The Full Belmonte, 8/25/2022
Student loan programs that were supposed to make college affordable have left people saddled with debt for many years after graduation.
PHOTO: BRIAN SNYDER/REUTERS
President Biden will forgive up to $20,000 in federal student loans for tens of millions of Americans.
“He’ll nix $10,000 in debt for borrowers making under $125,000 a year or couples making less than $250,000 a year, according to the White House. Federal Pell Grant recipients who meet the same income caps would be eligible for total forgiveness of $20,000. The unprecedented plan—which independent estimates suggest will cost more than $300 billion over 10 years—is expected to draw political and legal challenges.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
Illustration: Axios Visuals
Olivier Douliery/AFP via Getty Images
“President Joe Biden announced he would cancel $10,000 in student loans for borrowers earning less than $125,000 per year or households earning less than $250,000.” [Vox] Read more at NBC News / Lauren Egan, Kristen Welker, and Ali Vitali
“Low-income students who received Pell grants — around 60 percent of borrowers — are eligible for $20,000 in loan forgiveness. The administration estimates 90 percent of the assistance will go to households earning less than $75,000 per year.” [Vox] Read more at New York Times / Zolan Kanno-Youngs, Stacy Cowley, and Jim Tankersley
“While the relief is much less than the $50,000 some Democrats and advocates pushed for, the White House contends it will help up to 43 million people; 20 million borrowers could have their loans immediately canceled.” [Vox] Read more at USA Today
“The Department of Education also proposed slashing monthly payments and forgiving loan balances after 10 rather than 20 years. The pandemic-era pause on student loan repayments will be extended through December 31.” [Vox] Read more at CNN / Phil Mattingly, Katie Lobosco, and Maegan Vazquez
“Some critics say canceling the loans will worsen inflation by increasing consumer demand, and the plan may face challenges in court.” [Vox] Read more at [NPR / Cory Turner and Sequoia Carrillo
“About 8 million people should be eligible once the program goes live because the Education Department already has their income information. Everyone else must submit an application, which will be available by the end of the year.” [Vox] Read more at Vox / Kevin Carey
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky marked a subdued Independence Day with a holiday address.
“In the recorded message, he expressed optimism about liberating land seized by Moscow and mourned the thousands killed—amid dozens of disabled Russian armored vehicles on Kyiv’s main boulevard. In previous years, parades celebrated the country’s 1991 exit from the crumbling Soviet Union. No mass events were planned amid concerns about Russian attacks, but hundreds of people turned out to look at the vehicles. Zelensky later said that a Russian missile hit a passenger train in eastern Ukraine, killing at least 22 people, the deadliest civilian attack in weeks. Today marks the six-month anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
U.S. to Send Nearly $3 Billion Security Aid Package to Ukraine. Read more at Wall Street Journal
Russia Detains Ex-Mayor, a Critic of Putin, on Charges of Discrediting Military. Read more at Wall Street Journal
Jury Awards Vanessa Bryant $16 Million in Suit Over Kobe Bryant Crash Photos
Ms. Bryant had sued Los Angeles County over the sharing of photos of human remains from the helicopter crash that killed her husband, her daughter and seven others. Another plaintiff was awarded $15 million.
“LOS ANGELES — A jury awarded Vanessa Bryant $16 million on Wednesday in her lawsuit against Los Angeles County over the inappropriate sharing of photos of human remains from the helicopter crash that killed her husband, Kobe Bryant, and her daughter, Gianna, along with seven others.
Chris Chester, whose wife Sarah, 45, and daughter, Payton, 13 were among those killed in the crash and who joined the suit, was awarded $15 million.” Read more at New York Times
Interstate 80 in Emeryville, Calif., in the Bay Area. Photo: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images
“California's coming auto rules will put immense pressure on automakers to accelerate production of vehicles they already can’t build enough of, Axios Closer co-author Nathan Bomey reports.
The state is about to require 35% of automakers' new sales to be zero-emission vehicles in 2026.
The targets — which allow for some plug-in hybrids — steadily increase each year, hitting 68% in 2030 and 100% in 2035.
For context: EVs made up 15% of California's new-vehicle sales in the first half of 2022.” Read more at Axios
Idaho Must Allow Abortions in Certain Emergencies, Judge Rules
Preliminary decision is a win for Justice Department after the Biden administration lost initial ruling in case from Texas
Attorneys for the Idaho legislature leaving court in Boise on Monday after oral arguments in the Justice Department’s lawsuit against Idaho over its near-total abortion ban.PHOTO: REBECCA BOONE/ASSOCIATED PRESS
“A federal judge blocked Idaho from enforcing its near-total abortion ban in certain emergency situations, an early victory for the Justice Department in a case it filed this month.
U.S. District Judge B. Lynn Winmill on Wednesday issued a preliminary injunction that prevents the state from enforcing its ban in emergency circumstances where doctors and hospitals deem an abortion is necessary to avoid placing the health of a pregnant patient in serious jeopardy.
The judge, an appointee of Democratic President Bill Clinton, said Idaho’s criminal abortion statute conflicted with a federal law that requires hospitals to provide certain basic levels of emergency care.
Medicine’s goal, he said, ‘is to effectively identify problems and treat them promptly so patients are stabilized before they develop a life-threatening emergency. The Idaho law requires doctors to do the opposite—to wait until abortion is necessary to prevent the patient’s death.’” Read more at Wall Street Journal
Police chief fired after months of criticism for Uvalde elementary school massacre response
“UVALDE, Texas – The Uvalde school board on Wednesday night fired school district police chief Pete Arredondo, a move that comes three months to the day after the mass shooting at an elementary school that claimed the lives of 21 victims.
Arredondo has been the focus of much of the scrutiny and blame for law enforcement’s 77-minute delay in confronting the gunman who shot and killed 19 children and two teachers on May 24 at Robb Elementary School.
The board adjourned immediately after the unanimous vote and did not discuss it publicly.
Arredondo did not attend the meeting. Instead, his attorney released a 17-page statement Wednesday evening, arguing that all of Arredondo's actions on May 24 were consistent with active shooter training and that ‘Chief Arredondo did the right thing.’
‘Any allegation of lack of leadership is wholly misplaced,’ the statement said. "The complaint that an officer should have rushed the door, believed to be locked, to open it up without a shield capable of stopping an AR-15 bullet, without breaching tools … is tantamount to suicide.’
State investigators have found that the door was never locked and there was no evidence that any officer tried opening the door. Hallway video obtained by the American-Statesman, part of the USA TODAY Network, showed the first of several officers arriving with shields 19 minutes after the gunman.
The statement emphasized in bold and italic that Arredondo and other officers in the hallway were not aware that children were inside the classroom. 911 dispatchers fielded calls from children inside the classroom pleading to be rescued, but word of those calls apparently never reached officers on the scene.
Days after the shooting, Texas Department of Public Safety Director Steve McCraw identified Arredondo as the incident commander and said he mistakenly treated the situation as a barricaded subject and not an active shooter, which requires immediate action to stop the gunman. Later, in testimony before a state Senate panel, McCraw said Arredondo ‘decided to place the lives of officers before the lives of children.’
In the Wednesday statement, Arredondo's attorney, George E. Hyde, called characterizations of Arredondo as the incident commander ‘patently false.’
‘Out of all the officers that were there, from all sorts of agencies and departments, not even one came to him with even a suggestion that he should take a different approach,’ the statement read. ‘So it appears self-evident that all the officers that responded are reasonable and the actions he took were reasonable.’
In total, 376 officers responded to the deadly shooting, including 149 U.S. Border Patrol agents, 91 DPS troopers and five Uvalde school district officers.” Read more at USA Today
Investigators are trying to understand why Donald Trump wanted to hang on to the documents that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago.
“The two dozen boxes taken from the former president’s Florida home include 11 sets of classified documents, a note from President Barack Obama and some of Trump’s expired passports (which the Justice Department has since said it would return). Trump had said that the material was his property and destined for his presidential library, according to a person familiar with the matter. The DOJ and Trump are fighting in court over the release of an affidavit outlining evidence for the FBI’s search; the agency’s proposed redactions are due tomorrow.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“President Joe Biden said he had ‘zero’ advance notice before federal agents executed a search of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence earlier this month, his first public comments on the search.” Read more at USA Today
Trump Ally Scott Perry Sues to Block Justice Department From Reviewing Cellphone Contents
GOP lawmaker from Pennsylvania is under investigation for possible role in effort to overturn 2020 presidential election
According to Rep. Scott Perry’s lawsuit, FBI agents approached him when he was on vacation with his family and seized his cellphone.PHOTO: DYLAN HOLLINGSWORTH/BLOOMBERG NEWS
“WASHINGTON—Rep. Scott Perry, a Republican ally of former President Donald Trump, has sued the Justice Department for taking his cellphone, seeking a court order blocking prosecutors from reviewing its contents.
In a lawsuit filed on Aug. 18 but not unsealed until Tuesday night, Mr. Perry’s lawyers said messages on the phone are protected by the Constitution’s Speech or Debate Clause, which shields lawmakers from questioning about legislative acts.
After filing the case, Mr. Perry’s lawyers on Wednesday told a judge they were in talks with the Justice Department about resolving the dispute out of court. The judge agreed to put Mr. Perry’s case on hold while those discussions played out.
The seizure of Mr. Perry’s phone on Aug. 9 marked an escalation of a Justice Department investigation into efforts by several close allies of Mr. Trump to overturn the 2020 election. The inquiry was begun last year by the Justice Department’s inspector general’s office.
A department spokesman declined to comment Wednesday.
According to Mr. Perry’s lawsuit, FBI agents approached him when he was on vacation with his family. The agents seized his phone, created a forensic copy of it, and then returned the device to him the same day, according to the lawsuit.
The agents were executing a search warrant approved by a federal judge in Mr. Perry’s home state of Pennsylvania.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Rich Americans are hiding ‘vast amounts of income’ from the Internal Revenue Service by exploiting a ‘deeply troubling’ loophole in a 12-year-old US law designed to crack down on offshore tax evasion, according to a Senate Finance Committee report.
The IRS announced Wednesday that it will wipe out late fees for taxpayers who struggled to file their tax returns on time during the pandemic.” Read more at Bloomberg
Internal Revenue Service forms. Photographer: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg
Starbucks illegally withheld raises from union workers, labor board says
The coffee chain has been trying to tamp down a national organizing campaign
Ian Miller, 24, works at Starbucks in Olney, Md., on May 20. Miller has been a leader in the effort to unionize the location, following a national trend. (Amanda Voisard for The Washington Post)
“Starbucks illegally withheld wages and benefits from thousands of unionized baristas, the National Labor Relations Board alleged in a complaint Wednesday.
The complaint arrives during a campaign by the coffee chain and its interim CEO, Howard Schultz, to tamp down unionization efforts at its stores around the United States. More than 230 locations have voted to join the Starbucks Workers United union since late 2021, driving a surge in unionization nationwide.
The NLRB seeks back payments and benefits for unionized workers since May and to require Schultz to read a statement to workers about their union rights. The board, which is tasked with enforcing labor laws that protect union rights, said Starbucks’s denial of benefits and raises to union workers was intended to discourage union organizing.” Read more at Washington Post
“Stock traders remained hesitant to make any huge bets ahead of Jerome Powell’s speech on Friday, which may provide clues on how hawkish the Federal Reserve will be in the face of mounting economic challenges. After wandering aimlessly earlier Wednesday, the S&P 500 posted a small gain. For a second day in a row, the benchmark’s swing was capped within 1%. Such a stretch of intraday calm occurred only three other times in 2022. Here’s your markets wrap.” Read more at Bloomberg
Lawyers for Twitter and Elon Musk battled in court over the Tesla CEO’s requests for user data.
“An attorney for Musk argued that the social-media platform cherry-picked documents and misled the public about the data it presented investors on spam and fake accounts. Twitter’s lawyer told the court that such requests wouldn’t be material to Musk’s $44 billion takeover, and said the company had already handed over enough information. The legal fight got more complicated earlier this week when a whistleblower complaint was made public. Twitter’s former head of security accused the company of making misleading regulatory disclosures about the accounts. A Twitter spokeswoman disputed the complaint.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Whistleblower Has Warned of Cyber Disasters for Decades.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Meta and Twitter Remove Network of Accounts That Pushed Pro-Western Narratives.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
First Lady Jill Biden tested positive for a rebound case of COVID but is experiencing ‘no reemergence of symptoms.’ Go deeper at Axios
Ex-interior secretary Zinke lied to investigators in casino case, watchdog finds
The Interior Department’s inspector general detailed Zinke’s and his chief of staff’s attempts to mislead federal officials
President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for interior secretary, Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.), appears before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee on Jan. 17, 2017. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post)
“Former interior secretary Ryan Zinke, who’s favored to win a new House seat representing Montana this fall, lied to investigators several times about conversations he had with federal officials, lawmakers and lobbyists about two Indian tribes’ petition to operate a New England casino, the department’s watchdog said in a report released Wednesday.” Read more at Washington Post
“Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene's home in Georgia was involved in a ‘swatting’ incident early this morning, local police said. Greene and her family weren't harmed. ‘Swatting’ is placing fake emergency calls to get SWAT teams dispatched to private locations. Go deeper at Axios
“A new House investigative report says the Trump White House coordinated a pressure campaign for the FDA to authorize hydroxychloroquine to fight COVID-19 after it was shown to be ineffective and potentially dangerous.” Go deeper at Axios
“Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is heavily favored to cruise to a second term in the November general election, but anything less than a convincing win over Democrat Charlie Crist could spell doom for any 2024 presidential aspirations.” Read more at Bloomberg
Ron DeSantis. Photographer: Eva Marie Uzcategui/Bloomberg
The US launches retaliatory air strikes in Syria
“On Tuesday, the US launched airstrikes against Iran-backed militants in eastern Syria.” [Vox] Read more at NBC News / Courtney Kube
“President Biden ordered the strikes in retaliation for an August 15 drone strike on a US base. The small number of US forces fighting the Islamic State in Syria have increasingly been under attack.” [Vox] Read more at Washington Post / Sarah Dadouch
“The US initially said there were no casualties in the strikes, which targeted infrastructure; however, Syrian human rights groups said 10 people were killed.” [Vox] Read more at ABC News / Matt Seyler and Morgan Winsor
“The strikes come as the US tries to renegotiate a deal to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Iran denied any connection to the groups targeted.” [Vox] Read more at CNN
“Fighting broke out between Ethiopia and Tigrayan rebels on Wednesday, ending a months-long cease fire.” Read more at NYT / Declan Walsh
“Japan will scrap a requirement to show a negative Covid-19 result to enter the country for travelers who have gotten booster shots, as it faces pressure from the tourism industry and businesses to roll back some of the most stringent pandemic border restrictions left globally.” Read more at Bloomberg
Thailand’s Prime Minister Suspended While Court Decides on Term Limit
Prayuth Chan-ocha has come under increasing pressure for his government’s handling of the pandemic and the economy
Protesters gathered next to a picture of Thailand’s prime minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha, in Bangkok.PHOTO: ATHIT PERAWONGMETHA/REUTERS
“Thailand’s prime minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha, has been suspended from duty by the country’s constitutional court as it rules on whether he has exceeded his term limit, the latest test of the former army chief’s increasingly strained grip on power.
The past two years have heaped pressure on Mr. Prayuth, who became prime minister after leading a military coup in 2014. His government faced criticism for its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic and ensuing economic malaise, while a pro-democracy protest movement calling for his ouster gathered momentum.
The dispute over Mr. Prayuth’s term limit revolves around whether he reached the end of his constitutionally allowed term on Wednesday—eight years after he became prime minister in 2014. His supporters say his term started later, with some saying it should be counted from 2017 when a new military-drafted constitution limiting the term to eight years took effect and others saying it should be 2019 after he won elections and was sworn in under the new rules.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
The Numbers
“$1.2 billion
The value of late-filing penalties and interest the IRS is waiving and refunding. The relief will go to 1.6 million individual and business taxpayers who missed extended deadlines on their 2019 and 2020 federal tax returns. That works out to an average refund of about $750. The agency said taxpayers’ and its own Covid-19 pandemic struggles motivated the rare move.
175,000+
The number of Cuban migrants apprehended in the U.S. between last October and July. According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, that’s six times as many as in the previous 12-month period. Economic hardship and political repression are fueling the biggest exodus since Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
Suburban Rents Are Soaring in the US
“For renters encountering soaring housing costs in US city centers, decamping to the suburbs no longer offers much of a reprieve. The price advantage of renting in the suburbs versus downtowns has shrunk by 53% from three years ago, according to a report Wednesday from Realtor.com. While suburban renters used to save 12% compared with city dwellers in July 2019, they now pay 5.8% less. The shift is a blow for apartment hunters already squeezed by escalating costs and few options for relief. The median US rent rose 12% in July from a year earlier to $1,879, Realtor.com data show, a 17th straight monthly record.” Read more at Bloomberg
Houses in Westchester County, New York. Photographer: Stephanie Keith/Bloomberg
“The PGA Tour unveiled some of the most drastic changes in its history, overhauling its tournament structure, increasing prize money and ensuring the regular participation of its top players in a bid to rebut the threat it faces from the new Saudi-backed LIV Golf circuit.
The changes represent a fundamental shift in how the Tour operates. The moves pump more money into players’ pockets and essentially create an elite collection of events built around and for the most recognizable players.
Beginning next year, there will be 12 elevated events with average purses of $20 million—and top players will play in all of them. Those players also committed a new 20-event minimum, putting the game’s stars together on the course more often. A relatively new fund that rewards the game’s most popular players will also double in value to $100 million annually.
PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan outlined the sweeping changes Wednesday ahead of the Tour Championship, the prestigious finale to the tour’s season and playoffs, and after top players led by Tiger Woods held a rare players-only meeting last week.” Read more at Wall Street Journal