as student organizers and administrators <a href="https://www.cnn.com/business/live-news/columbia-yale-university-protests-04-24-24/index.html" target="_blank">held negotiations</a>. Al Jazeera <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/25/students-arrested-in-california-texas-as-gaza-war-protests-in-us-intensify" target="_blank">reported </a>Thursday that despite law enforcement's violent response to protesters, demonstrations have sprung up at dozens of schools."As a sheer tactical matter, mass arrests of the protesters seem to be having the opposite of its intended effect," <a href="https://twitter.com/chrislhayes/status/1783209948660253105" target="_blank">observed </a>MSNBC anchor Chris Hayes. Netanyahu's call for a greater show of force against students exercising their constitutional rights, said Palestinian ambassador to the United Kingdom Husam Zomlot, is evidence that the prime minister "knows the tide is turning, and time is against him and his racist government." <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783227339754606834">
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On Thursday morning, new demonstrations were announced at the City College of New York, Northwestern University, Emory University, <a href="https://twitter.com/GtownVoice/status/1783446028663795921" target="_blank">Georgetown University</a>, and Princeton University. Organizers of some of the protests said they would not dismantle their encampments until their demands, including for divestment from companies benefiting from Israel's policies in the occupied Palestinian territories, were met. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783492539066015922">
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"We refuse to allow business to continue as usual in the face of Northwestern's complicity," said organizers with Educators for Justice in Palestine, Jewish Voice for Peace, and Student Liberation Union at the university in Evanston, Illinois. "While Northwestern University rejects demands to disclose its investments, members of its Board of Trustees have served as executives of companies that supply arms to Israel. The university maintains partnerships like the Israel Innovation Project (IIP), whose research has strengthened the Israeli military-industrial complex and its capacity for surveillance and AI-powered apartheid. Our movement will not be stopped, nor will it be co-opted—we are committed to reclaiming our campus and reimagining what a university space should be until our following demands are met."The groundswell of protest activity on college campuses, taking place just over six months ahead of the U.S. general election, led some observers to note that Biden may be sacrificing crucial support from young voters in the interest of continuing to support a foreign government's military operation that has killed at least 34,305 Palestinians.<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783265874780000286">
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"As usual, Netanyahu openly amplifies GOP messages," <a href="https://twitter.com/RonBrownstein/status/1783335414473904537" target="_blank">said</a> The Atlantic senior editor Ronald Brownstein, "which should remind Biden he's tied himself to a partner [who is] hoping he loses."Biden <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2024/04/22/remarks-by-president-biden-in-press-gaggle-triangle-va/" target="_blank">told reporters</a> on Monday that he condemned "the antisemitic protests" without saying which student demonstrations have expressed support for antisemitism or how, and <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/04/21/columbia-university-protest-biden-antisemitism/" target="_blank">said </a>in a statement on Sunday that "blatant antisemitism is reprehensible and dangerous—and it has absolutely no place on college campuses, or anywhere in our country"—but also didn't specify in the remarks what antisemitic activity the White House has observed at protests in support of Gaza. U.S. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/25/israel-gaza-ceasefire-adam-smith" target="_blank">said</a> Wednesday in an interview with a CBS News reporter that campus protesters demanding a cease-fire are practicing "left-wing fascism" and "challenging representative democracy" and called for their arrests. On "All In with Chris Hayes" on Wednesday evening, Hayes pointed out that as politicians from across the political spectrum accuse student protesters of antisemitism and violence, "the actual issues raised by the protests and protesters, which include the status of the hostages in Gaza, Israel's ongoing war in Gaza, the 30,000+ deaths there, and how and when the war might be brought to a close, all remain completely unresolved."<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783298205792293035">
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"What is the endpoint here?" Hayes asked. "How many people have to die, how many is tolerable, how many tens of thousands, how many children? How will the hostages come home? With the specter of even more mass destruction looming ahead, how will the people of Gaza find anything approaching a habitable future?" ]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 16:39:22 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/netanyahu-college-protests</guid><category>Benjamin netanyahu</category><category>Columbia university</category><category>Divestment</category><category>Gaza</category><category>Israel</category><category>Joe biden</category><category>Military aid</category><category>Students</category><category>Protests</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/hundreds-of-activists-gather-for-an-encampment-on-the-university-of-michigan-s-campus.jpg?id=52104410&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Listen Live: US Supreme Court Hears Outrageous Argument That Trump Is Above the Law</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-immunity-supreme-court</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/former-president-donald-trump.jpg?id=52103024&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C503%2C0%2C1497"/> 
After months of delay, the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday will hear oral arguments in a closely watched case on whether former President Donald Trump should be immune from criminal charges stemming from his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss—an argument that legal experts say is both <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-immunity-hearing" target="_blank">absurd and dangerous</a>.


Listen live to the oral arguments, which are set to begin at 10:00 am ET:


<iframe frameborder="0" height="auto" lazy-loadable="true" scrolling="no" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/PWfYS_4L1TE?rel=0" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;" width="100%"></iframe>

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PWfYS_4L1TE" target="_blank"> 
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Thursday's proceedings mark the high court's final argument of its current term, and pro-democracy campaigners are calling on the justices to quickly reject the former president's <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/05/us/politics/trump-jan-6-case-dismissal.html" target="_blank">sweeping immunity claim</a> so he can face trial on federal election subversion charges before his November rematch with President Joe Biden.


As Bloomberg's Greg Stohr <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-04-22/trump-s-immunity-case-at-supreme-court-a-delay-means-a-win" target="_blank">noted</a> earlier this week, Thursday's oral arguments give "Special Counsel Jack Smith only a narrow window to put the former president in front of a Washington jury before voters go to the polls on November 5."


"With the trial on hold until the high court rules," Stohr added, "Smith needs a clear-cut victory, and he needs it quickly." 


Sean Eldridge, founder and president of the progressive advocacy group Stand Up America, said in a statement Thursday that "the Supreme Court's right-wing majority has already handed Trump a temporary victory by stalling this case for months, allowing him to delay accountability for his criminal attempts to cling to power."


"With so much at stake for our democracy, the Supreme Court should rule swiftly and decisively in this case," said Eldridge. "Accountability delayed could mean accountability denied."
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 13:26:29 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-immunity-supreme-court</guid><category>Election 2020</category><category>Jan 6 insurrection</category><category>Presidential immunity</category><category>Us supreme court</category><category>Donald trump</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/former-president-donald-trump.jpg?id=52103024&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Grand Jury Indicts Top Trump Aides, 11 Arizona Republicans Over 'Fake Electors' Scheme</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/arizona-fake-electors-scheme</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/mark-meadows.jpg?id=52100083&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C562%2C0%2C868"/> 
A grand jury in Arizona on Wednesday charged seven aides to Donald Trump and nearly a dozen Republican officials over a "fake electors" scheme in the state that aimed to keep the former president in power after his 2020 loss to President Joe Biden.


Trump, who is currently facing
<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/trump-charges-jan-6-classified-documents/" target="_blank">nearly 90 charges</a> across four criminal cases as he runs for another White House term, was described as "unindicted co-conspirator 1" in the <a href="https://www.azag.gov/sites/default/files/2024-04/Indictment.pdf" target="_blank">58-page indictment</a>, which was <a href="https://www.azag.gov/press-release/attorney-general-mayes-announces-state-grand-jury-indictments" target="_blank">announced</a> by Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes.


"The people of Arizona elected President Biden," Mayes, a Democrat, said Wednesday. "Unwilling to accept this fact, the defendants charged by the state grand jury allegedly schemed to prevent the lawful transfer of the presidency. Whatever their reasoning was, the plot to violate the law must be answered for."


The indictment names former Arizona Republican Party Chair Kelli Ward, sitting state Republican Sens. Jake Hoffman and Anthony Kern, former U.S. Senate candidate Jim Lamon, and seven others as the "fake electors" who sought to declare Trump the rightful winner of the state's presidential contest.


The names of other individuals indicted by the state grand jury are redacted, but the document's descriptions make clear that former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, and top Trump legal strategist Boris Epshteyn are among those facing felony charges—including fraud, forgery, and conspiracy.


"In Arizona, defendants, unindicted coconspirators, and others pressured the three groups of election officials responsible for certifying election results to encourage them to change the election results," the document reads. "Discussions about using the Republican electors to change the outcome of the election began as early as November 4, 2020. Those plans evolved during November based on memos drafted by [an attorney for the Trump campaign, Kenneth Chesebro]."


Mayes said Wednesday that had the fake elector scheme succeeded, it would have "deprived Arizona's voters of their right to have their votes counted for their chosen president."


"It effectively would have made their right to vote meaningless," said Mayes.

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A state grand jury, made up of everyday, regular Arizonans, has handed down felony indictments in the ongoing investigation into the fake elector scheme in Arizona.
<a href="https://t.co/Nu8GcD4ZqJ">pic.twitter.com/Nu8GcD4ZqJ</a> 
— AZ Attorney General Kris Mayes (@AZAGMayes)
<a href="https://twitter.com/AZAGMayes/status/1783271748882039054?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2024</a>
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Alex Gulotta, state director of All Voting Is Local Action Arizona, said Wednesday that "the indictment of the eleven fake electors is one of the first steps required in holding these election deniers accountable for their alleged attempts to take power away from voters by disrupting our free and fair elections."


"Arizonans deserve to trust the election officials responsible for administering our elections and preserving our democracy," said Gulotta, "and this is a positive step forward as we continue to strengthen the foundations of our democracy and restore faith in our elections."


The Arizona Republic <a href="https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/04/24/arizona-fake-electors-indictments/73184206007/" target="_blank">reported</a> Wednesday that "several of the Arizona electors have previously claimed they were merely offering Congress a backup plan, though nothing in the documents they sent to Congress and the National Archives backs up that assertion."


"The indictment includes several statements the false electors made on social media that contradict those claims," the newspaper observed.


Jenny Guzman, director of Common Cause's Arizona program, said the indictment "marks the start of a new chapter for the fake elector scheme that has plagued Arizona."


"Arizonans are still dealing with the fallout from the false electors and the Big Lie about the 2020 elections," said Guzman. "We are relieved that the investigation by Attorney General Mayes has concluded and Arizonans can now know that what comes next is accountability. These efforts by these fake electors to undermine the will of Arizona’s voters have had implications far beyond their failed attempt to overthrow the 2020 election."


"This indictment can reassure all Arizonans that if anyone, regardless of their political affiliation, attempts to undermine their vote, consequences will follow," Guzman added.
]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 09:02:52 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/arizona-fake-electors-scheme</guid><category>Arizona</category><category>Common cause</category><category>Donald trump</category><category>Election 2020</category><category>Kris mayes</category><category>Mark meadows</category><category>Republican party</category><category>Rudy giuliani</category><category>Fake electors</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/mark-meadows.jpg?id=52100083&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Watchdog Urges FEC to Investigate Trump Campaign Over Scheme for Legal Fees</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-save-america-campaign</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/trump.jpg?id=36449670&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C225%2C0%2C838"/> A campaign finance watchdog on Wednesday filed a Federal Election Commission <a href="https://campaignlegal.org/sites/default/files/2024-04/Red%20Curve%20Reporting%20Complaint%20%28Final%29.pdf" target="_blank">complaint</a> accusing former President Donald Trump's 2024 campaign, affiliated political groups, and an accounting firm of violating U.S. law in a scheme "seemingly designed to obscure the true recipients of a noteworthy portion of Trump's legal bills."The Washington, D.C.-based Campaign Legal Center (CLC) <a href="https://campaignlegal.org/press-releases/clc-files-complaint-alleging-illegal-payment-set-trump-legal-fees" target="_blank">said</a> that "evidence appears to show an illegal arrangement between several Trump-affiliated committees and a compliance firm named Red Curve Solutions that is designed to obscure the identities of those providing legal services and how much they are being paid.""Voters have a right to know how the presidential campaigns and other committees supporting presidential candidates spend their money."CLC alleges that the Trump campaign, Trump's political action committee (PAC) Save America, and three affiliated organizations "violated federal reporting requirements based on a scheme in which the committees reportedly paid over $7.2 million—described as 'reimbursement for legal' costs or expenses"—to Red Curve. The watchdog also said that Red Curve appears to be "making or facilitating illegal contributions that violate either federal contribution limits or the prohibition on corporate contributions."According to CLC: <blockquote>Red Curve is a domestic limited liability company that offers compliance and FEC reporting services but does not appear to offer any legal services. It is managed by Bradley Crate, who also serves as the treasurer for each of the five Trump-affiliated committees concerned in this complaint, as well as over 200 other federal committees. According to filings with the FEC, Red Curve appears to have been fronting legal costs for Trump since at least December 2022, with Trump-affiliated committees repaying the company later. This arrangement appears to violate FEC rules that require campaigns to disclose not only the entity being reimbursed (here, Red Curve) but also the underlying vendor. By not disclosing the vendors that actually provided legal services, the Trump-affiliated committees effectively blocked the public from knowing which attorneys and firms are being paid—and how much they are being paid—through this arrangement. </blockquote>"Voters have a right to know how the presidential campaigns and other committees supporting presidential candidates spend their money," CLC senior director of campaign finance Erin Chlopak said in a <a href="https://campaignlegal.org/press-releases/clc-files-complaint-alleging-illegal-payment-set-trump-legal-fees" target="_blank">statement</a>. "When campaigns and committees obscure that information from the public, not only do they make it difficult to determine if the law has been violated, but they deny voters the ability to make an informed choice when casting a ballot.""The steps taken by the Trump campaign, its affiliated committees, and Red Curve Solutions concealed information about how campaign funds were used to pay former President Trump's legal expenditures, including the amounts and ultimate recipients of these expenditures—and the FEC must investigate immediately," Chlopak added. Trump—who is the presumptive 2024 GOP presidential nominee—faces 88 federal and state felony charges related to his role in the January 6 insurrection and his organization's business practices. He is currently <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-new-york-trial" target="_blank">on trial</a> in New York for allegedly falsifying business records related to hush money payments to cover up sex scandals during the 2016 election cycle. The twice-impeached former president has been open about his <a href="https://theconversation.com/yes-trumps-pacs-really-can-pay-his-legal-fees-222693" target="_blank">use</a> of campaign donations to pay his legal costs. The new CLC filing comes a day after the watchdog filed separate FEC complaints urging investigations into a pair of Trump-affiliated "scam PACs," which "pretend to fundraise for major candidates or issues while secretly diverting almost all of their donors' money back into fundraising or the fraudsters' own pockets."Correction: This article originally said Trump faces 91 federal and state felony charges. The correct number is 88. ]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 23:56:14 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-save-america-campaign</guid><category>Bradley crate</category><category>Campaign legal center</category><category>Election 2024</category><category>Federal election commission</category><category>Political action committees</category><category>Red curve solutions</category><category>Save america</category><category>Donald trump</category><dc:creator>Brett Wilkins</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/trump.jpg?id=36449670&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>'One Step Closer': Arizona House Votes to Repeal 1864 Abortion Ban</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/arizona-abortion-laws</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/members-of-arizona-for-abortion-access.jpg?id=52098210&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C138%2C0%2C205"/> Three Republicans in the Arizona House of Representatives on Wednesday joined with Democrats to advance legislation that would repeal an 1864 ban on abortion—a development rights advocates welcomed while stressing that the fight is far from over. The <a href="https://twitter.com/CAKitchener/status/1783214623472111705" target="_blank">32-28</a> vote on House Bill 2677—with GOP Reps. Tim Dunn (25), Matt Gress (4), and Justin Wilmeth (2) voting in favor—was the third attempt in as many weeks to pass repeal legislation since the Arizona Supreme Court <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/arizona-abortion-ban" target="_blank">upheld</a> the ban."The state Senate could vote on the repeal as early as next Wednesday, after the bill comes on the floor for a 'third reading,' as is required under chamber rules," <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/arizona-abortion-ban-lawmakers-repeal-rcna149181" target="_blank">according to</a> NBC News. Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs on Wednesday <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/04/24/arizona-abortion-ban/" target="_blank">told</a> The Washington Post that "I am hopeful the Senate does the right thing and sends it to my desk so I can sign it."Applauding the House passage of H.B. 2677, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona president and CEO Angela Florez said that "today, Arizona is one step closer to repealing the state's Civil War-era total abortion ban. While the repeal still must pass the Senate, this is a major win for reproductive freedom.""We must celebrate today's vote in support of abortion rights and harness our enthusiasm to spread the word and urge lawmakers in the Senate to support this necessary repeal bill," she continued. "Despite this step forward, Arizonans cannot stop fighting."Florez noted that "even with the repeal of the Civil War-era ban, the state will still have a ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy that denies people access to critical care. And lawmakers continue to attack Arizonans' ability to access reproductive healthcare. Our right to control our bodies and lives is hanging on by a thread."
"Thankfully, voters will have the opportunity to take back control if the Arizona Abortion Access Act is on the ballot this November," she added. "Abortion bans are out-of-step with the will of Arizonans and will force pregnant people to leave their communities for essential healthcare. Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona will continue fighting to ensure everyone has the right to make decisions about their health and futures."<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783223546464047459">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/ACLUaz/status/1783223546464047459"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
The <a href="https://arizonaforabortionaccess.org/what-is-the-aaa/" target="_blank">Arizona Abortion Access Act</a> is a proposed state constitutional amendment that would prevent many limits on abortions before fetal viability and safeguard access to care after viability to protect the life or physical or mental health of the patient.The coalition supporting the amendment, Arizona for Abortion Access, <a href="https://x.com/azforaccess/status/1783256635261223153" target="_blank">highlighted</a> on social media that the House-approved bill "did not include the emergency clause required to stop the 1864 ban from taking effect on June 8," meaning H.B. 2677 wouldn't apply until 90 days after the end of the legislative session. Coalition campaign manager Cheryl Bruce <a href="https://x.com/azforaccess/status/1783256640353112383" target="_blank">said</a> that "with a total ban still set to take effect June 8, the Arizona Abortion Access Act is needed now more than ever. We remain committed to taking these decisions out of the hands of extremist politicians." Arizona is one of multiple <a href="https://apnews.com/article/abortion-ballot-amendment-ban-protection-states-2024-052ff9846f8416efb725240af22b92ec" target="_blank">states</a> where rights advocates are <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/abortion-law-florida" target="_blank">promoting</a> abortion rights ballot measures this cycle. Reproductive freedom is also dominating political races at all levels, including the presidential contest. Democratic President Joe Biden is set to face former Republican President Donald Trump in November. "Donald Trump is responsible for Arizona's abortion ban. Women in the state are still living under a ban with no exceptions for rape or incest and have been stripped of the freedom to make their own healthcare decisions," said Julie Chávez Rodriguez, Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris' reelection campaign manager. While the presumptive GOP nominee has tried to distance himself from the Arizona Supreme Court's reinstatement of a 160-year-old abortion ban, he has also <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-arizona-abortion" target="_blank">campaigned on</a> his three appointees to the U.S. Supreme Court who helped reverse Roe v. Wade. "Trump brags that he is 'proudly' the person responsible for these bans and if he retakes power, the chaos and cruelty he has created will only get worse in all 50 states," Chávez Rodriguez said. "President Biden and Vice President Harris are the only candidates who will stop him."]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 23:45:13 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/arizona-abortion-laws</guid><category>Aclu</category><category>Arizona</category><category>Arizona for abortion access</category><category>Arizona supreme court</category><category>Election 2024</category><category>Healthcare</category><category>Planned parenthood</category><category>Abortion</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/members-of-arizona-for-abortion-access.jpg?id=52098210&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>US Dodges Growing Calls for Probe of Mass Graves at Gaza Hospitals</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-mass-grave</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/civil-defense-authority-teams-remove-bodies-of-palestinians.jpg?id=52097911&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C115%2C0%2C228"/> 
While continuing to <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-israel-aid" target="_blank">give</a> Israel billions of dollars in support to wage war on the Gaza Strip, the Biden administration this week has declined to join the growing global demands for an international probe into <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/mass-grave-gaza-nasser-hospital" target="_blank">mass graves</a> discovered at hospitals in the besieged Palestinian enclave.

Two journalists on Tuesday questioned Vedant Patel, a spokesperson for the U.S. State Department, about the administration's response to the hundreds of bodies found at Gaza City's al-Shifa Hospital and Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis as well as United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk's <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/un-rights-chief-mass-graves" target="_blank">call</a> for an independent investigation.

"Would you support such an independent investigation?" Said Arikat asked during a press briefing. Patel responded, "Right now, Said, we are asking for more information... That is squarely where we are leaving the conversation."

Patel added that "I don't have any details to match, confirm, or offer as it relates to that. We're aware of those reports, and we have asked the government of Israel for additional clarity and information. And that's where I'm at."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782866582190150037">
<div style="margin:1em 0">Wow, StateSpox won\u2019t say if the US would support an independent investigation for another mass grave found in Gaza.\n\n@SMArikat: More than 300 bodies have been found, UN is calling for an independent investigation, would you support that?\n\nPatel: We are asking Israel for more info</div> — (@)
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When Said asked a follow-up about potential U.S. support for a probe, Patel reiterated that the administration is awaiting information from the Israeli government.

Later, Niall Stanage asked Patel to explain U.S. "resistance" to supporting a probe, the spokesperson insisted that "it's not about resistance to this particular situation, it is me not wanting to speak in detail about something which Said posed as a hypothetical question when, from the United States' perspective, I don't have any additional information on this aside from the public reporting."

After Patel again stressed that the administration has asked Israel for more information, Stanage inquired, "And do you believe the government of Israel is a credible source in enlightening you?"

The spokesperson interrupted Stanage to say, "We do."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782909848872489030">
<div style="margin:1em 0">Insufferable liars.</div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/SanaSaeed/status/1782909848872489030"></a>
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While supporting the six-month Israeli assault on Gaza that the International Court of Justice has found to be plausibly genocidal, the Biden administration is also arming Ukrainians' resistance to a Russian invasion. Brian Finucane, a senior adviser for the Crisis Group's U.S. program and a former legal adviser at the State Department, <a href="https://x.com/BCFinucane/status/1782863053848973692" target="_blank">pointed to</a> the latter. 

"Somehow I don't think the U.S. State Department would defer to Russia as a credible source to investigate itself if a mass grave were discovered in Ukrainian territory it had occupied," Finucane said on social media in response to Stanage's questioning.

Meanwhile, European Union spokesperson Peter Stano <a href="https://www.barrons.com/news/eu-urges-probe-into-reported-mass-graves-at-gaza-hospitals-ee794974" target="_blank">made clear</a> Tuesday that the E.U. supports an independent probe.

"This is something that forces us to call for an independent investigation of all the suspicions and all the circumstances, because indeed it creates the impression that there might have been violations of international human rights committed," Stano said. "That's why it's important to have independent investigation and to ensure accountability."

Human rights groups around the world joined the call for an independent investigation on Wednesday, as the official death toll in Gaza <a href="https://www.barrons.com/news/health-ministry-in-hamas-run-gaza-says-war-death-toll-at-34-262-1a86afd2" target="_blank">hit</a> 34,262 with 77,229 people injured and thousands more missing and presumed dead beneath the rubble.

In an Arabic statement <a href="https://aje.io/co05l6?update=2857687" target="_blank">translated</a> by Al Jazeera, the Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor <a href="https://euromedmonitor.org/ar/article/6283" target="_blank">said</a> that the number of bodies found in the mass graves is "alarming, and requires urgent international action, including the formation of an independent international investigation committee."

The group added that some of those killed were subjected to "premeditated murder as well as arbitrary and extrajudicial executions while they were detained and handcuffed."
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783078877453000868">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/MonicaLMarks/status/1783078877453000868"></a>
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Amnesty International senior director of research, advocacy, policy, and campaigns Erika Guevara Rosas <a href="https://www.amnestyusa.org/press-releases/discovery-of-mass-graves-in-gaza-highlights-urgent-need-to-grant-access-to-independent-human-rights-investigators/" target="_blank">said</a> in a statement that "the harrowing discovery of these mass graves underscores the urgency of ensuring immediate access for human rights investigators, including forensic experts, to the occupied Gaza Strip to ensure that evidence is preserved and to carry out independent and transparent investigations with the aim of guaranteeing accountability for any violations of international law."

"Lack of access for human rights investigators to Gaza has hampered effective investigations into the full scale of the human rights violations and crimes under international law committed over the past six months, allowing for the documentation of just a tiny fraction of these abuses," she noted. "Without proper investigations to determine how these deaths took place or what violations may have been committed, we may never find out the truth of the horrors behind these mass graves."

Guevara Rosas continued:
<blockquote>
Mass grave sites are potential crime scenes offering vital and time-sensitive forensic evidence; they must be protected until professional forensic experts with the necessary skills and resources can safely carry out adequate exhumations and accurate identification of remains. 
 
The absence of forensic experts and the decimation of Gaza's medical sector as a result of the war and Israel's cruel blockade, along with the lack of availability of the necessary resources for the identification of bodies such as DNA testing, are huge obstacles to the identifications of remains. This denies those killed the opportunity to have a dignified burial and deprives families with relatives missing or forcibly disappeared the right to know and to justice—leaving them in a limbo of uncertainty and anguish. </blockquote>
Noting that the International Court of Justice directed Israel to preserve evidence in its initial genocide case order, Guevara Rosas said that "amid a total vacuum of accountability and mounting evidence of war crimes in Gaza, Israeli authorities must ensure they comply with the ICJ ruling by granting immediate access to independent human rights investigators and ensuring that all evidence of violations is preserved."

"Third states must pressure Israel to comply with the ICJ orders by allowing the immediate entry into the Gaza Strip of independent human rights investigators and forensic experts, including the U.N.-appointed Commission of Inquiry and investigators of the International Criminal Court," she added. "There can be no truth and justice without proper, transparent independent investigations into these deaths." 
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 22:24:40 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-mass-grave</guid><category>Amnesty international</category><category>Euro-mediterranean human rights monitor</category><category>European union</category><category>Genocide</category><category>International court of justice</category><category>Israel</category><category>Mass graves</category><category>Palestine</category><category>Us state department</category><category>Gaza</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/civil-defense-authority-teams-remove-bodies-of-palestinians.jpg?id=52097911&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Sanders Launches Probe of 'Outrageously Overpriced' Ozempic and Wegovy</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/novo-nordisk-ozempic-wegovy</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/sen-bernie-sanders.jpg?id=50637947&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C284%2C0%2C1050"/> 
U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders on Wednesday opened an investigation into an "outrageously overpriced" medication manufactured by a Denmark-based company whose value by market capitalization is larger than the Scandinavian country's gross domestic product.

Sanders (I-Vt.), who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee, sent a
<a href="https://www.sanders.senate.gov/wp-content/uploads/Letter-from-Sen.-Bernard-Sanders-to-Novo-Nordisk.pdf" target="_blank">letter</a> to Lars Fruergaard Jørgensen, CEO of Novo Nordisk. The company makes semaglutide, a glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) agonist used to treat Type 2 diabetes under the brand name Ozempic and, when sold as Wegovy, to treat obesity in adults with at least one weight-related comorbidity.

"The scientists at Novo Nordisk deserve great credit for developing these drugs that have the potential to be a game-changer for millions of Americans struggling with Type 2 diabetes and obesity," Sanders acknowledged. "As important as these drugs are, they will not do any good for the millions of patients who cannot afford them."

"Further, if the prices for these products are not substantially reduced they also have the potential to bankrupt Medicare, Medicaid, and our entire healthcare system," he added.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783224125701468658">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/SenSanders/status/1783224125701468658"></a>
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Sanders continued:
<blockquote>
Today, Novo Nordisk is charging patients in the United States up to 15 times more for Ozempic and Wegovy than it charges patients in Canada, Europe, or Japan. For example, your company charges $969 in the United States for one month of Ozempic but just $155 in Canada and just $59 in Germany. Further, Novo Nordisk charges Americans $1,349 for one month Wegovy but just $140 in Germany and just $92 in the United Kingdom.
</blockquote>
"Meanwhile," the senator noted, "researchers at Yale University estimate that both of these drugs can be profitably manufactured for less than $5 a month."

"The result of these astronomically high prices is that Ozempic and Wegovy are out of reach for millions of Americans who need them," Sanders said. "Unfortunately, Novo Nordisk's pricing has turned drugs that could improve people's lives into luxury goods, all while Novo Nordisk made over $12 billion in profits last year—up 76% from 2021. That is unacceptable."

As of March 2024, Novo Nordisk was Europe's
<a href="https://ceoworld.biz/2024/02/14/europes-largest-companies-by-market-capitalization-2024/" target="_blank">most highly valued company</a> by market capitalization. Its $554 billion market cap is significantly higher than Denmark's annual gross domestic product of approximately $410 billion, <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/profile/DNK" target="_blank">according to</a> International Monetary Fund figures.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1773081793152835942">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/StevenTDennis/status/1773081793152835942"></a>
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Sanders also pointed out that Novo Nordisk is charging different prices for Ozempic and Wegovy, even though they're "the exact same drug."

"Novo Nordisk charges Americans with obesity nearly $400 more every month than those with Type 2 diabetes for the same product provided in similar doses," he wrote.

"The unjustifiably high prices of Ozempic and Wegovy are already straining the budgets of Medicare and Medicaid and severely limiting access for patients who need these drugs," the letter says. "Last year, researchers at Vanderbilt University's Department of Health Policy and the University of Chicago's Department of Medicine estimated in the
New England Journal of Medicine that it would cost Medicare over $150 billion a year to cover Wegovy and other similar weight loss drugs."

"To put this in perspective, the cost of all retail prescription drugs covered by Medicare in 2022 was less than $130 billion," Sanders added.

"As chairman of the committee, I am asking Novo Nordisk to substantially reduce the price of Ozempic and Wegovy so that these important drugs can be available to Americans with Type 2 diabetes and obesity," he wrote.

Existing law empowers the government to step in to lower drug prices in service of the public interest. Under the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980—legislation meant to promote the commercialization and public availability of government-funded inventions—federal agencies reserve the right to "march in" and authorize price-lowering generic alternatives to patented medications developed with public funding.

However, U.S. administrations—<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/march-in-rights-xtandi" target="_blank">including</a> President Joe Biden's—have been loath to exercise "march-in" rights.
<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783177982720307632">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
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Under pressure from the public and lawmakers led by Sanders, Novo Nordisk last year <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/bernie-sanders-insulin-prices" target="_blank">announced</a> that it would cut prices by up to 75% for some of its insulin products.

Responding to Wednesday's letter, Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America—Big Pharma's leading lobbyist—accused Sanders of "attacking an innovative company to advance a political agenda instead of addressing the real cause of affordability challenges."

Noting Novo Nordisk's bigger-than-Denmark market cap, Warren Gunnels, the HELP Committee's majority staff director, <a href="https://twitter.com/GunnelsWarren/status/1783210555014013095" target="_blank">wrote</a> on social media that the company "made over $12 billion in profits last year by, among other things, charging Americans $969 for Ozempic while it can be purchased for $59 in Germany and costs $5 to make."
 

"Our political agenda is to end this greed," he added. "Guilty. As. Charged."
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 22:13:20 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/novo-nordisk-ozempic-wegovy</guid><category>Bernie sanders</category><category>Denmark</category><category>March-in rights</category><category>Medicare</category><category>Novo nordisk</category><category>Obesity</category><category>Ozempic</category><category>Senate help committee</category><category>Type 2 diabetes</category><category>Wegovy</category><category>Big pharma</category><dc:creator>Brett Wilkins</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/sen-bernie-sanders.jpg?id=50637947&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Texas State Troopers in Riot Gear Crack Down on UT Students' Gaza Protest</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/ut-austin-police</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/a-student-is-arrested-during-a-pro-palestine-demonstration.jpg?id=52097391&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C2331%2C0%2C421"/> This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates... Civil rights advocates on Wednesday expressed alarm at a rapid escalation by Texas state troopers who descended on a student-led protest at University of Texas at Austin, which was organized in solidarity with Gaza and other U.S. college students taking part in a growing anti-war movement. UT students <a href="https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2024/04/24/ut-students-protest-gaza-war-as-texas-state-troopers-intervene-at-rally/" target="_blank">gathered</a> on campus at midday and were promptly given two minutes to disperse by state troopers, who had already been called to the scene. The troopers were equipped with riot gear, with some carrying assault rifles and several stationed on horses. Erick Lara, a 20-year-old sophomore, <a href="https://www.dallasnews.com/news/education/2024/04/24/ut-students-protest-gaza-war-as-texas-state-troopers-intervene-at-rally/" target="_blank">told </a>The Dallas Morning News that the nonviolent protest transformed "within minutes" after the police began arresting demonstrators. "I didn't think it would escalate this far," he told the outlet. "And I didn't think there would be this much police intervention from what's supposed to be a peaceful protest. Not very peaceful when there's a bunch of aggressors around, especially on horses." The organizers called the gathering "The Popular University" and said it was aimed at pressuring UT to "divest from death." <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783180239410958748">
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The protesters walked out of their classes to demand UT divest from weapons manufacturers in order to end its complicity in Israel's U.S.-backed assault on Gaza, which has killed <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/4/24/israels-war-on-gaza-live-rafah-family-killed-injured-in-israeli-strike" target="_blank">at least 34,262 Palestinians</a>. Student-run newspaper The Daily Texan <a href="https://twitter.com/thedailytexan/status/1783185154459996599" target="_blank">reported</a> roughly 50 state troopers were deployed to stop the initial protest of about 150-200 people. Ryan Chandler, a reporter for NBC affiliate KXAN-TV and UT alum, reported that there were <a href="https://twitter.com/RyanChandlerTV/status/1783219890624528405" target="_blank">at least 10 student</a><a href="https://twitter.com/RyanChandlerTV/status/1783219890624528405">s</a> detained. "Went here for four years, never saw anything like this," said Chandler, posting a video of a group of police pushing one student to the ground and arresting them. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783214460280172691">
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Joseph Pierce, a Stony Brook University professor who attended graduate school at UT, also <a href="https://twitter.com/PepePierce/status/1783201334629421192" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">said</a> the escalation was an unusually "drastic response to students advocating for an end to the genocide of the Palestinian people.""It is a response that did not occur when in 2005 we protested the anti-gay marriage bill; in the late 2000s when we protested anti-immigration bills; in the 2010s when we protested the open-carry bill," Pierce said. "It is a clear attempt at silencing Palestinian and anti-Zionist Jewish voices." The students faced the state troopers in a standoff on the university's main street. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783198788955615287">
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"This violence against peaceful student protesters at UT Austin is absolutely horrifying—and should be condemned in the strongest terms by every politician and mainstream journalist,"<a href="https://twitter.com/erinoverbey/status/1783211258709180661" target="_blank"> said</a> former New Yorker editor Erin Overbey. UT media and Middle East studies professor Nahid Siamdoust said the university "brought out everything but the kitchen sink to make sure" students couldn't erect an anti-war encampment like students at <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/college-students-columbia-solidarity" target="_blank">Columbia University</a>, <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/unions-columbia-solidarity" target="_blank">New York University</a>, and <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/college-students-columbia-solidarity" target="_blank">other schools </a>across the U.S. have in recent days. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1783203342103294166">
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The university had informed organizers with the on-campus Palestine Solidarity Committee on Tuesday that exercising their First Amendment rights in support of Palestinians in Gaza would "violate our policies and rules." "The freedom to protest is integral to our democracy," <a href="https://twitter.com/ACLUTx/status/1783206294456868949" target="_blank">said</a> the ACLU of Texas Wednesday amid reports of the crackdown. "UT Austin students have a First Amendment right to freely express their political opinions—without threats of arrest and violence."]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 20:43:27 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/ut-austin-police</guid><category>Campus speech</category><category>Civil disobedience</category><category>Columbia university</category><category>Gaza</category><category>Israel</category><category>Police</category><category>Protests</category><category>Student protest</category><category>Texas</category><category>University of texas at austin</category><category>Palestine</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/a-student-is-arrested-during-a-pro-palestine-demonstration.jpg?id=52097391&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Endorsing Biden, Building Trades Union Slams Trump as Lackey for 'His Billionaire Buddies'</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/nabtu-endorses-biden</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/joe-biden.jpg?id=52096051&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C1265%2C0%2C430"/> 
The leadership of a union that represents more than 3 million building trades workers in the U.S. and Canada endorsed President Joe Biden's reelection bid on Wednesday, slamming presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump for catering to the needs of billionaires like himself during his first four years in the White House.


"When Trump was elected, we took him at his word that he would have a worker-centered agenda and deliver on long-stalled issues such as infrastructure investment,"
<a href="https://nabtu.org/press_releases/nabtu-endorses-biden-for-president-2024/" target="_blank">said</a> Sean McGarvey, president of North America's Building Trades Unions (NABTU), whose governing board <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2024/04/23/politics/biden-building-trades-union-endorsement/index.html" target="_blank">voted</a> to endorse Biden on Tuesday.


"Instead of delivering," McGarvey added, Trump "aligned himself with his billionaire buddies to enact tax cuts that raised costs for our members. Simply put, he failed to deliver. Given our experience and knowing his track record, the choice is clear."


Building trades unions and their rank-and-file members are <a href="https://www.teenvogue.com/story/building-trades-unions-conservative-politics" target="_blank">generally seen as more conservative</a> and pro-Trump than other elements of the U.S. labor movement. In 2017, McGarvey <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/08/opinion/sunday/the-unions-that-like-trump.html" target="_blank">celebrated</a> Trump's effort to advance construction work on the Keystone XL pipeline, a massive fossil fuel project that Biden <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/06/11/following-keystone-xl-victory-climate-leaders-demand-biden-cancel-line-3-and-other" target="_blank">effectively killed</a> in 2021 after years of organizing by environmentalists and Indigenous tribes.


But NABTU's leadership endorsed Clinton over Trump in the 2016 presidential election and Biden over Trump in 2020.


In a five-minute ad released Wednesday, the union highlights Trump's <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-dictator-day-one" target="_blank">pledge</a> to be a dictator on "day one" and condemns the former president as a dangerous egomaniac.


NABTU <a href="https://nabtu.org/press_releases/nabtu-calls-for-president-trump-to-step-down-immediately/" target="_blank">called for Trump's resignation</a> after the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. 


"Donald Trump, he's not a good man. He's not a good person. He does not care about anybody in this world except Donald Trump," McGarvey says in the new ad. "His dark side is very, very dark."
 

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Wow. You may have seen a short version of the North America Building Trade Union (
<a href="https://twitter.com/NABTU?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@NABTU</a>) video endorsement of Biden. The full video is incredible and absolutely devastating for Trump. They did not hold back. A must watch till the end. <a href="https://t.co/stL7b7JazP">pic.twitter.com/stL7b7JazP</a> 
— MeidasTouch (@MeidasTouch)
<a href="https://twitter.com/MeidasTouch/status/1783173181659853087?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2024</a>
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In his statement Wednesday announcing NABTU's endorsement, McGarvey cites the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the Chips and Science Act, and the Inflation Reduction Act as key legislative achievements that "brought life-changing, opportunity-creating, generational change focused on the working men and women of this great country who have for far too long been clamoring for a leader to finally keep their word."
 


"In the coming months," he added, "we will continue to engage our membership and their families directly, member to member, door to door, and jobsite to jobsite, with an unprecedented field program in key battleground states, to tell them how important President Biden and his policies have been to them, their economic security, and their freedoms."


But McGarvey <a href="https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/4617991-building-trades-union-endorses-biden/" target="_blank">said</a> in an appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Wednesday that the union does not intend to "waste a lot of time talking to every American that supports Donald Trump" or "some of our members that support Donald Trump, because we're not gonna change their minds."


Speaking at NABTU's annual legislative conference on Wednesday, Biden welcomed the union's endorsement and said that "Donald Trump's vision of America is one of revenge and retribution, a defeated former president who sees the world from Mar-a-Lago, who bows down to billionaires and looks down on union workers."


NABTU is the latest major union to back Biden as he prepares for his high-stakes rematch with Trump in November. In January, Biden <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-uaw" target="_blank">secured</a> the support of the <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/tennessee-volkswagen-workers-join-uaw" target="_blank">emboldened United Auto Workers</a>, whose president called Trump a "scab" who "stands against everything we stand for as a union."


"Donald Trump is a billionaire," said UAW president Shawn Fain, "and that's who he represents." 
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 19:18:07 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/nabtu-endorses-biden</guid><category>Billionaires</category><category>Donald trump</category><category>Election 2024</category><category>Labor</category><category>President joe biden</category><category>Unions</category><category>Workers</category><category>North america's building trades unions</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/joe-biden.jpg?id=52096051&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Tennessee GOP Shuts Down Debate, Passes Bill Allowing Handguns for Teachers</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/tennessee-teachers-guns</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/protesters-and-students-enter-the-tennessee-state-capitol-building-in-protest.jpg?id=52093620&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C62%2C0%2C1189"/> A Democratic leader in the Tennessee House on Tuesday <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/watch-tennessee-republicans-bully-extreme-153427231.html" target="_blank">warned</a> that a bill pushed through by Republicans to permit teachers to carry concealed handguns was "nothing but a bad disaster and tragedy waiting to happen," after the GOP cut off a debate and refused to include amendments that aimed to add safety measures to the legislation. House Bill 1202 <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/watch-tennessee-republicans-bully-extreme-153427231.html" target="_blank">passed</a> in a 68-28 vote, and Republican Gov. Bill Lee, who has never vetoed legislation, is expected to sign it, clearing the way for the state to require school districts to allow teachers to carry firearms without notifying students' parents. <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/watch-tennessee-republicans-bully-extreme-153427231.html" target="_blank">According to</a> The Tennessean, the legislation does not allow schools or school districts to opt out of the program and requires administrators "to consider every individual who wants to carry."The legislation was passed just over a year after a shooting at the <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/tag/covenant-school-shooting" target="_blank">Covenant School </a>in Nashville killed six people, including three children. "Our children's lives are at stake," said House Democratic Caucus Chair John Ray Clemmons (D-55).After last year's shooting, the Tennessee Legislature garnered national attention when Republicans <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/tennessee-house-democrats-expulsion-vote" target="_blank">voted to expel</a><a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/tennessee-house-democrats-expulsion-vote"> expel</a> state Reps. Justin Jones (D-52) and Justin Pearson (D-86) for joining outraged students in a chant for gun control during a protest. <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/nashville-tennessee-reappoints-justin-jones" target="_blank">Jones</a> and <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/reappointed-justin-pearson-vows-to-fight-on-against-powers-that-expelled-him-in-tennessee" target="_blank">Pearson</a> were soon reinstated.Following Tuesday's vote on arming teachers, Republicans <a href="https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2024/04/23/tennessee-house-republicans-pass-bill-to-allow-teachers-to-carry-handguns/73331384007/" target="_blank">voted to bar</a> Jones from speaking in House proceedings for two days after he was accused of committing three rules violations, including recording on the chamber's floor—something a GOP member was also accused of doing. Jones applauded Tennessee residents for speaking out against H.B. 1202 in the House chamber. "Despite my Republican colleagues' best effort, the power of the people cannot and will not be stopped," said the lawmaker. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782577067022049489">
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The GOP <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/watch-tennessee-republicans-bully-extreme-153427231.html" target="_blank">ended the debate</a> over the legislation after one teacher, Lauren Shipman-Dorrance, cried out from the viewing section. Shipman-Dorrance was removed by state troopers on orders from House Speaker Cameron Sexton (R-25). After the bill passed overwhelmingly—despite four Republicans who joined the Democrats and three who abstained—the remaining protesters chanted, "Blood on your hands!" before the GOP ordered state troopers to remove them. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782872310321443241">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
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Sarah Shoop Neumann, whose children attend Covenant Day School, <a href="https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2024/04/22/thousands-sign-letter-opposing-tennessee-arming-teachers-bill/73414680007/" target="_blank">delivered a letter</a> with more than 5,300 signatures to the House on Monday demanding that lawmakers defeat the bill and warning that the legislation "ignores research that shows the presence of a gun increases the risks posed to children."Shoop Neumann <a href="https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2024/04/23/tennessee-house-republicans-pass-bill-to-allow-teachers-to-carry-handguns/73331384007/" target="_blank">told</a> The Tennessean that the bill's passage was "disgraceful.""We worked with the Senate and representative sponsors of this bill to make it even a little bit safer—anything, really—and I'm utterly disappointed that that was not taken into consideration," she told the outlet.Kris Brown, president of gun violence prevention group Brady,<a href="https://www.bradyunited.org/about-us/press/tennessee-bill-arms-teachers" target="_blank"> pointed out</a> that "multiple teachers were armed at [the Covenant School], yet that was not enough to stop six children and school employees from being murdered." "The Tennessee Legislature has just dishonored all who were killed at the Covenant School shooting last year by choosing to promote the proliferation of firearms in classrooms," said Brown. "H.B. 1202 is especially egregious as it has no safe storage requirements, meaning firearms could potentially fall into a child's hands." "If we want to be free of this uniquely American crisis, we cannot continue to perpetuate the deadly norms that got us here by adding more unsecured firearms in spaces where children should be safe to learn and grow," she added. "We urge Gov. Lee to veto this bill and ask him to work alongside us, teachers, and gun safety advocates to craft meaningful reforms across the Volunteer State."Democrats <a href="https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2024/04/23/tennessee-house-republicans-pass-bill-to-allow-teachers-to-carry-handguns/73331384007/" target="_blank">proposed</a> amendments to require that teachers lock up their handguns and only remove them during a security breach, that teachers be held civilly liable for using their guns, and that schools inform parents if guns are on campus, but the GOP rejected all of the proposals. "I can assure you these people have never experienced an actual working high school classroom or they wouldn't be passing this nonsense," said one Tennessee teacher. "A child will die because of this." <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782917499262022048">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/JohnsonHojo4/status/1782917499262022048"></a>
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Pearson <a href="https://twitter.com/Justinjpearson/status/1782869869509116022" target="_blank">said</a> the passage of the bill marked "an awful day for Tennessee, our kids, our teachers, and communities." "Instead of protecting kids," said the lawmaker, "they've protected guns again." ]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 18:29:38 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/tennessee-teachers-guns</guid><category>Brady</category><category>Children</category><category>Covenant school shooting</category><category>Education</category><category>Gun control</category><category>Gun violence</category><category>Justin jones</category><category>Justin pearson</category><category>Schools</category><category>Teachers</category><category>Tennessee</category><category>Guns</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/protesters-and-students-enter-the-tennessee-state-capitol-building-in-protest.jpg?id=52093620&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>'All States Will Be Impacted' by US Supreme Court's Idaho Abortion Case</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/supreme-court-abortion</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/die-in-for-abortion-rights.jpg?id=52093794&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C365%2C0%2C303"/> 
Less than a month after a key abortion pill
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/supreme-court-mifepristone-2667604441" target="_self">hearing</a>, the right-wing U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday heard arguments for another major reproductive rights case—one out of Idaho that could impact healthcare for pregnant women and people across the country.

Idaho is among the over 20 states that have
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/us/abortion-laws-roe-v-wade.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">tightened</a> restrictions on abortion since the high court's right-wing majority <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/06/24/dark-day-our-nation-right-wing-supreme-court-ends-constitutional-right-abortion" target="_self">reversed</a> Roe v. Wade nearly two years ago with Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. Since August 2022, abortions have been banned in the state except for reported cases of rape or incest or when "necessary to prevent the death" of the pregnant person.

"If the court does not uphold emergency abortion care protections, this ruling will have devastating consequences for pregnant people."
 
Before Idaho's near-total ban on abortion took effect, U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/08/25/fears-another-supreme-court-assault-abortion-rights-grow-after-idaho-ruling" target="_self">barred</a> enforcement of it to the extent that it conflicts with the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA), a 1986 federal law <a href="https://www.cms.gov/medicare/provider-enrollment-and-certification/certificationandcomplianc/downloads/emtala.pdf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">requiring</a> emergency departments that accept Medicare to provide "necessary stabilizing treatment" to any patient with an emergency medical condition. The Biden administration <a href="https://www.scotusblog.com/2024/04/supreme-court-to-hear-emergency-abortion-dispute-out-of-idaho/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">argues</a> that such care includes abortion; Idaho's Republican policymakers—<a href="https://x.com/chrisgeidner/status/1782989896078008533" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">backed</a> by the far-right Christian Alliance Defending Freedom—disagree. The U.S. Supreme Court in January <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/supreme-court-idaho-abortion" target="_self">paused</a> Winmill's order and agreed to hear arguments in <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/23-726.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Moyle v. United States</a> and <a href="https://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docket/docketfiles/html/public/23-727.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Idaho v. United States</a>. As The New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/04/24/us/abortion-supreme-court-idaho" target="_blank">reported</a> Wednesday:<blockquote>In a lively argument, questions by the justices suggested a divide along ideological lines, as well as a possible split by gender on the court. Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative, appeared skeptical that Idaho's law, which bars doctors from providing abortions unless a woman's life is in danger or in specific nonviable pregnancies, superseded the federal law. The argument also raised a broader question about whether some of the conservative justices, particularly Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., may be prepared to embrace language of fetal personhood, that is, the notion that a fetus would have the same rights as a pregnant woman. </blockquote>Also noting Barrett's apparent alignment with the three liberal women on the court, Law Dork's Chris Geidner <a href="https://x.com/chrisgeidner/status/1783170516418773488" target="_blank">predicted</a> "it comes down to" Chief Justice John Roberts and fellow right-winger Brett Kavanaugh."Already, we see
<a href="https://apnews.com/article/pregnancy-emergency-care-abortion-supreme-court-roe-9ce6c87c8fc653c840654de1ae5f7a1c" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> women miscarrying and giving birth</a> to stillborn infants in restrooms and in their cars after hospitals have turned them away, and medical professionals put in impossible positions by extremist lawmakers," said MomsRising executive director and CEO Kristin Rowe-Finkbeiner, citing Associated Press <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/emergency-abortions" target="_blank">reporting</a> from last week.

"Of all the horrors SCOTUS unleashed with its appalling, dangerous, massively unpopular ruling overturning
Roe v. Wade, the threat that pregnant people—most of whom are moms—will be denied emergency medical care is among the worst," she asserted. "An adverse ruling in this case will mean emergency rooms can deny urgently needed care to people experiencing serious pregnancy complications that can destroy their health, end their fertility, and take their lives."

Alexa Kolbi-Molinas, deputy director of the ACLU Reproductive Freedom Project, similarly
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/newswire/supreme-court-to-determine-whether-politicians-can-deny-emergency-medical-care-to-pregnant-people" target="_blank">stressed</a> that under a decision that favors the Idaho GOP, "pregnant people will suffer severe, life-altering health consequences, and even death."

"We're already seeing the devastating impact of this case play out in Idaho, where medical evacuations to transport patients to other states for the care they need have dramatically spiked since the Supreme Court allowed state politicians to block emergency abortion care," she noted.
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The has also been an exodus of healthcare providers. Pointing out that those who violate Idaho's ban face five years in prison,
The Guardian <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/law/2024/apr/24/us-supreme-court-abortion-rights-emtala" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">reported</a> Wednesday that "between 2022, when Roe was overturned, and 2023, about 50 OB-GYNs moved out of the state."

As Republican lawmakers in various states have ramped up attacks on reproductive freedom since
Dobbs, states that still allow abortions have seen an influx of "healthcare refugees." A Planned Parenthood spokesperson <a href="https://www.ktnv.com/news/nevada-clinics-see-30-out-of-state-patients-for-abortion-care" target="_blank">confirmed</a> in January that about 30% of its abortion patients in Nevada—which borders Idaho—are from other states.

"With several of Nevada's bordering states enforcing abortion bans, pushing many people seeking care to our state, we've seen firsthand the devastation that anti-abortion policies are already wreaking,"
Reproductive Freedom for All director of Nevada campaigns Denise Lopez <a href="https://reproductivefreedomforall.org/news/reproductive-freedom-for-all-nevada-statement-on-supreme-court-hearing-case-that-could-deny-pregnant-people-emergency-care/" target="_blank">said</a> Tuesday. "The Supreme Court must not allow us to spiral further into this healthcare crisis." 

If the high court rules in favor of Idaho's Republican lawmakers, she warned, "all states will be impacted, even in places like Nevada with more than 4 in 5 voters supporting reproductive freedom."

Destiny Lopez, acting co-CEO of the Guttmacher Institute,
<a href="https://www.guttmacher.org/2024/04/destiny-lopez-acting-co-ceo-guttmacher-institute-calls-us-supreme-court-protect-abortion" target="_blank">declared</a> that "at its core, this Supreme Court decision will reflect who we are becoming as a society: Are we okay with requiring pregnant individuals who face severe complications to suffer life-threatening health consequences rather than granting them access to abortion? Are we okay with forcing doctors to choose between violating federal law by not providing emergency abortion care or violating state law if they do?"

"If the court does not uphold emergency abortion care protections, this ruling will have devastating consequences for pregnant people—particularly Black and Brown folks, immigrants, people with lower incomes, those without health insurance, and LGBTQ+ communities—while further emboldening extremists," she emphasized.
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Arguments in the case have sparked multiple demonstrations, from a weekend
<a href="https://www.plannedparenthoodaction.org/pressroom/icymi-ahead-of-supreme-court-oral-arguments-idahoans-rally-in-boise-for-the-right-to-emergency-medical-care" target="_blank">rally</a> in Boise, Idaho to a Wednesday gathering outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., where Women's March organized a die-in to highlight the potential consequences of the forthcoming ruling.

"It's a horrifying time to be someone who needs critical abortion care in America right now," said Women's March executive director Rachel O'Leary Carmona. "The GOP is chipping away at women's bodily autonomy and livelihoods one illegitimate court case at a time—from fast-tracking a case on the authorization of a medication that's been safely administered for decades last month, to now bringing the fate of emergency abortion care to a Supreme Court captured by their radical, anti-choice agenda."

"We know what these cases really are: They're part of a series of efforts by Christian nationalist politicians to do anything they can to control women's bodies and cut back women's decisions about their healthcare, their family planning, and their lives," she added.

Similar warnings about far-right Christian nationalist
<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-bible" target="_blank">attacks</a> on a range of rights have dominated political contests this cycle—including the race for the White House. In November, Democratic President Joe Biden, who supports access to abortion care, is set to face former Republican President Donald Trump, who <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-abortion-ban" target="_blank">brags</a> about appointing three of the six justices who reversed Roe.

The case has renewed arguments for considering changes to the country's top court, which over the past few years has not only seen plummeting levels of public trust but also been rocked by repeated ethics scandals.

"Idaho's abortion ban is a direct consequence of the court's radical decision to overturn
Roe v. Wade and allow partisan state legislatures to determine Americans' access to abortion care," said Stand Up America managing director of policy and political affairs Brett Edkins. "If the Supreme Court once again sides with anti-abortion extremists, it will be further proof that this court is radically out of touch with the American people and must be reformed."
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 18:14:18 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/supreme-court-abortion</guid><category>Dobbs v jackson women's health organization</category><category>Emergency medical treatment and active labor act</category><category>Healthcare</category><category>Idaho</category><category>Roe v wade</category><category>Us supreme court</category><category>Abortion</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/die-in-for-abortion-rights.jpg?id=52093794&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Biden Signs TikTok Ban—Among the 'Stupidest and Most Authoritarian' Tech Bills</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-signs-tiktok-ban</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/keep-tiktok-protesters-rally-outside-the-u-s-capitol.jpg?id=52093793&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C290%2C0%2C53"/> 
Digital rights defenders on Wednesday slammed the passage of a U.S. foreign aid package containing a possible nationwide TikTok ban as unconstitutional, xenophobic, and ill-advised during an election year in which President Joe Biden desperately needs as many young votes as possible.

Biden
<a href="https://twitter.com/cspan/status/1783156254594011511" target="_blank">signed</a> the $95 billion bill late Wednesday morning after senators <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-israel-aid" target="_blank">voted</a> 79-18 the previous evening to approve the package, which includes tens of billions of dollars in U.S. military assistance for Ukraine, Taiwan, and Israel—which is waging a genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza.

One of the bill's provisions would force ByteDance, TikTok's Chinese parent company, to sell the app to a non-Chinese company within a year or face a federal ban. Approximately 170 million Americans use TikTok, which is especially popular among members of Gen-Z and small-to-medium-sized businesses, and <a href="https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/resource/tiktok-us/" target="_blank">contributes</a> tens of billions of dollars to the U.S. economy annually. 

"Whether it's dressed up as a ban or a forced sale, the bill targeting TikTok is one of the stupidest and most authoritarian pieces of tech legislation we've seen in years," Fight for the Future director Evan Greer said in a
<a href="https://www.fightforthefuture.org/news/2024-04-23-the-tiktok-ban-is-the-stupidest-tech-policy-proposal-in-years-of-course-its-going-to-pass/" target="_blank">statement</a>.

 Jenna Leventoff, senior policy counsel at the ACLU, <a href="https://www.aclu.org/press-releases/aclu-statement-on-congress-latest-attempt-to-ban-tiktok-and-restrict-free-speech-online" target="_blank">called</a> the provision "nothing more than an unconstitutional ban in disguise."

"Banning a social media platform that hundreds of millions of Americans use to express themselves would have devastating consequences for all of our First Amendment rights, and will almost certainly be struck down in court," she added.
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Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, <a href="https://knightcolumbia.org/content/knight-institute-comments-on-passage-of-tiktok-ban-in-foreign-aid-package" target="_blank">said</a>:
 
<blockquote>
The First Amendment means that the government can't restrict Americans' access to ideas, information, or media from abroad without a very good reason for it—and no such reason exists here. Repackaging the government's reasons for the ban in the language of "national security" does not change the analysis. There's no national security exception to the First Amendment, and creating such an exception would make the First Amendment a dead letter.
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Proponents of the possible ban attempted to spin it as something else and pointed to precedents including the 2020
<a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/6/21168079/grindr-sold-chinese-owner-us-cfius-security-concerns-kunlun-lgbtq" target="_blank">forced sale</a> of the popular LGBTQ+ dating app Grindr, formerly owned by a Chinese company.

"I want to be very clear: This is not a 'TikTok ban,'" Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), who voted to approve the bill, said in a statement. "I have no interest in banning TikTok. This bill will simply make TikTok safer by separating it from the Chinese Communist Party so that the data of 170 million Americans—many of whom are children—is protected."

Senate Commerce Committee Chair Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.)
<a href="https://www.npr.org/2024/04/24/1246663779/biden-ban-tiktok-us" target="_blank">said</a> before Tuesday's vote that "Congress is acting to prevent foreign adversaries from conducting espionage, surveillance, maligned operations, harming vulnerable Americans, our servicemen and women, and our U.S. government personnel."
"Banning TikTok without passing real tech regulation will just further entrench monopolies like Meta and Google, without doing anything to protect Americans from data harvesting or government propaganda."
However, Kate Ruane, who directs the Center for Democracy & Technology's Free Expression Project, asserted that "Congress shouldn't be in the business of banning platforms. They should be working to enact comprehensive privacy legislation that protects our private data no matter where we choose to engage online."

Greer said that "not only is this bill laughably unconstitutional and a blatant assault on free expression and human rights, it's also a perfect way to derail momentum toward more meaningful policies like privacy and antitrust legislation that would actually address the harms of Big Tech and surveillance capitalism."

Greer continued:
 
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Banning TikTok without passing real tech regulation will just further entrench monopolies like Meta and Google, without doing anything to protect Americans from data harvesting or government propaganda.
 
 
We could be months away from another Trump administration, and top Democrats are busy expanding mass surveillance authority and setting the precedent that the government can ban an entire social media app based on vague 'national security' concerns that haven't been explained to the public.
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Some critics questioned the wisdom of Biden signing off on a potential ban of the most popular social media app among many young users during an election year in which many younger voters are disappointed in the president's record on climate, student debt relief, the Gaza genocide, and more.

One user of X, the social platform formerly known as Twitter,
<a href="https://twitter.com/jepasta/status/1767950320183714290" target="_blank">said</a> earlier this year that signing the bill would demonstrate a "comical level of political malpractice, the equivalent of seeing the rake on the ground and purposefully stepping on it."

Moments after Biden signed the bill, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew
<a href="https://www.reuters.com/technology/tiktok-ceo-expects-defeat-us-restrictions-we-arent-going-anywhere-2024-04-24/" target="_blank">vowed</a>, "We aren't going anywhere." 

"The facts and the Constitution are on our side and we expect to prevail again," he said, referring to the three times when federal judges <a href="https://www.npr.org/2024/04/22/1246391855/tiktok-ban-congress-biden-china-lawsuit" target="_blank">blocked</a> efforts to ban TikTok.
<div class="rm-embed embed-media"><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-media-max-width="560">TikTok CEO Shou Chew responds to the bill that could ban the app: “Make no mistake, this is a ban, a ban of TikTok and a ban on you and your voice.” “Rest assured, we aren’t going anywhere.” <a href="https://t.co/qElI8JvY0D">pic.twitter.com/qElI8JvY0D</a> — philip lewis (@Phil_Lewis_) <a href="https://twitter.com/Phil_Lewis_/status/1783169292646658166?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2024</a></blockquote> <script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script></div>In the most recent case, U.S. District Court Judge Donald Molloy
<a href="https://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-judge-blocks-montanas-anti-153000623.html" target="_blank">ruled</a> last December that a Montana law that would have banned the app "violates the Constitution in more ways than one" and had a "pervasive undertone of anti-Chinese sentiment."

It is unclear who would buy TikTok. Analysts estimate the platform is worth upward of $100 billion, placing it out of reach for all but the biggest U.S. tech titans and, ironically, setting up possible antitrust challenges from the very administration that ultimately forced the sale. ]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 18:10:45 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/biden-signs-tiktok-ban</guid><category>Aclu</category><category>Bytedance</category><category>China</category><category>Fight for the future</category><category>Free speech</category><category>Joe biden</category><category>John fetterman</category><category>Tiktok</category><category>U.s. senate</category><category>Xenophobia</category><category>Digital rights</category><dc:creator>Brett Wilkins</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/keep-tiktok-protesters-rally-outside-the-u-s-capitol.jpg?id=52093793&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Israel's War on Gaza Has Helped Fuel 'Near Breakdown of International Law': Amnesty</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/2023-near-breakdown-international-law</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/body-bags-are-laid-in-front-of-the-white-house-as-part-of-a-protest-calling-for-a-gaza-cease-fire.jpg?id=52093735&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C252%2C0%2C260"/> 
Government aggression and the rise of Big Tech are threatening the rules-based international order and global human rights, Amnesty International warned in its annual
State of the World's Human Rights report, <a href="https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2024/04/amnesty-international-sounds-alarm-international-law-flagrant-rule-breaking-governments-corporate-actors/" target="_blank">released</a> Wednesday.

The organization expressed particular alarm over Israel's war on Gaza and the inability or unwillingness of its allies to rein in the government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from bombing civilian populations, displacing more than 1.9 million people, and restricting the flow of aid into the besieged Gaza Strip. This and other conflicts, such as Russia's invasion of Ukraine, had led to a "near breakdown of international law," Amnesty said.

"For millions the world over, Gaza now symbolizes utter moral failure by many of the architects of the post-World War Two system; their failure to uphold the absolute commitment to universality, our common humanity, and to our 'never again' commitment," Amnesty International's secretary-general Agnès Callamard wrote in the preface to the report.

"One country, one government is allowed to annihilate international law, to put its middle finger in the eye of international law."

Amnesty wrote that Israel had made a "mockery" of some of the key tenants of international humanitarian law such as proportionality and distinction by targeting civilization populations and infrastructure such as refugee camps, hospitals, bakeries, and United Nations schools. As of the end of 2023, Israel had killed 21,600 Palestinians, a third of them children. At present, the death toll has <a href="https://www.barrons.com/news/health-ministry-in-hamas-run-gaza-says-war-death-toll-at-34-262-1a86afd2?refsec=topics_afp-news" target="_blank">surpassed</a> 34,200, though that is likely an undercount as many remain buried beneath rubble.
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Amnesty International researcher Budour Hassan <a href="https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1783124986309517396" target="_blank">told</a> Deutsche Welle that it was "utterly disappointing" that "one country, one government is allowed to annihilate international law, to put its middle finger in the eye of international law, and go on as if nothing has happened, normalizing the abnormal, normalizing the atrocities that have been happening, so that the crime that was an atrocity two days ago would become normal."

Hassan said there were things that the international community could do to try to stop the violence, such as cutting off weapons sales to Israel and Palestinian armed groups.

"It's just that the international community has proven desperately unwilling and incapable of upholding these norms," Hassan added, saying that, by failing to act, it could be "signing a death sentence to the whole international order."
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In particular, Amnesty criticized the U.S. for spending months <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/us-vetoes-ceasefire" target="_blank">vetoing</a> U.N. Security Council resolutions calling for a cease-fire, as well as European Union countries like Germany and the U.K. that called out their opponents' human rights abuses but continued to back Israel.

"What we saw in 2023 confirms that many powerful states are abandoning the founding values of humanity and universality enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” Callamard said.

In addition to Israel and its Western allies, Amnesty also pointed to Russia and its ongoing invasion of Ukraine, as well as China's human rights abuses against the Uyghur and financial backing of the Myanmar military, which killed at least 1,000 civilians in 2023.

"We have here three very large countries, superpowers in many ways, sitting on the Security Council that have emptied out the Security Council of its potentials, and that have emptied out international law of its ability to protect people," Callamard <a href="https://apnews.com/article/amnesty-international-annual-report-human-rights-b0f436e3037145d2ba2e3e755898eb54" target="_blank">told</a> The Associated Press of the U.S., Russia, and China.

In addition to state actors, Amnesty International sounded the alarm about the growing power of large technology companies, and, in particular, the rollout of artificial intelligence. The human rights group said that both new and existing technologies were making it easier for governments to target vulnerable groups like women, minorities, and members of the LGBTQ community. For example, the New York City Police Department informed Amnesty that it used facial recognition technology to keep tabs on Black Lives Matter activists, while Israel used it in the West Bank to help control Palestinian movement. The organization warned of how under-regulated technologies could exacerbate the scapegoating of marginalized groups as many countries hold elections in 2024.

"Big Tech's surveillance business model is pouring fuel on this fire of hate, enabling those with malintent to hound, dehumanize, and amplify dangerous narratives to consolidate power or polling," Callarmard said. "It's a chilling specter of what's to come as technological advances rapaciously outpace accountability."

Callarmard called for reforms to the U.N. Security Council so that no country could use its veto power to obstruct action and for better governmental regulation of developing technologies.

The silver lining is that ordinary people around the world continue to demonstrate for human rights, both their own and others. Amnesty cited the international movement for a cease-fire in Gaza; abortion rights protests in the U.S., El Salvador, and Poland; and the Fridays for Future youth movement to phase out fossil fuels and address the climate emergency.

"People have made it abundantly clear that they want human rights; the onus is on governments to show that they are listening," Callamard said.
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 17:54:31 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/2023-near-breakdown-international-law</guid><category>Amnesty international</category><category>Artificial intelligence</category><category>Big tech</category><category>China</category><category>Gaza</category><category>International law</category><category>Israel</category><category>Russia</category><category>Ukraine war</category><category>United states</category><category>Human rights</category><dc:creator>Olivia Rosane</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/body-bags-are-laid-in-front-of-the-white-house-as-part-of-a-protest-calling-for-a-gaza-cease-fire.jpg?id=52093735&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Chamber of Commerce Sues to Block FTC Ban on Anti-Worker Noncompete Agreements</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/chamber-of-commerce-ftc-noncompetes</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/ftc-commissioner-lina-khan.jpg?id=52093082&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C90%2C0%2C911"/> 
The powerful U.S. Chamber of Commerce sued the Federal Trade Commission on Wednesday in an effort to block the agency's <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/noncompete-clause" target="_blank">widely celebrated new rule</a> banning most noncompete clauses, pervasive contract agreements that restrict employees' ability to work for or start a competing business.


The Chamber filed its <a href="https://www.uschamber.com/assets/documents/Complaint-Chamber-v.-FTC-E.D.-Tex.pdf" target="_blank">lawsuit</a> alongside the Business Roundtable and other corporate lobbying groups in a federal court in Texas. The suit came shortly after Ryan LLC, a tax service firm, <a href="https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/tax-firm-first-to-sue-ftc-over-authority-to-issue-noncompete-ban" target="_blank">filed the first legal challenge</a> to the FTC's rule in a separate Texas venue.


"The commission's categorical ban on virtually all non-competes amounts to a vast overhaul of the national economy," reads the Chamber's complaint against the rule, which the FTC finalized in a 3-2 vote on Tuesday.


The agency, led by Biden-appointed Commissioner Lina Khan, <a href="https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/04/ftc-announces-rule-banning-noncompetes" target="_blank">estimates</a> that roughly 30 million U.S. workers are subject to a noncompete agreement, limiting their ability to start their own companies or switch jobs in pursuit of better wages and benefits.


"Noncompete clauses keep wages low, suppress new ideas, and rob the American economy of dynamism, including from the more than 8,500 new startups that would be created a year once noncompetes are banned," Khan said in a <a href="https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/04/ftc-announces-rule-banning-noncompetes" target="_blank">statement</a> Tuesday. "The FTC's final rule to ban noncompetes will ensure Americans have the freedom to pursue a new job, start a new business, or bring a new idea to market."


"Noncompetes are about reducing competition, full stop. It's in their name."


The Chamber, the largest corporate lobbying organization in the United States, <a href="https://www.uschamber.com/finance/antitrust/u-s-chamber-to-sue-ftc-over-unlawful-power-grab-on-noncompete-agreements-ban" target="_blank">signaled</a> its intent to sue the FTC immediately after the agency finalized its new rule on Tuesday.


"The Federal Trade Commission's decision to ban employer noncompete agreements across the economy is not only unlawful but also a blatant power grab that will undermine American businesses’ ability to remain competitive," Chamber president and CEO Suzanne Clark said in a <a href="https://www.uschamber.com/finance/antitrust/u-s-chamber-to-sue-ftc-over-unlawful-power-grab-on-noncompete-agreements-ban" target="_blank">statement</a> following the FTC's vote.


While the organization claims to fight for the interests of businesses small and large, a Public Citizen <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/despite-its-rhetoric-chamber-of-commerce-mostly-fights-for-big-business-in-court" target="_blank">report</a> published earlier this year found that the majority of the Chamber's legal work supports big corporations.


The Chamber <a href="https://www.uschamber.com/finance/antitrust/u-s-chamber-letter-in-response-to-sens-warren-whitehouse-letter-on-ftc-non-competes" target="_blank">acknowledged</a> in response to questioning from a pair of Democratic senators last year that its corporate members use noncompete clauses—though the group did not specify which members.


"Why does the U.S. Chamber of Commerce hate dynamism in the American economy, where workers are free to move to the best opportunities, and companies are free to recruit the best talent?" <a href="https://twitter.com/arindube/status/1782908388306759682" target="_blank">asked</a> University of Massachusetts Amherst economics professor Arin Dube in response to the Chamber's pledge to sue over the FTC's rule.


According to the FTC, its ban would boost the average U.S. worker's earnings by $524 a year, increase new business formation by close to 3% annually, and lower national healthcare costs by nearly $200 billion over the next decade.


"Noncompetes are about reducing competition, full stop. It's in their name," Heidi Shierholz, president of the Economic Policy Institute, <a href="https://www.epi.org/press/epi-applauds-the-ftcs-ban-on-noncompete-agreements/" target="_blank">said</a> Tuesday. "Noncompetes are bad for workers, bad for consumers, and bad for the broader economy. This rule is an important step in creating an economy that is not only strong but also works for working people."
]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 17:13:33 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/chamber-of-commerce-ftc-noncompetes</guid><category>Corporate power</category><category>Ftc</category><category>Labor</category><category>Lina khan</category><category>Noncompete clauses</category><category>Workers</category><category>Chamber of commerce</category><dc:creator>Jake Johnson</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/ftc-commissioner-lina-khan.jpg?id=52093082&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>300+ Arrested Outside Schumer's Home During Jewish-Led Seder Against Gaza Genocide</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/news/schumer-protest-gaza</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/police-intervene-and-arrest-hundreds-of-people-as-pro-palestinian-jewish-organizers-gather-to-protest.jpg?id=52093061&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C984%2C0%2C1681"/> As U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer prepared to vote on Tuesday night for a foreign aid package including billions to continue arming Israel in its bombardment of Gaza, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/24/not-like-other-passovers-hundreds-of-jewish-demonstrators-arrested-after-new-york-protest-seder" target="_blank">roughly 300 protesters </a>were arrested outside his home in Brooklyn for holding an "emergency Passover seder" protest, demanding the U.S. end its support for an assault that has killed at least 34,262 Palestinians. The protest was led by anti-Zionist Jewish organizers with Jewish Voice for Peace, IfNotNow, and Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, with a large round banner representing a traditional Seder plate at the center of the protest at Grand Army Plaza, a block from Schumer's home. Hundreds of people, some wearing traditional Palestinian keffiyehs, linked arms and chanted, "Free, free Palestine!" while blocking traffic and displaying the Seder plate. "No one is free until everyone is free," read the banner. "Jews say stop arming Israel."<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782922738811699260">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/jvpliveNY/status/1782922738811699260"></a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>
Schumer's home has been the site of numerous protests since October, when Israel began its attacks on and blockade of Gaza, which have left parts of the enclave <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/samantha-power-famine" target="_blank">facing famine </a>and the entire population of 2.3 million people suffering from <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/gaza-2667538636" target="_blank">"acute food insecurity,"</a> at a minimum."A genocide being carried out in our names as Jews demands that we adapt our sacred tradition again, take to the streets, and do everything we can to prevent more death," author and activist Naomi Klein <a href="https://twitter.com/jvpliveNY/status/1782909093914583142" target="_blank">said</a> at the protest. The Biden administration has approved numerous weapons transfers to Israel, and the Senate<a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/senate-israel-aid" target="_blank"> overwhelmingly voted</a> Tuesday night in favor of the package that includes $17 billion more in unconditional aid for the Israel Defense Forces. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) were the only members of the Democratic caucus who <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/04/23/us/politics/senate-vote-aid-israel-tiktok.html?pgtype=Article&action=click&module=RelatedLinks" target="_blank">voted against</a> the funding bill. Fifteen Republicans also <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/which-senators-voted-against-ukraine-israel-aid-tiktok-2024-4" target="_blank">opposed</a> the bill over its inclusion of Ukraine aid. The demonstration at Grand Army Plaza was organized amid a <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/college-students-columbia-solidarity" target="_blank">burgeoning protest movement</a> on U.S. college campuses, including at Columbia University, where <a href="https://www.commondreams.org/news/columbia-arrests-palestine-protest" target="_blank">more than 100 students </a>were suspended and then arrested for trespassing last week after setting up an encampment to demand the school divest from all companies that work with the Israeli government. The student-led protests have been denounced by President Joe Biden and other pro-Israel critics as <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-condemns-antisemitic-protests-palestine-columbia-university/" target="_blank">"antisemitic"</a> and endangering Jewish students, despite the fact that Jewish students have<a href="https://zeteo.com/p/i-am-a-jewish-student-at-columbia" target="_blank"> helped to organize</a> the nonviolent demonstrations. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1782935928128086180">
<div style="margin:1em 0"></div> — (@)
<a href="https://twitter.com/JoshuaPHilll/status/1782935928128086180"></a>
</blockquote>
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One organizer, Calvin Harrison,<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/23/nyregion/schumer-seder-protest-brooklyn.html" target="_blank"> told </a>The New York Times that he attended the Brooklyn protest Tuesday night "because I'm a Jew and I was raised to believe that Judaism is about justice.""Passover is a celebration of liberation for the future," he told the Times. "We can't celebrate liberation for ourselves while we're oppressing Palestinians." Yonah Lieberman, co-founder of IfNotNow, recalled the group's Liberation Seder in 2016 in New York, where campaigners protested the Anti-Defamation League's support for the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories. "Eighteen of us were arrested," he <a href="https://twitter.com/YonahLieberman/status/1782929406039597247" target="_blank">said</a>. "Tonight: [Organizers] led a Seder in the streets demanding Schumer stop arming Israel. Hundreds are being arrested. The movement grows."]]></description><pubDate>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 15:48:41 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/news/schumer-protest-gaza</guid><category>Brooklyn</category><category>Chuck schumer</category><category>Ifnotnow</category><category>Israel</category><category>Jewish americans</category><category>Jewish voice for peace</category><category>Judaism</category><category>Military aid</category><category>Naomi klein</category><category>New york city</category><category>Passover</category><category>Police</category><category>Gaza</category><dc:creator>Julia Conley</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/police-intervene-and-arrest-hundreds-of-people-as-pro-palestinian-jewish-organizers-gather-to-protest.jpg?id=52093061&width=980"></media:content></item><item><title>Record Number of US Cities, Counties, and States to Raise Minimum Wage in 2023</title><link>https://www.commondreams.org/minimum-wage</link><description><![CDATA[
<img src="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/workers-advocate-for-20-an-hour-minimum-wage.jpg?id=32387279&width=1200&height=400&coordinates=0%2C343%2C0%2C0"/> After a decade since the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2012/11/30/166217423/n-y-fast-food-workers-strike-for-better-wages" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">launch</a> of the Fight for $15 movement in New York City, a record number of U.S. states and communities are set to raise the minimum wage in the new year.From New Year's Eve to New Year's Day, the minimum wage will increase in 23 states and 41 cities and counties, according to a report released Thursday by the National Employment Law Project (NELP). In 40 of those 64 jurisdictions, it will hit or exceed $15 an hour for at least some workers."The raises we are seeing are a true testament to the power of organizing."By the end of 2023, additional increases are planned in five states and 22 localities—with 21 reaching or topping $15 an hour—bringing the total for next year to 86: 27 states and 59 cities and counties, says the report, <a href="https://s27147.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2023-NELP-Raises-Report.pdf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Raises From Coast to Coast in 2023</a>. The totals take into account that multiple increases are planned in Michigan and four local jurisdictions."The raises we are seeing are a true testament to the power of organizing," <a href="https://www.nelp.org/news-releases/record-number-of-cities-states-will-increase-minimum-wages-in-2023/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">said</a> Yannet Lathrop, senior researcher and policy analyst at NELP, in a statement. "These raises were achieved in a variety of ways, from ballot initiatives to statehouses to workers making their demands to employers directly.""As these wins continue and we see the real-world impact of higher pay—from <a href="https://www.nelp.org/publication/10-year-legacy-fight-for-15-union-movement/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">growing unionization to narrowing racial wealth gaps</a>—we encourage lawmakers to go further and raise pay broadly across our economy," Lathrop added.<blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1605945501219708930">
<div style="margin:1em 0">\u201cA record 86 cities, counties, & states are raising wages sometime in 2023. (5 jurisdictions are raising\nwages 2x in 2023 & are only counted once in our report.) These raises are a necessary advancement towards a sustaining #MinimumWage \u270a\u201d</div> — NELP (@NELP)
<a href="https://twitter.com/NelpNews/status/1605945501219708930">1671722150</a>
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<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>As the report details: <blockquote>In the 10 years since fast food workers walked out of their jobs demanding a $15 minimum wage and a union, the Fight for $15 worker movement has won minimum wage increases in 28 states and nearly five dozen cities and counties. These victories have led to an estimated $150 billion in additional annual pay for 26 million workers and to the narrowing of the racial wealth gap. The movement has also put pressure on employers to raise their pay scales, leading… hundreds of businesses, large and small, to raise wages to $15 or more. Among them are corporate giants employing hundreds of thousands of workers from coast to coast, including Amalgamated Bank, Bank of America, Barclays, Best Buy, Charter Communications, Chobani, Chipotle, CVS, Ikea, JP Morgan Chase, LabCorp, Macy's, MetLife PNC, Sam's Club, Southwest Airlines, Synchrony Financial, T- Mobile, Target, Under Armour, USAA, Verizon, Walgreen's, Walmart, and Wells Fargo. </blockquote>"The monumental impact of the Fight for $15 is clearly visible in this year's record wage increases as well as those in years past," said NELP executive director Rebecca Dixon. "But in those same 10 years, congressional action to expand worker rights has been limited.""While it is encouraging to see boosts to the minimum wage in cities and states across the country, we need federal policy to address the mounting crises brought about by record increases in the cost of living and pandemic recovery," she stressed. "We must pass a higher federal minimum wage—at least $15 an hour—that accounts for rising costs of living and ensures that workers have the ability to support themselves and their families."In March 2021, eight members of the Democratic caucus, joined all 50 Republicans in the U.S. Senate to kill legislation that would have established a $15 federal minimum wage, lifting millions of people out of poverty. Among those Democrats was Sen. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona, who officially declared herself an Independent in recent weeks.State-wide polling conducted shortly before that vote last year showed a majority of Arizonans across the political spectrum in favor of increasing the minimum wage to $15 per hour. In November 2021, the people of Sinema's hometown of Tucson approved a ballot initiative to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour in Arizona's second-largest city.NELP's new report notes that Tucson residents are on track to see a $15 hourly wage by 2025. The city's current rate is $13, but it is set to increase to $13.85 on January 1, with a $10.85 tipped wage—both in line with the state's floor.Worker wins from 2022 highlighted in the report include campaigns in Foster City and San Mateo County, California; Hawaii; Nebraska; Tukwila, Washington; and Washington, D.C. <blockquote class="rm-embed twitter-tweet" data-partner="rebelmouse" data-twitter-tweet-id="1605946400839061504">
<div style="margin:1em 0">\u201cPlus, in the South, underpaid workers are demanding higher wages & stronger labor standards. @RaiseUptheSouth is organizing workers in the service sector throughout the region #OrganizeTheSouth #UnionsForAll\u201d</div> — NELP (@NELP)
<a href="https://twitter.com/NelpNews/status/1605946400839061504">1671722150</a>
</blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>"In 2023 and 2024, the campaigns to watch include an $18 ballot measure in California and possible ballot measures in Arizona, Ohio, and Michigan," the publication points out. "On the legislative front, there may be one fair wage campaigns in Hawaii, Illinois, Massachusetts, and Maryland," the report adds, "as well as efforts to raise the minimum wage in Maryland (to speed up the state's implementation of a $15 minimum wage), Massachusetts (where the minimum will reach $15 in 2023 and there are no inflation adjustments planned for following years), and New York (where the demand is $21.25 by 2026-2027)."]]></description><pubDate>Thu, 22 Dec 2022 21:43:53 +0000</pubDate><guid>https://www.commondreams.org/minimum-wage</guid><category>#raisethewage</category><category>Workers</category><category>Minimum wage</category><dc:creator>Jessica Corbett</dc:creator><media:content medium="image" type="image/jpeg" url="https://www.commondreams.org/media-library/workers-advocate-for-20-an-hour-minimum-wage.jpg?id=32387279&width=980"></media:content></item></channel></rss>

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