10/5/2022
SCOTUS weighs Black voting power in Alabama
Anna Moneymaker / Getty Images
“The Supreme Court on Tuesday heard oral arguments in a case that could further undermine the 1965 Voting Rights Act, which prohibits racial discrimination against minority voters.” [Vox] Read more at Reuters / Andrew Chung and Nate Raymond
“The case concerns Alabama’s congressional map, which gives Black voters a real chance of electing their candidate of choice in one out of seven districts. However, more than a quarter of the state’s population is Black.” [Vox] Read more at NPR / Nina Totenberg
“When Merrill v. Milligan was decided in a lower court earlier this year, a three-judge panel which included two Donald Trump appointees ruled Alabama’s map unlawfully diluted Black voting power. The panel ordered the state to redraw the map with an additional majority-Black district before the upcoming 2022 midterm elections.” [Vox] Read more at Associated Press / Mark Sherman
“The Supreme Court ruled 5-4 shortly afterward to reverse the panel’s decision and keep Alabama’s map in place. Now the Court will decide whether the map gives Black Alabamians less opportunity to participate in the state’s electoral process.” [Vox] Read more at CNN / Ariane de Vogue
“The conservative-majority Court will likely rule in Alabama’s favor, given its past rulings against voting rights. But the Court could rule narrowly or eliminate protections against racial gerrymandering.” [Vox / Ian Millhiser]
Three ‘click chemistry’ scientists win Nobel prize
Carolyn Bertozzi, Morten Meldal and K Barry Sharpless found way to ‘click’ molecules together
The award is worth 10m Swedish kronor. Photograph: Fernando Vergara/AP
“Three scientists who fueled a revolution in chemistry by devising a way to ‘click’ molecules together like building blocks, even inside living organisms, have been awarded the 2022 Nobel prize in chemistry.
Carolyn Bertozzi at Stanford University, Morten Meldal at the University of Copenhagen and K Barry Sharpless at Scripps Research Institute in California were honoured for finding and exploiting elegant and efficient chemical reactions to create complex molecules for the pharmaceutical industry, mapping DNA and making designer materials.
The award, announced on Wednesday by the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm, is worth 10m Swedish kronor (£804,000), and will be shared equally among the winners. The Nobel committee said the prize was being given ‘for the development of click chemistry and bio-orthogonal chemistry’.” Read more at The Guardian
“Residents of one of Florida's barrier islands will be allowed to return to view their homes today for the first time since Hurricane Ian devastated the state last week. Ian wiped out a portion of the causeway connecting Sanibel Island to the mainland, setting the stage for days of evacuations by air and sea as crews searched for people who were stranded. While residents in this area will be given access to their properties today, officials warn the island remains extremely unsafe with ‘alligators running around’ and ‘snakes all over the place,’ Sanibel Fire Chief William Briscoe said. Crews have evacuated approximately 1,000 people from Sanibel since Ian ripped through the island. Meanwhile, President Biden and first lady Jill Biden are scheduled to visit Florida today to see the destruction firsthand.” Read more at CNN
Homer for history
Aaron Judge watches his 62nd home run, off the Texas Rangers' Jesús Tinoco. Photo: Tony Gutierrez/AP
“Yankees outfielder Aaron Judge hit his 62nd home run of the season last night, breaking Roger Maris' American League record set in 1961.
Judge hit his record-setting homer during his first at-bat in the second game of a doubleheader against the Texas Rangers, Axios' TuAnh Dam reports.
Judge rounds the bases after No. 62. Photo Ron Jenkins/Getty Images
Judge is still in the hunt for the Triple Crown — when a hitter leads his league in batting average, home runs and RBIs in the same season.
He trails Minnesota's Luis Arráez in batting average with one game left.
Teammates congratulate Judge. Photo: Tony Gutierrez/AP
Five other players — Maris, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa and Babe Ruth — have hit 60 or more home runs in a single season.
McGwire has admitted steroid use. Bonds and Sosa have denied allegations that they used performance-enhancing drugs.
President Biden tweeted: ‘History made, more history to make.’” Read more at Axios
Herschel's family feud
Photo illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios. Photo: James Gilbert/Getty Images
“Republicans and anti-abortion movement leaders aren't backing down from their support for embattled Georgia Senate nominee Herschel Walker, Axios' Josh Kraushaar, Emma Hurt and Alexi McCammond report.
Why it matters: Georgia threatens to become a third missed opportunity for Senate Republicans, joining Arizona and New Hampshire as states where the GOP fears it won't unseat vulnerable Democrats because of flawed candidates.
Republicans put up a united front today, including former President Trump, top Senate Republicans and anti-abortion groups.
‘We are full speed ahead in Georgia,’ said Senate Leadership Fund president Steven Law, whose super PAC has spent or reserved $37.1 million in the race.
Between the lines: Watch for new developments including Walker's son Christian Walker, a 23-year-old conservative TikTok influencer, who said his father lied about his personal life.
Georgia-based conservative commentator Erick Erickson wrote: ‘Georgia Republicans overnight were burning up my phone with text messages. It didn’t hit home for them until Christian Walker started his tweets, largely throwing his dad under the bus.’
North Georgia conservative talk show host Martha Zoller told Axios that she heard ‘from a number of people that have pause about what they’ve heard. ... They’d like to see him give a more robust not only defense but explanation.’” Read more at Axios
Trump Asks Supreme Court to Intervene in Review of Mar-a-Lago Records
In earlier cases, the justices have ruled against the former president when he sought to shield his financial and presidential records from prosecutors and congressional investigators.
Lawyers for former President Donald J. Trump appealed on narrow grounds, not asking the Supreme Court to overturn the most important part of an appeals court’s decision.Credit...Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times
“WASHINGTON — Former President Donald J. Trump asked the Supreme Court on Tuesday to intervene in the litigation over sensitive documents that the F.B.I. seized from his Florida estate, saying that an appeals court had lacked jurisdiction to remove them from a special master’s review.
But Mr. Trump’s lawyers did not ask the Supreme Court to overturn the most important part of the appeals court’s intervention: its decision to free the Justice Department to continue using documents with classification markings in its criminal investigation of Mr. Trump’s handling of government records.
The new filing was technical, saying that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, had not been authorized to stay aspects of a judge’s order appointing a special master to review all materials that the F.B.I. had seized in its search of Mr. Trump’s residence, Mar-a-Lago.
‘The 11th Circuit lacked jurisdiction to review the special master order, which authorized the review of all materials seized from President Trump’s residence, including documents bearing classification markings,’ the application said.” Read more at New York Times
Oath Keepers leader called Biden 'illegitimate usurper'
“Audio recordings and messages shown Tuesday during the trial of Oath Keepers leader Stewart Rhodes and other members of the right-wing extremist militia show the group began planning for a violent confrontation in Washington just days after Joe Biden was named the president-elect. The 2020 presidential election was called in Biden's favor on Nov. 7, 2020. That same day, Rhodes called Biden an ‘illegitimate usurper’ and issued a call to action via the encrypted messaging app Signal. The defendants face numerous crimes in connection to the events of that day, including the rare charge of seditious conspiracy.” Read more USA Today
Supporters of the extremist group Oath Keepers stand outside the federal courthouse, on Monday, Oct. 3, 2022, in Washington.Manuel Balce Ceneta, AP
Biden keeping abortion front and center as midterms approach
“Just weeks before the midterm elections, President Joe Biden is doubling down on his administration's efforts to protect abortion access. He held a meeting Tuesday of the Cabinet-level task force he assembled to coordinate a federal response to the reversal of Roe v. Wade. During the conversation, he announced new guidance for universities and funding steps for family planning.” Read more at USA Today
In this image taken from a campaign video posted by Katie Darling, Darling holds her newborn son moments after giving birth. Darling said she was seven months pregnant when she decided to join Louisiana’s U.S. House race in reaction to the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June 2022 that ended constitutional protections for abortion.AP
Putin signs laws annexing 4 Ukrainian regions
“Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed laws absorbing four Ukrainian regions into Russia, a move that finalizes the annexation carried out in defiance of international law. Earlier this week, both houses of the Russian parliament ratified treaties making the Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions part of Russia. The formalities followed Kremlin-orchestrated ‘referendums’ in the four regions that Ukraine and the West have rejected as a sham. Ukraine's counteroffensive is driving back Russian forces; More than 450 settlements in the Kharkiv region have been liberated in the past month, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.” Read more at USA Today
Ukrainian soldiers sit on an armored vehicle as they drive on a road between Izium and Lyman in Ukraine on Tuesday Oct. 4, 2022.Francisco Seco, AP
War in Ukraine
Source: Institute for the Study of War | By Marco Hernandez and Josh Holder
“Ukrainian troops expelled Russian forces from a key town in Kherson Province, pushing farther into Russian-controlled territory by attacking several places at once.” Read more at New York Times
“Russian forces are outnumbered in Kherson, according to pro-Kremlin bloggers.” Read more at New York Times
“Russians are fleeing to countries like Kyrgyzstan to avoid the military draft.” Read more at New York Times
“President Biden spoke with Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, and pledged to send four more of the mobile rocket launchers known as HIMARS.” Read more at New York Times
Russia’s Military Woes Grow
“Ukrainian forces have driven back Russian troops in three partially occupied Ukrainian territories—humiliating setbacks for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has claimed the regions as his own and is already facing sharp domestic criticism for his battlefield failures.
The rapid retreat from strategic cities underscores the growing disorder in Russia’s military campaign, even as the Kremlin moves to illegally annex four Ukrainian territories and mobilize hundreds of thousands of new forces. In recent weeks, Kyiv has recaptured large swaths of territory while nearly 200,000 Russians have fled to bordering nations to escape Putin’s conscription order.
‘Russia isn’t winning. Putin’s great nationalist celebration of conquests is turning out to be a debacle,’ said Daniel Fried, a fellow at the Atlantic Council and a former U.S. ambassador to Poland.
Just days after seizing the city of Lyman, a strategic hub in Donetsk, and pushing forward into Luhansk, Ukrainian forces have now also forced Russia to retreat along the strategic west bank of the Dnipro River in Kherson. The rapid retreat is due in part to overstretched Russian units, according to the Institute for the Study of War. Citing Russian military bloggers, ISW noted that ‘elements of the 126th Coastal Defense Brigade of the Black Sea Fleet have operated in the area without rotation since March and … the frontline is stretched so thin that some villages in this sector have 15 men defending them.’
These advances add to over 2,000 square miles of land in Kharkiv that Kyiv has recaptured over the last month, as FP’s Jack Detsch reported.
Fried said Ukraine’s recent tactical victories are consistent with its military performance throughout Putin’s invasion. ‘At each turn in the war, the Russians have been worse than people expected and the Ukrainians have done better,’ he said.
Russia’s losses in Lyman in particular have provoked stinging criticism from two of Putin’s close allies, who publicly attacked top military officials over their battlefield failures.
‘Send all these pieces of garbage barefoot with machine guns straight to the front,’ wrote Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the Wagner Group and Putin’s close associate. Ramzan Kadyrov, the leader of Chechnya, said a leading general should be ‘sent to the front to wash his shame off with blood.’
The dysfunction on the ground also appears to be ingrained at the top, especially with the Kremlin’s recent admission that it can’t identify the precise borders of its annexed territories, while it struggles to repel advancing Ukrainian forces.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“Uganda’s ebola outbreak. Uganda is scrambling to respond to an ebola outbreak that has killed nine people and infected dozens more. Since the strain currently cannot be vaccinated against or treated, officials are establishing isolation centers and testing labs while Uganda’s neighbors are monitoring travelers for symptoms. Six new vaccine candidates that could potentially defend against this strain are currently in development.
‘This is another wake-up call for the international community,’ Kartik Chandran, a virologist at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, told the Wall Street Journal. ‘The medical community has to keep working on vaccines and therapeutics that work on multiple strains, not just a single strain, ready for the next outbreak.’” Read more at Foreign Policy
“EU mulls Iran sanctions. The European Union is considering imposing sanctions on Iran in response to its harsh crackdown on mass protests, just a day after U.S. President Joe Biden also vowed to inflict ‘further costs’ on complicit Iranian officials. Human rights organizations estimate that as many as 130 people have died since the demonstrations first began.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“U.K. train strikes. Train operators and railway staff in the United Kingdom are expected to hold another strike over working conditions and wages today, after their respective unions said ongoing negotiations with the government stalled. The strike takes place while the Conservative Party gathers in Birmingham for its annual party conference; the planned disruptions will halt most train lines in and out of the city, making it difficult for the members of Parliament and other London-based party activists and officials to make their way back to the capital.” Read more at Foreign Policy
“Iran protests. High school girls have added their voices to the protests sweeping the country by staging protests of their own in classrooms, the Guardian reports. President Ebrahim Raisi has blamed the ongoing demonstrations on foreign provocateurs but even hardline media outlets have begun to criticize the government. ‘Neither foreign enemies nor domestic opposition can take cities into a state of riot without a background of discontent,’ an editorial in the conservative newspaper Jomhuri Eslami said. ‘The denial of this fact will not help.’” Read more at Foreign Policy
“Blinken’s Latin America trip. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has embarked on a five-day-long tour to three Latin American countries—Colombia, Chile, and Peru—in a bid to strengthen ties with the countries’ left-wing presidents. Discussions over drug trafficking, migration, and economic issues are expected to dominate the agenda.” Read more at Foreign Policy
Why Musk caved
Illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios
“Elon Musk reversed course on Twitter again, offering to proceed with his $44 billion buyout of the company, Axios' Dan Primack and Sara Fischer report.
Between the lines: One reading of Musk's about-face is that he's lost confidence in his legal case, having already experienced a series of procedural losses in Delaware Chancery Court.
Musk is maintaining his $54.20 per share offer price, according to a letter to the SEC first obtained by Bloomberg.
He was scheduled to face a deposition starting this week.
Twitter's board is considering Musk's offer, but is taking its time to reply because of fears that it could be a legal ploy, The Washington Post reports.” Read more at Axios
“Here are immediate tasks Elon Musk would face as Twitter's new proprietor, Axios managing editor Scott Rosenberg writes from the Bay Area:
Free speech: Musk has said Twitter should enforce fewer rules about speech, and let users say anything that is not explicitly outlawed by their governments. 15 years of experience with online social networks tell us that such an approach is wildly impractical — and likely to unleash floods of spam, bullying, fraud and disinformation.
Donald Trump: The biggest free-speech choice of all Musk will immediately confront is whether to re-platform the former president. Musk has said he's against permanent bans — and many of his fans believe he'll invite Trump back to the service.
Business: Big social platforms typically start with meteoric user growth, then build massive revenue streams with fat profit margins. Twitter has never figured out how to fulfill that pattern.
Under the hood: During Musk's months-long effort to wriggle out of his deal to buy Twitter, he has complained that the service is overrun by fake accounts and bots. Last month, Twitter's former security head filed a whistleblower complaint charging the company with a slew of operational lapses.
Staffing: A Musk-owned Twitter will face the challenge of trying to retain and inspire teams at Twitter whose work Musk has repeatedly disparaged. More likely, he will have to hire a ton of talent to replace the departing droves.” Read more at Axios
Kevin Spacey trial begins in New York, five years after sexual abuse accusations
Anthony Rapp alleges Spacey acted to gratify sexual desire during an encounter in 1986, when he was 14 and the Oscar winner was 26 or 27
Wed 5 Oct 2022 02.30 EDT
“Actor Kevin Spacey faces the first of a series of sexual abuse claims dating back decades on Thursday in New York in a trial that may come to overshadow a glittering career on stage and screen that included two Oscars and numerous other top awards.
The case against the 63-year-old American focuses on accusations by Anthony Rapp, a star of the Broadway musical Rent, who five years ago publicly accused Spacey of sexual assault when he was a teenager.
In the subsequent lawsuit now coming to trial, Rapp alleges that Spacey – whose real name is Kevin Spacey Fowler – acted to gratify his sexual desire during an encounter at a Manhattan party in 1986, when he was 14 and Spacey 26 or 27.” Read more at The Guardian
“NASA and SpaceX are set to send the first Native American woman into orbittoday. The astronaut, NASA's Nicole Aunapu Mann, will serve as mission commander on the trip scheduled to kick off at 12 p.m. ET. Mann and three crewmates will ride on a SpaceX rocket set to take off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. They'll travel to the International Space Station for a five-month stay, joining a long list of astronauts to serve as full-time staff aboard the orbiting laboratory, which has hosted humans for nearly 22 years. On her trip, Mann will carry some special mementos: her wedding rings, a surprise gift for her family, and a dream catcher that her mother gave her.” Read more at CNN
Would-be M.B.A. candidates are MIA.
“Top business schools, such as Harvard, Wharton, Yale, the University of Chicago and NYU, are reporting steep drops in applications, due to a hot labor market and high tuition costs. (Fun fact: The 10% drop in August’s total job openings, reported today, is the largest decline since the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Labor Department said.)” Read more at Wall Street Journal
Photo illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios. Photo: Joe Robbins/ISI Photos/Getty Images
“Sexual misconduct and verbal and emotional abuse had ‘become systematic’ in the National Women's Soccer League, according to a highly anticipated report, Axios' Erin Doherty writes.
Why it matters: The report details abuse, vicious coaching tactics and a repeated failure by team executives and the league to intervene.
Between the lines: Included in the report is a previously undisclosed encounter between then-player Erin Simon and Christy Holly, a male former head coach.
‘[S]he recalls Holly opened his laptop and began the game film,’ per the report. The coach told Simon that he was going to touch her for every bad pass.
‘When her teammate picked her up to drive home, Simon broke down crying.’
The big picture: Players began speaking out last year.
A reckoning followed across the league — with games canceled, the commissioner stepping down and multiple coaches fired.” Read more at Axios
“Lives Lived: Loretta Lynn built her stardom not only on her Grammy-winning country music but also on her image as a symbol of rural pride. She died at 90.” Read more at New York Times