| Trump threatens to crack down on social media after Twitter posts a fact check of his tweets on voting by mail Posted: 27 May 2020 06:35 AM PDT  The president's threat came one day after Twitter declined to remove his tweets demanding an investigation into the death of a Florida woman after her widower's request.
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| Here are the likely contenders on Biden's vice president shortlist Posted: 27 May 2020 10:27 AM PDT  While Joe Biden has committed to selecting a female running mate, few further details are confirmed. Here's a look at five women in the picture.
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| ‘Burn It Down. Let Them Pay’: Deadly Chaos Erupts in Minneapolis as Fires Rage Over Police Violence Posted: 28 May 2020 03:25 AM PDT  MINNEAPOLIS—Flames and black smoke poured into the sky here early Thursday as protests over the death of George Floyd took a violent turn, with multiple local businesses and residential buildings near police headquarters set ablaze and at least one person fatally shot in the area. Minneapolis Police spokesman John Elder confirmed the shooting shortly before midnight local time, but did not say if it was connected to the protests, according to the Star Tribune. A video shared on Twitter and purportedly filmed at the scene showed medics frantically trying to save a man lying on the ground; at one point, one of the medics can be heard urging people to stay away, yelling, "There's somebody in there with a rifle, back up! Back up!"The shooting came amid major fires across the southern part of city, including an AutoZone that burned to the ground overnight, spewing toxic fumes across the entire neighborhood. Widespread looting included mobs—whose ties to organized protesters were vague at best—clearing out a Target across from the precinct house, and video emerged of heavily armed white men who said they were trying to keep people from damaging property.By 1 a.m., Mayor Jacob Frey, a first-term Democrat, said he was calling in the National Guard and state police to help get the scene under control. He pleaded for peace and urged people to go home.But for some protesters who'd faced down the threat of tear gas and rubber bullets, the fires were nothing compared to the death of Floyd, 46. The unarmed black man's last moments were captured on camera for the whole world to see as a white police officer knelt on his neck. "The whole city can burn down. They should all be out here protesting, not just people who care about black lives. Everybody. Burn it down. Make them pay. Maybe then they'll understand," one protester, Elicia S.—she declined to give her full last name—told The Daily Beast late Wednesday. "I read somewhere that you're never gonna care until it hits your front door. We are here now, knocking in the front door," demonstrator Becky Mathews added. The chaos came after police tried to fend off protesters surrounding Third Precinct headquarters by erecting barricades and firing projectiles at the crowd.One demonstrator, Jeremy Kocke, held up the back of his shirt to show a large bruise forming from a rubber bullet. "I turned around and was shot in the back," he said Wednesday evening. "I didn't do anything to get shot."The 32-year-old was one of several protesters struck by projectiles after activists surrounded the department's embattled precinct house. Some threw water bottles and rocks over a hastily constructed police barricade. From the roof, looming police brandished weapons at the crowd below.Earlier on Wednesday, Kocke and a roommate had listened to Minneapolis City Council members "talk about how the police need to be restrained and will show restraint," he told The Daily Beast. "They asked protesters to show restraint. But they [the police] aren't. This isn't restraint. There is no restraint. This is chaos."Like COVID-19 death rates and social-distancing arrests, a new wave of protests—and their police response—are highlighting racial disparities in the coronavirus era. Tuesday's initial demonstrations in Minneapolis, which protested the death of Floyd, likewise saw officers in riot gear crack down on demonstrators, striking at least one protester in the head with a rubber bullet and bloodying a reporter. Meanwhile, right-wing "reopen" protests in Minnesota and elsewhere have generally proceeded without police violence, even as mostly white demonstrators—some with extremist ties—occupied government buildings with semi-automatic rifles.Derek Chauvin, Minneapolis Cop Shown Kneeling on George Floyd's Neck, Hires Philando Castile Shooter's Lawyer Activists in Minneapolis say race is a motivating factor in police responses to the protests. It's why some say they're coming out to protest—even during a deadly pandemic—in the first place, and why an increasingly volatile landscape in a progressive city began to take on the feel of Ferguson-style unrest."Throwing tear gas at kids is not going to help," Leslie Redmon, president of the Minneapolis NAACP, told The Daily Beast. Redmon said she was among the demonstrators hit with tear gas on Tuesday and that the heavy-handed response would not improve the police's relationship with protesters.Nekima Levy-Armstrong, Minneapolis-based civil-rights attorney and founder of the Racial Justice Network, a racial equality group, described the police response as "excessive and militarized." Officers were filmed using tear gas, rubber bullets, and what appeared to be stun grenades on demonstrators on Tuesday and Wednesday nights. "There was no communication to protesters that police were going to start shooting projectiles and shooting rubber bullets and spraying tear gas," Levy-Armstrong told The Daily Beast, echoing activists and journalists who were caught in the crossfire. "They just started doing it. They didn't give people time to leave the area if they didn't want to engage with police on that level."Monique Cullars-Doty, an organizer with Black Lives Matter Twin Cities, said the police response hindered medical care for at least one person struck in the head with a rubber bullet. "They called 9-1-1 and the protesters were told that the police [on the scene] were the first responders and no medical attention was given. They were trying to get this person to ride to the hospital," said Cullars-Doty, whose own nephew was killed by police in nearby St. Paul in 2015.After witnessing one night of tear gas, Lisa Grimm brought water and milk to Wednesday night's protest. "I live less than a mile away from the murder. This is my home," she told The Daily Beast."How have the killers not been arrested and held like anyone else? This wouldn't be happening like this. We wouldn't have to risk our safety. We wouldn't be at risk for coronavirus. It's common logic." Some of the response might have stemmed from the police department's unprecedented decision to fire four officers involved in Floyd's death. A viral video showed Minneapolis Police officer Derek Chauvin kneeling on Floyd's neck for at least seven minutes after police apprehended him over an alleged forgery. In the harrowing video, captured by a bystander, Floyd repeatedly states that he cannot breathe and that he is dying. Bystanders plead with Chauvin to get off Floyd, noting that he appears to have died. Although police initially claimed Floyd later died in the hospital after a "medical incident," a Minneapolis Fire Department report found that he had no pulse when he was placed in an ambulance.The four officers' brisk firings were a first for the city and may have motivated police response to protesters, Levy-Armstrong argued. (The Minneapolis Police Department did not immediately return a request for comment.)"They want to retaliate," she told The Daily Beast earlier Wednesday. "They're angry, they're upset, and that's what we witnessed last night. Why did they need to wear riot gear and treat people like they were serious threats?"Images from reopen protests, including of white militia members lynching an effigy of Kentucky's governor, or armed protesters storming Michigan's statehouse, have led some protesters to question whether activists of color could get away with the same stunts."When I look and see the angry white protester with their guns and having the opportunity to celebrate their constitutional rights, then look at black protesters who are peaceful… getting tear gas and shot with rubber bullets," said Toya Woodland, a minister and Black Lives Matter activists. "We've never been looked at as whole people. We're still being looked at as animals, by the Three-Fifths Compromise," she said, referring to the part of the U.S. Constitution classifying enslaved people as less than fully human.Carmen Perez-Jordan, president of the nonprofit The Gathering for Justice, likewise tied the disparity in police response to America's centuries-long racial divides."How is it that an officer feels safe with an armed white person yelling and spitting in their face, but not with an unarmed black person?" she asked. Minneapolis, in particular, has struggled with those narratives. In 2015, Minneapolis police shot and killed Jamar Clark, a 24-year-old black man. When activists staged a days-long occupation outside the police station in protest, white supremacists fired on the crowd, seriously wounding five people.In 2016, a police officer in nearby Falcon Heights shot and killed Philando Castile, a black man during a traffic stop, while Castile's girlfriend and her young daughter looked on in horror. Chauvin, the officer who kneeled on Floyd's neck, has hired the lawyer who defended Castile's killer.Protests over Castile's killing were also marked by arrests."My friend had a bouquet of flowers in her hand, and there's a photo of her being arrested," Cullars-Doty said. "How much more peaceful can you be when you're just standing holding flowers?"She noted that the Castile protests had taken place at the state capitol in neighboring St. Paul, which has its own police force, where reopen protesters had demonstrated earlier this month, without incident.Reopen protesters don't deserve the crackdown Minneapolis protesters experienced, Perez-Jordan noted. But their demands differ. "Black and brown people are asking for their full humanity to be respected. They're asking for the right to live," she said, as opposed to reopen protesters who are demanding "a perceived right to access to privilege, like having a certain haircut or being able to go out to eat in public. That's very different from what we're seeing online every single day when it comes to police officers who can kill an unarmed black person or an unarmed brown person with impunity."And while reopen protesters will theoretically go home when the lockdowns end, Minneapolis protesters said the demonstrations might continue. (If protests do go on, Floyd's family—through their attorney, Benjamin Crump—has asked that looting and violence be rejected.)Anika Bowie, an activist who attended the Minneapolis protests on Wednesday, said the demonstrations were building on momentum from the Black Lives Matter protests that touched off after the killing of black teenager Mike Brown in Ferguson, Missouri."Just since Ferguson, we've had this whole backlog of history of police brutality," she said. "Now, we have more networks to exchange this information and communication."As a press conference Thursday, Frey tried to make protesters feel seen even as Police Chief Medaria Arradondo decried a "core group of people who had really been focused on causing destruction.""What we've seen is the result of so much built up anger and sadness, anger and sadness that has been engrained in our black community—not just because of five minutes of horror but 400 years," Frey said. "If you're feeling that sadness, that anger, it's not only understandable, it's right."For her part, Cullars-Doty attributed the protest explosion to the nature of Floyd's death. It wasn't the first time a horrific video of a black man who died in police custody went viral. But the deaths are adding up."That video that we just have is gut-wrenching," she said. "I was getting messages from people who haven't been out protesting ever. They're saying now that they're either fed up; they sat on the sidelines too long and some people have had their eyes opened. So I think this really is a big one."Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| So-called honor killing of teen girl sparks outcry in Iran Posted: 27 May 2020 02:53 PM PDT  The so-called honor killing of a 14-year-old Iranian girl by her dad, who reportedly beheaded her as she slept, has sparked a nationwide outcry.
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| Iran outraged by 'honour killing' of 14-year-old girl Romina Ashrafi Posted: 28 May 2020 03:36 AM PDT  The killing of an Iranian teen by her father after she eloped with an older man sparked outrage on Wednesday, with local media denouncing "institutionalised violence" in "patriarchal" Iran. Iranian media covered the apparent "honour" crime extensively, with Ebtekar newspaper leading its front page with the headline "Unsafe father's house". According to local media, Romina Ashrafi was killed in her sleep on May 21 by her father, who decapitated her in the family home in Talesh in northern Gilan province. The reports said her father had refused her permission to marry a man fifteen years her senior, spurring her to run away, but she was returned home after her father reported her. The legal marriage age in Iran is 13 for women. Iranian media reported that after authorities detained the teenager, she told a judge she feared for her life if she was returned to home. But what most outraged public opinion was the lenient punishment the father is likely to face, Ebtekar wrote. The newspaper notes that Iran's normal "eye for an eye" retributive justice does not apply to fathers who kill their children. Accordingly, he is likely to face three to 10 years in prison, a sentence that could be reduced further, the newspaper wrote, denouncing the "institutionalised violence" of Iran's "patriarchal culture". With the farsi hashtag Romina_Ashrafi focusing outrage on Twitter, President Hassan Rouhani "expressed his regrets" in a cabinet meeting on Wednesday, pleading for the speedy passing of several anti-violence bills, his office said. On Twitter, Vice President for Women and Family Affairs, Masoumeh Ebtekar, said a bill on the protection of young people was in the "final phase" of validation by Iran's Guardian Council. The council, which vets legislation to ensure compliance with Iran's constitution and Islamic sharia law, has thrice previously called for changes to the law after it was passed by lawmakers, Ebtekar newspaper wrote. The publication fears that if the council sends back the bill, it will be buried by Iran's new parliament, which held its first session Wednesday and is dominated by conservatives and hardliners opposed to Rouhani.
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| Archaeologists discover pristine ancient Roman mosaic floor buried under piles of vines Posted: 27 May 2020 12:17 PM PDT  Archaeologists have revisited an ancient Roman dig site that hasn't been touched in a century — and found something incredible underneath.In a vineyard outside the Italian city of Verona, under several feet of vines and dirt, researchers have uncovered what appears to be a perfectly preserved mosaic floor and pieces of a villa foundation dating back to the third century A.D. Surveyors in the commune of Negrar di Valpolicella north of Verona shared images of the site, providing a glimpse at a discovery that's largely still hidden beneath the dirt, BBC reports.Archaeologists first mapped out what appeared to be the remains of an ancient Roman villa outside Verona back in 1922 before the site was abandoned. The Superintendent of Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape of Verona decided to revisit the site last October and again in February, but their efforts to unearth the site were cut short when COVID-19 arrived in Italy, the Guardian reports. Excavation resumed last week and, by Monday, there was something incredible to show for their efforts. There's still a lot of careful work to be done before the whole floor and foundation can be revealed — along with some careful negotiation with the owners of the vineyard now growing on top of this ancient discovery.More stories from theweek.com Trump retweets video declaring 'the only good Democrat is a dead Democrat' Researchers tested 4,160 people for coronavirus in a San Francisco neighborhood. Not a single white person tested positive. Twitter's Dorsey defends fact-checks as another label is applied to China spokesperson
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| Taiwan pledges help for fleeing Hong Kongers, riles China Posted: 27 May 2020 11:26 PM PDT  Taiwan promised on Thursday to settle Hong Kongers who flee the Chinese-ruled city for political reasons, offering help from employment to counselling, and prompting angry condemnation from Beijing as it pushes security legislation for Hong Kong. Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen this week became the first world leader to pledge specific measures to help people from Hong Kong who may leave the former British colony because of the new legislation. Chen Ming-tong, head of Taiwan's top China-policy maker, the Mainland Affairs Council, told parliament the government will establish an organisation to deliver "humanitarian relief" that includes settlement and employment in a joint effort with activists groups.
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| Coronavirus infections are rising as states reopen, potentially signaling a second wave Posted: 27 May 2020 08:48 AM PDT  Twenty states reported an increase in new infections during the week ending May 24, up from 13 states the week before.
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| Senate Democrats take on GOP court-packing in blistering new report Posted: 27 May 2020 03:12 PM PDT  The senators pointed to conservative activist Leonard Leo as the driving force behind the many of the president's appointments.
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| Mexican drug lord pleads poverty in bid to escape arrest Posted: 27 May 2020 05:23 PM PDT  Drug lord Rafael Caro Quintero, a notorious underworld figure who is on the FBI's most wanted list for the murder of a federal agent over three decades ago, said in a legal appeal that he has no money, is too old to work and has no pension. The odd plea was filed Tuesday by Caro Quintero's lawyer seeking an injunction against his arrest or extradition to the United States for the kidnapping and murder of DEA Special Agent Enrique Camarena in Mexico in 1985. The U.S. government says Caro Quintero and his family remain in the drug trade.
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| The UK now has the highest coronavirus death rate in the world Posted: 28 May 2020 05:16 AM PDT  The UK has recorded the highest coronavirus death rate in the world, according to new analysis.
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| Biden on 100,000 coronavirus deaths: 'To those hurting, the nation grieves with you.' Posted: 27 May 2020 04:39 PM PDT  Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden released a video message on Wednesday marking the grim milestone of 100,000 American lives lost to the coronavirus pandemic, telling the bereaved: "The nation grieves with you." Biden spoke after various tallies of COVID-19 deaths, including one compiled by Reuters, showed that the novel coronavirus has killed over 100,000 people in the United States, even as the slowdown in deaths encouraged businesses to reopen and Americans to emerge from more than two months of lockdowns. Biden, speaking from his home in Delaware, drew on his own family loss when making his remarks.
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| Pakistani villager urges India to return 'spy' pigeon Posted: 27 May 2020 06:29 AM PDT  The owner of a pigeon "arrested" by India for spying says his bird was freed for Eid and is innocent.
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| Letters to the Editor: L.A. is blowing its chance to have open trails and beaches during a pandemic Posted: 28 May 2020 03:00 AM PDT  Eaton Canyon is closed again. Some beaches were packed this weekend. Rules on masks and social distancing were disregarded. Come on, L.A.
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| Britain shuts embassy in North Korea after extreme lockdown Posted: 27 May 2020 08:22 AM PDT  Britain has closed its embassy in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang and ordered its staff to leave the country. The surprise closure is linked to coronavirus-related restrictions in place since earlier this year, which the Foreign Office said had left it unable to "rotate our staff and sustain the operation of the Embassy". It follows a similar evacuation of a number of other diplomats and foreign residents from the North Korean capital in March. A number of sources told the US news website NK News on Wednesday that the British diplomats left North Korea by land, crossing the DPRK's border with China earlier on Wednesday. Flights out of the country remain grounded. Hundreds of foreign residents remain in Pyongyang, including diplomats from the Swedish and Russian embassies and a small number of aid workers, though absent representatives from Germany, Switzerland, France, and Italy. There are currently no British residents in the country. Resident diplomats had previously raised their concerns about the severity of the DPRK authorities' coronavirus-prevention rules, which saw the country close its borders and place them under effective house arrest for over a month earlier in the year.
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| Cheered by Private Schools, DeVos Demands Public Education Shares Pandemic Aid Posted: 27 May 2020 12:01 PM PDT  WASHINGTON -- Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, defiant amid criticism that she is using the coronavirus pandemic to pursue a long-sought agenda, said she will force public school districts to share a large portion of federal rescue funding with private school students, regardless of income.DeVos announced the measure in a letter to the Council of Chief State School Officers, which represents state education chiefs, defending her position on how education funding from the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act, or CARES Act, should be spent."The CARES Act is a special, pandemic-related appropriation to benefit all American students, teachers and families," DeVos wrote in the letter Friday. "There is nothing in the act suggesting Congress intended to discriminate between children based on public or nonpublic school attendance, as you seem to do. The virus affects everyone."A range of education officials say DeVos' guidance would divert millions of dollars away from disadvantaged students and force districts starved of tax revenues during an economic crisis to support even the wealthiest private schools. The association representing the nation's schools superintendents told districts to ignore the guidance, and at least two states -- Indiana and Maine -- said they would.DeVos accused the state education chiefs of having a "reflex to share as little as possible with students and teachers outside of their control" and said she would draft a rule codifying her position to "resolve any issues in plenty of time for the next school year." The proposed rule would need to go through a public comment process before it could take effect.Private school leaders, who serve about 5.7 million of the nation's children, say they too are in crisis. Enrollment and tuition revenues are plunging along with philanthropic donations and church collections that help some religious schools operate. Many of those schools serve low-income students whose parents have fled failing public schools. Private school groups say 30% of the families they serve have annual incomes below $75,000, and those families are most at risk without federal aid. "I don't understand why we have to pick winners and losers when everything we're asking for is targeted at helping children and families," said Jennifer Daniels, associate director for public policy for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.Under federal education law, school districts are required to use funding intended for their poorest students to provide "equitable services," such as tutoring and transportation, for low-income students attending private schools in their districts. But DeVos maintains the coronavirus rescue law does not limit funding to just poor students, and her guidance would award private schools more services than the law would normally require.Last week, leaders from education committees in the House and Senate, including Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., said DeVos' interpretation was flawed.Democratic leaders called on DeVos to revise her guidance, which they said would "repurpose hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars intended for public school students to provide services for private school students, in contravention of both the plain reading of the statute and the intent of Congress."Carissa Moffat Miller, executive director of the Council of Chief State School Officers, said the organization believed the secretary's guidance "could significantly harm the vulnerable students who were intended to benefit the most from the critical federal COVID-19 education relief funds Congress has provided."DeVos has been unabashed in her use of coronavirus funding to further her decadeslong effort to divert public dollars to private and parochial schools. In a radio interview last week, first reported by Chalkbeat, the Roman Catholic archbishop of New York, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, asked DeVos if she was "utilizing this particular crisis to ensure that justice is finally done to our kids and the parents who choose to send them to faith-based schools." She responded, "Absolutely."In her letter, DeVos said "a growing list of nonpublic schools have announced they will not be able to reopen, and these school closures are concentrated in low-income and middle-class communities."At least 26 schools, the vast majority of them Catholic, have announced closures caused by or attributed to the pandemic, according to the Cato Institute, a libertarian research organization that is tracking such announcements. The National Catholic Educational Association said that at least 100 of its member schools are at risk of not reopening. More than 40 groups that support private schools wrote to House and Senate leaders this month asking for tuition aid, tax credits for families and other measures to prevent "massive nonpublic school closures."Leaders in some religious communities say they cannot fall back on public education."It is unthinkable for us not to give our children a Jewish education, in the same way it is unthinkable for us not to keep the Sabbath or the kosher dietary laws -- it is fundamental to Jewish life," said Rabbi Abba Cohen, vice president for federal affairs at Agudath Israel of America, one of the groups that signed the letter.Earlier this month, the Archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, announced it would close 10 schools. While the organization said a plan to consolidate had already been underway, Cardinal Joseph Tobin, archbishop of Newark, wrote in a letter to the community that "this historical moment presents crucial challenges to the sustainability and ongoing success of our schools."Among the closed schools was Cristo Rey Newark High School, part of a network of 37 Catholic college-preparatory schools across the country that exclusively serves low-income students."My concern is that people are painting this with a very large brush stroke that's based on an assumption that Catholic and private means fancy and expensive, and that is not the case," said Elizabeth Goettl, president of the Cristo Rey Network.Ninety-eight percent of the network's 12,000 students are students of color, and all of them are from financially disadvantaged families, Goettl said. Only 10% of the schools' operational revenue comes from tuition, and every family pays what they can on a sliding scale, on average about $900 a year, though some pay as little as $20 a month.Fifty percent of the school's operational revenue comes from a corporate work-study program that could be affected by the economic fallout from the pandemic. Companies employ students in entry-level jobs, and students assign their wages to their tuition."They're literally earning their education at age 14, which is remarkable in itself," she said. "For the federal government to say we're not going to help your kids sanitize, or do whatever COVID-related things that need to be done, seems reprehensible."A recently passed House bill would limit private schools from accessing any new emergency relief funding, including equitable services. But private school leaders have launched an aggressive campaign to lobby Congress and the White House."When all is said and done, people are going to try to do the right thing and not try to pick which students we're not going to keep safe," said Michael Schuttloffel, executive director of the Council for American Private Education.Private school groups lobbying Congress say that mass closures would also hurt public schools. If 20% of private school students have to be absorbed into the public school system, it would cost the public system roughly $15 billion, according to estimates from those groups.Public school groups said that the argument proves their point."I think it's more proof that we need to be focused on public education, because if public education is not fully funded, there is no fallback," said Maggie Garrett, co-chairwoman of the National Coalition for Public Education, which represents more than 50 national organizations that oppose private school vouchers.Ruth Arias, an Amazon warehouse worker and single mother of five in New York City, said moving her children back to their neighborhood school would mean taking them "out of a place where they feel their best and putting them into a school system where they fall apart."With the help of an organization called the Children's Scholarship Fund, Arias said she enrolled her children in a private Christian school to "believe in something better."Arias was battling the coronavirus last month when she saw that the city's Department of Education would help students get iPads for remote learning.Having only one computer and a cellphone for her children to share, she was relieved -- until she was told her children's private schooling made them ineligible."I honestly had one thought," she said, "which I had a lot when I was dealing with the public school system: Are you kidding me?"This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| Coronavirus deaths in US top 100,000 Posted: 28 May 2020 07:34 AM PDT  The US has seen more deaths (currently 100,047) and infections (1.69 million) than any other country.
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| Pompeo declares Hong Kong no longer autonomous from China in a move that threatens to escalate US-China tensions Posted: 28 May 2020 07:22 AM PDT  The action follows a new China national security law for Hong Kong that bans treason and other perceived offenses in the semiautonomous territory.
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| Police arrested a Bay Area woman who they say posted racist notes on the homes of Asian Americans Posted: 27 May 2020 08:17 AM PDT  The notes suggested that those not native to the US leave the country immediately.
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| One chart shows a noticeable correlation between how late a country started its coronavirus lockdown and the number of excess deaths Posted: 28 May 2020 06:30 AM PDT  Analysis from the Financial Times has shown that the number of excess deaths correlates to when a country decided to lock down.
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| Turkey's Erdogan says many facilities to reopen on June 1 Posted: 28 May 2020 10:20 AM PDT  Turkey will lift restrictions on intercity travel and allow restaurants, cafes, parks and sports facilities to reopen from June 1 as it eases restrictions imposed to curb the coronavirus outbreak, President Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday. Museums and beaches will also open from June 1, Erdogan said after a cabinet meeting. The virus has killed nearly 4,500 people in Turkey, with more than 160,000 infections.
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| Michigan governor in hot water over boat launch claim Posted: 26 May 2020 03:41 PM PDT  The Michigan governor who implemented some of the toughest coronavirus lockdown rules in the United States came under heavy criticism Tuesday over allegations that her husband pressured a dock to prepare his boat for an outing. Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat who has defended her tough stay-at-home policies against armed protestors and attacks from President Donald Trump, announced last week the lifting of some restrictions ahead of the long Memorial Day weekend. According to a claim posted on Facebook by Northshore Docks owner Tad Dowker, Whitmer's husband Marc Mallory subsequently tried to use her position to get his boat moved ahead of others for launching before the holiday weekend.
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| Wisconsin reports record number of new coronavirus cases, deaths Posted: 28 May 2020 09:09 AM PDT  Wisconsin saw a record number of new coronavirus cases and deaths, two weeks after the state's Supreme Court struck down its stay-at-home order.
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| Navy admiral submits results of probe on virus-infected ship Posted: 27 May 2020 04:09 PM PDT  The Navy's top admiral on Wednesday received the results of an internal investigation into the spread of the coronavirus aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt and the firing of the aircraft carrier's skipper in April. The report is not expected to be made public until decisions are made about potentially restoring Capt. Brett Crozier to command of the Roosevelt or disciplining other officers. It was submitted Wednesday to Adm. Mike Gilday, the chief of naval operations.
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| Tesla slashes prices to boost demand Posted: 27 May 2020 09:06 AM PDT  Tesla Inc. has cut prices of its electric vehicles by as much as 6% in North America following a decline in auto demand in the region during weeks of lockdown that have now started to ease.
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| This Neo-Futuristic Home Found Its Inspiration in the British Countryside Posted: 27 May 2020 01:14 PM PDT |
| Trump, for some reason, compares coronavirus death toll (over 98,000) to that of swine flu (under 20,000) Posted: 26 May 2020 02:43 PM PDT  On a day when the U.S. death toll from the coronavirus pandemic neared 100,000, President Trump sought to direct the nation's attention back to the 2009 H1N1 swine flu pandemic as a way to smear the reputation of his Democratic rival Joe Biden, who was vice president at the time.
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| Gang of 26 arrested for allegedly smuggling people from Vietnam to Europe in investigation prompted by Essex lorry deaths Posted: 27 May 2020 07:29 AM PDT  A gang of 26 suspected people smugglers have been arrested in France and Belgium in an investigation prompted by the deaths of 39 Vietnamese migrants found in the back of a lorry in Essex last year. The early morning raids took place in Paris and Brussels, with 13 people detained in each country. In Belgium, 11 Vietnamese and two Moroccans were held, while in France, authorities said the suspects were "mostly Vietnamese and French". The suspects are allegedly part of an organised crime group that smuggles refugees from Asia, particularly from Vietnam, and that likely has transported up to several dozen people every day for several months, Europol said in a statement. "Prompted by the discovery of 39 deceased Vietnamese nationals inside a refrigerated trailer in Essex in the United Kingdom in October 2019, a joint investigation team (JIT) was created between Belgium, Ireland, France, the United Kingdom, Eurojust and Europol," Europol said.
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| U.N. court postpones Mladic appeals hearings Posted: 28 May 2020 09:38 AM PDT  Mladic, who was sentenced in 2017 to life in prison on charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in the 1990s war in Bosnia, is recovering from surgery. Judges cited filings by the court's registrar that Mladic, 78, is "part of a high risk group due to his age and medical history" and said travel and other restrictions made a June 16 start date unworkable.
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| A pharmacist known as 'the Mask Man' has been charged with hoarding $200,000 worth of N95 masks and price-gouging customers Posted: 27 May 2020 02:35 PM PDT  The DOJ said the pharmacist, 66-year-old Richard Schirripa, sold $2,690 of masks to an undercover officer and said he felt "like a drug dealer."
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| US Congress approves China sanctions over ethnic crackdown Posted: 27 May 2020 02:56 PM PDT  Congress voted Wednesday to toughen the U.S. response to a brutal Chinese crackdown on ethnic minorities, adding another factor to the increasingly stormy relationship between the two countries. The House passed a bipartisan bill that would impose sanctions on Chinese officials involved in the mass surveillance and detention of Uighurs and other ethnic groups in the western Xinjiang region, a campaign that has drawn muted international response because of China's influence around the world. The measure already passed the Senate and needs a signature from President Donald Trump, who said this week he'll "very strongly" consider it amid U.S. anger over China's handling of the coronavirus outbreak and tension over a Chinese plan to restrict civil liberties in Hong Kong.
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| Protester who hung effigy of Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear fired from job at car dealership Posted: 27 May 2020 12:39 PM PDT  Terry Bush, president of the Kentucky 3 Percenters group, only hoisted the effigy, his wife Patsy said Wednesday morning.
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| Philippines confirms 539 new coronavirus cases, largest single-day increase Posted: 28 May 2020 01:17 AM PDT  The Philippines' health ministry on Thursday reported 17 more novel coronavirus deaths and 539 new infections, the largest number of cases reported in a single day since the virus was first detected in the country. The number of recovered patients was 3,598. An inter-agency panel on coronavirus has recommended to President Rodrigo Duterte the easing of strict lockdown measures in the capital, which accounts for most of the coronavirus cases and deaths, to restart economic activity.
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| Russia seizes 40 tonnes of embargoed European cheeses Posted: 27 May 2020 09:49 AM PDT  Russia on Wednesday seized 40 tonnes of European cheeses smuggled into the country in breach of an embargo on EU food imports, the customs service said. The shipment included Dorblu blue cheese and Italian hard cheeses such as Grana Padano, the customs service said. This was in response to EU sanctions over Russia's actions in Ukraine including the annexation of Crimea.
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| Coronavirus: How the pandemic in US compares with rest of world Posted: 28 May 2020 04:55 AM PDT  More than 100,000 people have died and the country is now slowly reopening amid fears of new spikes.
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| These women say they had miscarriages. Now they're in jail for abortion. Posted: 28 May 2020 09:11 AM PDT  In El Salvador, the law is clear: If you have an abortion, you go to jail. But many women say they were wrongfully convicted. Could it happen in the U.S.?
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| Ford made its police SUV heat itself up to more than 133 degrees to kill the coronavirus Posted: 27 May 2020 08:45 AM PDT  Ford worked with Ohio State and police departments to develop the tech. Ford has a longstanding relationship with law enforcement.
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| Judge who told woman to ‘close your legs’ to prevent assault is removed from bench Posted: 27 May 2020 03:00 AM PDT  A New Jersey judge who said closing your legs could prevent sexual assault has been barred from presiding over a courtroom and dismissed from the State Supreme Court bench.The unanimous decision on Tuesday cited "repeated and serious acts of misconduct" by state superior court judge John Russo Jr.
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| Mammoth skeletons dug up at Mexico City airport construction site Posted: 28 May 2020 08:51 AM PDT  Alongside construction crews racing to build the Mexican capital's new airport, skulls and curving tusks of massive mammoths peek through the dirt as archaeologists dig up more and more bones belonging to the ice age's most famous mammal. The latest discoveries include two huge skulls, along with scattered ribs and limbs, found just inside the perimeter of where a new civilian airport is being built, about 30 miles (50km) north of downtown Mexico City. To date, some 70 individual mammoths have been unearthed since late last year.
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| Hard-line former Tehran mayor named Iran parliament speaker Posted: 27 May 2020 10:09 PM PDT  Iran's parliament elected a former mayor of Tehran tied to the Revolutionary Guard as its next speaker Thursday, solidifying hard-line control of the body as tensions between the U.S. and the Islamic Republic remain high over its collapsed nuclear deal. Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf's assumption of power comes after a string of failed presidential bids and 12 years as the leader of Iran's capital city, in which he built onto Tehran's subway and supported the construction of modern high-rises. Many, however, remember Qalibaf for his support as a Revolutionary Guard general for a violent crackdown on Iranian university students in 1999.
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| House passes PPP bill giving small businesses more time, flexibility to access small business loans Posted: 28 May 2020 10:17 AM PDT  The Paycheck Protection Program already has provided more than 4.4 million small businesses with an infusion of cash to keep their workers employed.
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| US Air Force looks to up-gun its airlift planes Posted: 28 May 2020 08:36 AM PDT  Two demonstrations of a new "palletized munitions" concept have shown promise, an Air Force general said.
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| French restaurants set empty tables in appeal for lockdown help Posted: 27 May 2020 08:34 AM PDT  Restaurants, bars and hotels across France set empty tables and draped chef's aprons outside on Wednesday to protest against continuing lockdown restrictions and demand more state aid. France ordered the shutdown of its hospitality industry on March 14 - three days before a nationwide coronavirus lockdown - and all establishments remain closed even after the government began relaxing some restrictions on May 11. "It's sad not to have restaurants and bars open, they're part of our life and culture," Aurore Begue, co-owner of three restaurants, said at a protest meeting by the Alexandre III bridge over the Seine.
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| Twitter fact-checks China amid bias row Posted: 28 May 2020 07:07 AM PDT  After fact-checking President Trump, Twitter adds warnings to Chinese tweets too.
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| A white woman who called the police on a black man telling her to put her dog on a leash says she's 'not a racist' Posted: 26 May 2020 11:45 AM PDT  "I'm not a racist. I did not mean to harm that man in any way," Amy Cooper told CNN, after saying she wanted to "publicly apologize to everyone."
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| Pelosi calls on Trump to 'take responsibility' for coronavirus response Posted: 27 May 2020 01:15 PM PDT  In a press conference Wednesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called on President Trump to "stop making excuses. Take responsibility" for his response to the coronavirus pandemic.
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