The United States on Wednesday indicted Roman Semenov and Roman Storm, two co-founders of the cryptocurrency platform Tornado Cash, for their involvement with the banned outfit and its work for a North Korean government-linked hacking group.  

The criminal charges against Semenov and Storm, which include conspiracy to commit money laundering and sanctions violations, come one year after the U.S. Treasury banned Tornado Cash on allegations that it supports North Korea.

Waymaker Law, the firm representing Semenov, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Neither did the FBI.  

Storm, a naturalized U.S. citizen and resident of Washington state, was arrested on Wednesday in conjunction with the charges.  

A lawyer for Storm, Brian Klein, said in a statement: “We are incredibly disappointed that the prosecutors chose to charge Mr. Storm because he helped developed software, and they did so based on a novel legal theory with dangerous implications for all software developers. Mr. Storm has been cooperating with the prosecutors’ investigation since last year and disputes that he engaged in any criminal conduct.”  

Semenov, a Russian citizen, was sanctioned on Wednesday by the Treasury Department. He is not in U.S. law enforcement custody, according to a statement by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.
…

While the Islamic State terror group continues to lose influence in Iraq, U.S. Major General Matthew W. McFarlane recently warned that IS remnants still pose a threat to areas not under the protection of the U.S.-led coalition, including parts of Syria. Analysts see Islamic State expanding into Africa and Asia.

McFarlane commands the Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve based in Iraq, working to defeat Islamic State militants and prevent their resurgence.

In an online briefing to journalists this month, McFarlane, calling the group ISIS as well as the Arab acronym Daesh, said Islamic State no longer controls any territory, has lost leaders and fighters, and carries out fewer attacks than in the past.

He said there was a 65% reduction in Islamic State activity this year compared to last year.

“They continue to degrade. Having said that, there are still radical fighters out there that aspire to re-emerge or rebuild the caliphate,” McFarlane said. “We work very closely with our Iraqi counterparts.”

McFarlane said the U.S. and Iraq share intelligence to ensure they can address any possible re-emergence or possible threats that emerge from ISIS fighters that are still at large. He also said they work to address the long-term efforts like repatriation of internally displaced people and Daesh detainees that are in Syrian detention facilities.

Steven Heydemann, a nonresident senior fellow at Washington’s Brookings Institution, told VOA that McFarlane gave a “fairly balanced assessment” of Islamic State at this time.

However, Heydemann points to a recent United Nations report that says the Islamic State group still commands between 5,000 and 7,000 fighters in Syria and Iraq.

“There’s certainly no sense in which we can declare mission accomplished in terms of Operation Inherent Resolve,” Heydemann said. “It continues to play an important role in degrading ISIS. And yet ISIS retains the ability to sustain pretty high levels of insecurity in eastern Syria and northwestern Iraq.”

Heydemann added that the U.S. and others can’t underestimate the extent to which local groups that publicly affiliate with ISIS have in some ways overtaken the core group as a source of threat.

“Africa is clearly one arena in which we’re seeing that happen,” he said.

South Africa-based analyst Martin Ewi has also warned of the growing threat in Africa, where Islamic State is active in more than 20 countries already. He cautioned that the continent may represent “the future of the caliphate.”

Analyst Nicolas Heras at Washington’s New Lines Institute told VOA that Islamic State is like a “perennial” dormant in the Middle East heartland but regenerating and springing to life in central Asia and Africa.

“ISIS has numerous cells in Syria and has also established, in that sort of western badlands of Iraq, a support network,” Heras said. “ISIS has tried to manage the reality that it is an organization looking for this opportunity to spring back. The ISIS brand globally has found opportunity to grow in central Asia, particularly Afghanistan but also, it’s looking to spread into Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and is looking to take advantage of rising communal religious tensions in India.”

Heras said that in Africa, Islamic State is trying to take advantage of the war in Sudan and the destabilization of Ethiopia.
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Public opinion polling by the Pew Research Center says nearly two-thirds of Americans expect gun violence to increase over the next five years. The politics of enacting more restrictive gun laws has long divided most Republicans and Democrats, and now the issue appears to be creating a divide between generations of Republicans as well.

Several polls released this year show young Republicans are likelier to support more restrictive gun laws than older voters in their party.

“Older Republicans didn’t grow up in a mental health crisis like we have,” said Nicholas Stilianessis, a 14-year-old from Passaic County, New Jersey, and a member of the High School Republican National Federation.

“Suicides and suicide attempts are higher for us than any generation before, and, of course, so are school shootings,” he told VOA. “I’m sad for the loss of life, but I’m also angry because politicians in both parties aren’t doing anything about it except using it as a tool to campaign.”

A YouGov survey in February 2023 reported that 47% of young Republicans support more restrictive gun laws, compared with just 23% of older Republicans. And the figure for young Republicans is growing, up from 41% in August 2022. 

“It makes sense,” said Ryan Barto, communications manager with March For Our Lives, a student-led organization that demonstrates in support of gun control legislation. “Young people bear the brunt of the gun violence epidemic. We’ve lived with active shooter drills, constant news coverage of mass shootings, and have lost friends to firearms. There isn’t room for partisan politics when lives are on the line.”

Measured restrictions

Stilianessis was quick to point out, however, that he doesn’t support all — or even most — gun control measures.

“Gun control is broad,” he said, maintaining that people should be able to own guns for self-protection. “For me, I’m in favor of stronger background checks, I don’t think anyone should have automatic weapons, and because mental illness is such a big part of these shootings, I think we need to screen better for mental health before we give someone a gun.”

Eugene Johnson is a professor at Dillard University in New Orleans. He says younger Republicans tend to support laws restricting gun ownership based on a gun-seeker’s age, mental health and history of violence.

“I think Republicans, and possibly most Americans, will want to arm themselves because they care about safety and it’s easier to arm themselves than it is to pass public policy,” Johnson told VOA.

The Gallup polling organization reported in 2020 that 32% of U.S. adults say they personally own a gun, while 44% reported living in a gun household.  

“Young Republicans seem in agreement that the problem isn’t guns, but that the wrong people have access to them,” Johnson said. “The kinds of laws they’re supporting are popular because they don’t fully remove guns. They look at limiting who should have them.”

But for some older Republicans, even that is too restrictive. Alberto Perez, a 44-year-old development officer from Blairsville, Georgia, believes the younger members of his party will change their minds as they get older and take on more responsibility.

“They don’t bear the weight of raising a family and having to keep them safe,” Perez told VOA. “I may agree in theory with some sensible gun laws that make it more difficult to purchase and keep a gun, but the reality is that criminals and psychopaths will find a way around it and that puts the rest of us in danger.”

Varied viewpoints

Willow Hannington, 20, said she is open to increased regulations.

“I’m willing to consider things like universal background checks and mental health evaluations,” she told VOA. “I think implementing mandatory gun safety courses is a good idea, as is hosting community events to destigmatize gun use and promote safe handling and procedures.

“Mostly, though,” she added, “I want to see legislators address gun violence through mental health reform. That’s where the crisis is.”

While support for gun control among young Republicans is growing, a majority of young party members still oppose restrictions.

“Not only do we not believe there should be any further gun restrictions put in place,” said Mark Basta, 19-year-old vice chairman of the California College Republicans, “but we believe all current restrictions should be repealed because they are unconstitutional, and they punish law-abiding citizens rather than actually affect criminals.”

“Any young Republicans who support gun control,” he continued, “are most likely doing so because of a lack of knowledge and brainwashing by their schools and peers.”

Hannington said opinions like Basta’s make her feel stuck.

“I think many of us in Gen-Z are passionate about improving our society and open to compromise in areas like gun control,” she explained. “But Democrats take advantage of our compassion … and Republicans tell us we don’t have the knowledge or maturity to understand the issues.”

“Honestly, I’d like to see more people from my generation run for office,” she added. “I think we’re wiser than most people think, and we’d be able to diminish the political divide we’re seeing today.”

“One big question is whether support for gun restrictions among younger-generation Republicans is due only to the effects of mass shootings, or if their opinion is stable and will continue into the future,” said James Garand, a professor of political science at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.

“I don’t think it will impact this election, but if it persists, and they make up a higher share of the Republican coalition, I think it could affect some low-intensity gun restrictions in the future.”

If he were old enough to vote in 2024, Stilianessis said, he would “absolutely support” a Republican who considers some gun control measures.

“Current legislators don’t focus on what the youth need and want,” he said. “They’re not listening to us. But we’re the future of the Republican Party, and one day they’ll have to pay attention to what we say. Because this is an issue that concerns us, and when they’re long gone, we’ll still be here dealing with it.”
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The daughter of a German citizen of Iranian descent who was sentenced to death by Tehran pleaded Tuesday for the United States and Germany to act urgently to save him. 

The daughter of Jamshid Sharmahd was making her case in Washington, including holding a sit-in outside the State Department, on the heels of a deal by President Joe Biden’s administration to free five U.S. citizens who were imprisoned in Iran. 

According to his family, Sharmahd, a software developer who had been living in California, was kidnapped in 2020 on a visit to the United Arab Emirates and taken to Iran. 

He was sentenced to death over a deadly blast at a mosque in 2008 in the southern city of Shiraz, charges the family describes as ridiculous. Iran’s Supreme Court confirmed the death penalty in April. 

“What I’m asking the U.S. and Germany is to free my father, to bring my father back, to save (his) life,” said his daughter Gazelle Sharmahd, who lives in California. 

“This is a life-and-death situation,” she told a roundtable. 

She voiced frustration that Germany and the United States are playing “some form of responsibility ping-pong.”  

“It goes back and forth. Not my citizen. He doesn’t live here. Not my problem, not my problem. And we’re not getting through to them,” she said. 

Germany has said it is engaging at the highest levels and through all channels on the case, with a foreign ministry spokesman acknowledging that the family is “going through something unimaginable and unbearable.” 

But Gazelle Sharmahd insisted that German efforts were focused only on improving his conditions in prison. 

“What, does he need better toothpaste before they murder him right now?” she said. 

The U.S. State Department has called Iran’s treatment of Sharmahd reprehensible but said it was for Germany to discuss the case of its own citizen. 

Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that all U.S. citizens have been released from prison under the deal, which drew fire from the Republican Party. 

Under the arrangement, the five U.S. citizens, all of Iranian origin, were freed to house arrest and are expected to be allowed to leave after the unfreezing of $6 billion in Iranian oil revenue that had been held in South Korea to comply with U.S. sanctions. 
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Child gun deaths in the United States have hit a record high, according to a new study published by the American Academy of Pediatrics. 

Using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s mortality database, the study published on Monday in the AAP’s journal Pediatrics found that 4,752 children died from gun-related injuries in 2021, the latest year for which data was available, up from 4,368 in 2020 and 3,390 in 2019.  

Gun violence has been the No. 1 cause of death for children in the United States since 2020.  

The study was published as Tennessee lawmakers opened a special session on public safety after a Nashville school shooting earlier this year that killed three children and three teachers.  

Annie Andrews, a South Carolina pediatrician and gun violence prevention researcher who was not involved in the study, said that when she became a doctor, “I never imagined I would take care of so many children with bullet holes in them. 

“But the fact of the matter is, in every children’s hospital across this country, there are children in the pediatric intensive care units suffering from firearm injuries.” 

The study further showed that Black children accounted for around 67% of firearm homicides, while white children made up about 78% of gun-assisted suicides.  

Iman Omer, a junior at Vanderbilt University in Nashville and an anti-gun violence advocate with Students Demand Action, said the study’s findings were devastating but unsurprising. 

“Every year, I know that 128 children and teens in Tennessee die by guns,” Omer said as she headed to the state’s capitol Tuesday to join protesters who have been demanding tougher gun laws.  

Tennessee Governor Bill Lee, who knew two of the teachers killed in the Nashville shooting, had asked lawmakers in the special session to bolster so-called red flag laws aimed at keeping firearms out of the hands of people deemed to be a threat. He has faced resistance from his fellow Republicans who control the statehouse. 

In a statement Tuesday, the Tennessee Firearms Association expressed concern that “while some Republican legislators have said that no red flag laws will pass, far fewer have stated that no laws that would have any negative impact on Second Amendment protected rights would pass.” 
…

Two weeks after the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century swept through the Maui community of Lahaina, authorities say anywhere between 500 and 1,000 people remain unaccounted for — a staggering number for officials facing huge challenges to determine how many of those perished and how many may have made it to safety but haven’t checked in.

Something similar happened after a wildfire in 2018 that killed 85 people and destroyed the town of Paradise, California. Authorities in Butte County, home to Paradise, ultimately published a list of the missing in the local newspaper, a decision that helped identify scores of people who had made it out alive but were listed as missing. Within a month, the list dropped from 1,300 names to only a dozen.

Hawaii officials have expressed concern that by releasing a list of the missing, they would also be identifying some people who have died. In an email Tuesday, the State Joint Information Center called it “a standard held by all law enforcement and first responders here in Hawaii, out of compassion and courtesy for the families, to withhold the names until the families can be contacted.”

As of Monday, there were 115 people confirmed dead, according to Maui police. All single-story, residential properties in the disaster area had been searched, and teams were beginning to search multistory residential and commercial properties, Maui County officials said in an update late Monday.

There are widely varying accounts of the tally of the missing. Hawaii Governor Josh Green said Sunday that more than 1,000 remained unaccounted for. Maui Mayor Richard Bissen said in a recorded video on Instagram that the number was 850. And during President Joe Biden’s tour of the devastation on Monday, White House homeland security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall put it between 500 and 800.

An unofficial, crowd-sourced spreadsheet of missing people posted online listed nearly 700 names as of Tuesday.

State Senator Gilbert Keith-Agaran, representing central Maui, said he’s not aware of any rules that prevent officials from making the list public. But as someone with several members of his extended family still unaccounted for, he understands why some may not want the list released.

“I’m not going to second-guess the approach by the mayor and his people right now,” he said.

Questions are also emerging about how quickly the names of the dead are being publicly released, even after family members have been notified. Maui residents are growing increasingly frustrated as the search for their loved ones drags on.

The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported Tuesday that the Maui Police Department has instructed the medical examiner in Honolulu — where some burn patients were taken for treatment — not to release the names of anyone who dies from injuries sustained in Lahaina fire. The request came after one severely burned patient died and the man’s name appeared in media reports after notification of his next of kin.

“I don’t know why they aren’t releasing the names,” Honolulu Department of the Medical Examiner Supervising Investigator Theresa Reynolds told the newspaper.

Clifford Abihai said he feels like he’s getting the run-around from authorities. He came to Maui from California to try to find answers about his grandmother, Louise Abihai, 98. He has been just as frustrated on the ground in Maui.

“I just want confirmation,” he said last week. “Not knowing what happened, not knowing if she escaped, not knowing if she’s not there. That’s the hard thing.”

As of Tuesday, he said he had learned nothing further.

His grandmother lived at Hale Mahaolu Eono, a senior living facility where another member of his extended family, Virginia Dofa, lived. Authorities have identified Dofa as among the dead. Abihai described Dofa and Louise Abihai as best friends.

He said his grandmother was mobile and could walk a mile a day, but it was often hard to reach her because she’d frequently turn off her cellphone to save battery power.

Confirming whether those who are unaccounted for are deceased can be difficult. Fire experts say it’s possible some bodies were cremated in the Lahaina fire, potentially leaving no bones to identify through DNA tests.

The situation on Maui is evolving, but those who lived through similar tragedies and never learned of their loved ones’ fate are also following the news and hurt for the victims and their families.

Nearly 22 years later, almost 1,100 victims of the 9/11 terror attacks, which killed nearly 3,000, have no identified remains.

Joseph Giaccone’s family initially was desperate for any physical trace of the 43-year-old finance executive, who worked in the World Trade Center’s North Tower, brother James Giaccone recalled. But over time, he started focusing instead on memories of the flourishing man his brother was.

“So I am OK with the way it is right now,” he said.
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The United States is announcing new visa restrictions on current and former Chinese officials for their involvement in what U.S. and U.N. officials say is the forcible assimilation of more than one million Tibetan children in government-run boarding schools.

In a statement on Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said these “coercive policies” seek to “eliminate Tibet’s distinct linguistic, cultural, and religious traditions among younger generations of Tibetans.”

“We urge PRC (People’s Republic of China) authorities to end the coercion of Tibetan children into government-run boarding schools and to cease repressive assimilation policies, both in Tibet and throughout other parts of the PRC,” said Blinken.

Visa restrictions under the authority of Section 212(a)(3)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act means foreign nationals may not be granted a visa to enter the U.S. due to potentially significant adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.

A State Department spokesperson declined to provide names of officials from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) who are subject to the visa ban, citing “individual visa records are confidential.”

The spokesperson told VOA today’s announcement on visa restrictions covers current or former PRC and CCP officials believed to be responsible for, or complicit in, policies or actions aimed at repressing religious and spiritual practitioners, members of ethnic groups, dissidents, human rights defenders, journalists, labor organizers, civil society organizers, and peaceful protestors in the PRC.

China has maintained control over Tibet since 1951, following the takeover through troop deployment in what it said a “peaceful liberation.”

Chinese officials have said their policies in Tibet reflect their desire to create “religious harmony, social harmony, and ethnic harmony.”

Tibetans who live outside of China say the government has been systematically persecuting, imprisoning and killing Tibetans for decades.

“China’s unconscionable separation of Tibetan children from their families cannot be left unchecked. It shows the depths of Beijing’s plan to eliminate the Tibetan way of life and turn Tibetans into loyal followers of the CCP,” said Tencho Gyatso who is President of International Campaign for Tibet.

VOA has requested the Chinese Embassy in Washington for comment but has not received a response.

In February, United Nations human rights experts said they were “very disturbed” that in recent years the residential school system for Tibetan children appears to act as “a mandatory large-scale program intended to assimilate Tibetans into majority Han culture,” contrary to international human rights standards.
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The first of the 18 co-defendants of former U.S. President Donald Trump facing 2020 election interference and racketeering charges in the southern state of Georgia are starting to turn themselves in to be arrested and booked.

John Eastman, a former Trump lawyer who pushed a plan to have then-Vice President Mike Pence attempt to block congressional certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory over Trump, surrendered Tuesday to Fulton County authorities in the Georgia state capital city, Atlanta. Another defendant, Scott Hall, a bail bondsman who was a Republican poll watcher in Georgia, also turned himself in.

Eastman faces nine charges that could, if he is convicted, land him in prison for years. On Monday, he reached a $100,000 bond agreement to be released pending trial.

Eastman was adamant in his intention to fight the allegations brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.

“I am here today to surrender to an indictment that should never have been brought,” Eastman said in a statement. “It represents a crossing of the Rubicon for our country, implicating the fundamental First Amendment right to petition the government for redress of grievances.”

In a separate election interference case filed against Trump alone in Washington by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, Eastman has been identified as one of Trump’s six unnamed co-conspirators in trying to upend the 2020 election outcome so Trump could stay in power.

But Eastman lawyer Harvey Silverglate has said his client has no intention of plea bargaining with either federal or state prosecutors to lessen the threat to his freedom.

“With respect to questions as to whether Dr. Eastman is involved in plea bargaining, the answer is no,” Silverglate said in a statement earlier this month. “But if he were invited to plea bargain with either state or federal prosecutors, he would decline. The fact is, if Dr. Eastman is indicted, he will go to trial. If convicted, he will appeal. The Eastman legal team is confident of its legal position in this matter.”

Trump, facing 13 charges in the Georgia case, says he is set to fly from his golf resort in New Jersey to Atlanta on Thursday to be arrested and booked, the fourth criminal indictment filed against him in the last five months. In all, he is accused of committing 91 offenses before, during and after his single-term presidency.

“Can you believe it? I’ll be going to Atlanta, Georgia on Thursday to be ARRESTED,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social account.

The former president’s lawyers reached an agreement on Monday with Georgia authorities on a $200,000 bond so he could be released pending trial, with Trump also agreeing to not threaten or intimidate witnesses, including on social media platforms.

Even as he faces weeks-long trials in the first half of 2024, Trump holds a commanding lead among Republican voters for the party’s presidential nomination in next year’s national election. To this day, he contends that vote-counting fraud in the 2020 election cheated him out of another term in the White House. Trump has denied all wrongdoing in the four indictments against him.

In last week’s 41-count indictment encompassing 19 defendants, Willis, the Fulton County prosecutor, filed seven charges against Hall.

He is alleged to be involved in an effort to illegally breach election equipment in Coffee County, Georgia, more than 300 kilometers from Atlanta, to try to prove a conspiracy theory that the voting machines had been rigged in Biden’s favor.

At the heart of the case against Trump in Georgia is his taped phone call in early 2021 to state election officials asking them to “find” him 11,780 votes, one more than Biden’s margin of victory.

Willis has asked that the sprawling Georgia racketeering and conspiracy case be started March 4, but Trump’s lawyers have yet to propose a trial date. Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee will eventually set the date.
…

The first big event of the 2024 U.S. presidential election campaign will be held Wednesday when candidates of the Republican Party meet on a debate stage in the Midwestern city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

Nine candidates have qualified under the Republican Party’s rules to be on the stage inside the Fiserv Forum, the overwhelming front-runner — former President Donald Trump — says he will be skipping the event.

Few of the participants have been outspoken in criticizing Trump. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is an exception. Others, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is running a distant second to Trump, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, have taken a more measured approach, hoping to convince a party base that remains loyal to Trump that they can implement the former president’s right-wing “Make America Great Again” agenda without the legal encumbrances and other controversies.

Then there is Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, who defends his ceremonial certification of the 2020 election results against Trump’s wishes. He is still in the low single digits in most polls of potential 2024 Republican voters.

In addition to Pence, Christie, DeSantis and Haley, others who have qualified for the event hosted by Fox News are Ohio businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson.

Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social on Sunday that due to his vast lead in the polls and his known accomplishments during his one term as president, “I WILL THEREFORE NOT BE DOING THE DEBATES.”

Trump reportedly was referring to the first two debates of the primary airing on Fox News, including next month’s face-off in California, leaving open the possibility he is willing to face Republican rivals on stage later in the campaign season.

The former president has recently turned critical of Fox News, which championed his candidacy in the last two presidential elections. But the media empire of magnate Rupert Murdoch, which owns Fox News, has taken a more measured approach to Trump amid the current crowded field of Republican contenders.

Trump has also stated he will not sign the RNC’s “loyalty pledge,” which asks all the primary losers to eventually support the nominee, one of the requirements for participating in the Milwaukee debate.

“Surprise, surprise… the guy who is out on bail from four jurisdictions and can’t defend his reprehensible conduct, is running scared and hiding from the debate stage,” Christie posted Friday on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, foreshadowing the rhetoric he is expected to unleash against the absent front-runner on Wednesday. Christie added that Trump is a “certified loser, verified coward.”

Even without Trump exchanging insults with Christie and others, the conversation at the event is anticipated to be largely about him, including the more than 90 felony charges the former president faces for alleged crimes committed before, during and after his presidency

“It creates a very, very difficult environment for the other Republicans, because they have their own ideas for what they want to do with respect to key issues like the economy or Ukraine or immigration. But that doesn’t mean they’ll have much of a chance to talk about it. They’ll be asked about Donald Trump,” predicts Stephen Farnsworth, a political science professor at the University of Mary Washington.

The debate will not be very consequential for Trump — he will still be the front-runner regardless of what happens. But for the others, there could be a viral moment, good or bad, that significantly changes their polling numbers.

“We’ve seen from debates in past election seasons that candidates sometimes have a moment in a debate that ends up disqualifying them because they look bad. We’ve also seen moments in past debates where candidates have said something that got a lot of attention for them in a positive way and gave them a huge boost,” notes Provost Associate Professor Jordan Tama of American University’s School of International Service.

DeSantis is the candidate who perhaps has the most at stake. Once touted as the party’s Trump slayer, the second-term governor has dropped in the polls. In a few surveys, the relatively unknown Ramaswamy has pulled even with or surpassed DeSantis for distant second place.

“This is his moment,” says Farnsworth of DeSantis. “Remember, in 49 other states, these people do not know the governor of Florida. They maybe have seen a little bit on the news here and there. But most of the coverage is focused on the former president. As a result, Ron DeSantis will be introducing himself to the country. And one of the things he needs to do is make a good first impression. If he doesn’t, he won’t be able to really change the dynamics of the race in a significant way.”

The Fox News moderators are also certain to attempt to draw the candidates out on why they would be a better leader than President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic Party nominee, who would be 82 if he is inaugurated in January 2025.

The first Republican Party debate also puts the spotlight on Wisconsin, one of the few states expected to provide a true contest between the two major parties in next year’s presidential election. Milwaukee will host the Republican Party’s nominating convention next July.

Four of the last six presidential elections have been decided by less than a percentage point in Wisconsin. Trump won narrowly in the state in 2016 before losing by a similar margin to Biden four years later.
…

Meta Platforms on Tuesday launched the web version of its new text-first social media platform Threads, in a bid to retain professional users and gain an edge over rival X, formerly Twitter.

Threads’ users will now be able to access the microblogging platform by logging-in to its website from their computers, the Facebook and Instagram owner said.

The widely anticipated roll out could help Threads gain broader acceptance among power users like brands, company accounts, advertisers and journalists, who can now take advantage of the platform by using it on a bigger screen.

Threads, which crossed 100 million sign-ups for the app within five days of its launch on July 5, saw a decline in its popularity as users returned to the more familiar platform X after the initial rush.

In just over a month, daily active users on Android version of Threads app dropped to 10.3 million from the peak of 49.3 million, according to a report, dated August 10, by analytics platform Similarweb.

The company will be adding more functionality to the web experience in the coming weeks, Meta said.
…

Hours before doors would open, thousands of K-pop fans lined up in downtown Los Angeles, stretching long city blocks in the warm August sun. In pleated skirts and platform shoes, toting the clear bags that have become arena staples, they danced and traded homemade stickers, banners, bracelets and photocards. Inside was their paradise: an IRL (in-real-life) space to commune over their URL passions.

If anything, the 2023 LA KCON was a microcosm of K-pop’s macro influence on the music industry as a whole.

Held from Friday to Sunday at the Los Angeles Convention Center and adjacent Crypto.com Arena, an estimated 140,000 fans from all over the world celebrated their favorite K-pop idols across three days of panels, premium meet-and-greets, interviews, dance breaks, concerts, and more.

Inside the convention center, fans carried light sticks of their favorite groups, showed off DIY shirts with simple, direct slogans like “I HEART MINGI,” collected sticker books and K-beauty products, and lined up for tteokbokki.

KCON started 11 years ago in Irvine, California, drawing 10,000 people to its inaugural celebration of Korean culture, says Steve Chung, chief global officer of organizers CJ ENM. Now it’s a global event, taking place in multiple countries: So far in 2023, KCON has hit Thailand, Japan and the U.S.

“We’ve welcomed something like half a million people in those (11) years all throughout the world,” he says.

In Los Angeles, panels were held on K-pop songwriting and cup sleeve creations (K-pop fan events are held at cafes on an idol’s birthday, anniversary, or some other special date). Up-and-coming groups like NMIXX led dance classes on one stage, while another stage allowed rookie groups to introduce themselves to a wider audience.

Over the course of the weekend, The Associated Press spoke to an incredible diversity of fans who, among them, drove 12 hours straight from Utah, flew in from the U.K. and South America and represented a range of ages, genders, races, and socioeconomic backgrounds.

“The culture of inclusiveness is huge,” said 40-year-old Annya Holston from Florida who got into K-pop through her daughter. “We’ve made so many friends, being here.”

At $500 a day, premium tickets allowed attendees to access a “Red Carpet” area, where acts posed for portraits and answered two or three questions in a 30-minute window — along with entry to the convention and concert. For an additional $100, fans could pay for “Hi-Touch” — a quick meet-and-greet where fans and performers high-five — with one group of their choice. With renewed concerns about the spread of COVID-19, “Hi-Touch” became “Hi-Wave” (exactly what it sounds like, to the chagrin of a few fans hoping for that physical connection; others were happy with the sheer proximity).

Those experiences served as a welcome reminder of a facet of the music industry that K-pop knows remarkably well, and far better than most: fandom is this business’ most lucrative and enduring resource.

As Peyton Tran, a 17-year-old L.A. native and dancer told AP at KCON, “It’s just cool to see how much people can support these businesses out here.”

In 2023, the music industry faces unique challenges, including what Mark Mulligan, a MIDiA Research music industry analyst, has referred to as the “fragmentation of fandom.” New artists suffer a kind of competition unheard of before the streaming age, a direct effect of algorithmic listening. Think of it this way: It is rare for a new act to reach the level of monolithic pop star — the ranks of Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Harry Styles, all who started performing pre-streaming — because listenership is hyper-specific.

In K-pop, where companies are typically fully integrated institutions — a record label and a talent agency all in one — and hyper-consumerism is welcomed, business focuses on building a community of superfans and inspiring those loyal listeners to advocate for their group, fueling a sense of participation beyond their purchasing power. It doesn’t hurt that K-pop audiences have a tendency to coordinate global fan actions on their own and create rituals and events, communicating on bespoke fandom platforms like WeVerse and Vlive.

Niche doesn’t mean small; it means specialized. KCON is proof.

At the concerts, held all three nights for the first time, fans witnessed K-pop groups and soloists from across “generations”: Taemin from the second-generation boy band SHINee,Rain — the first K-pop idol to take off internationally, and now a manager himself — fourth-generation boy bands ATEEZ and Stray Kids, and rookie groups like XG and ZEROBASEONE.

XG performed songs like the Kesha -channeling “TGIF,” with production pulling heavily from the current liquid drum-and-bass/U.K. garage trend in global pop music, a welcomed retro-futuristic sound from a group and convention with eyes set on the future.

Notably, these concerts placed a lot of emphasis on K-pop girl groups, reflecting a recent trend in listenership. Historically, boy bands were thought to be more lucrative — but girl groups like IVE, ITZY, NMIXX, Kep1er, (G)I-DLE, and EVERGLOW proved that’s vintage thinking in their explosive KCON sets.

A particularly unique and effective moment during the concert was called the “Dream Stage,” where a few dozen fans who auditioned to perform a dance with a K-pop group earlier in the day were brought out to do exactly that.

On the second day of the convention, iHeartRadio’s KIIS-FM set up a new, open-to-the-public “K-pop Village,” where the K-pop-curious could experience free performances from newer acts — like LEO, who made his U.S. debut on the outdoor stage.

“2023 is like a crossover event. The last 10 years has been about sort of serving the endemic fanbase of people who already know K-pop and who love K-pop,” Chung says. “As evidenced by the iHeartMedia partnership, it’s really like a crossover moment where K-pop goes mainstream.”

On the last day of the convention, not even Tropical Storm Hilary could stop the most devoted fans from lining up in the rain to see their favorite acts. On the train the night before, the AP asked a K-pop fan from Massachusetts, who publishes fan cam videos on YouTube under the name Toadcola, if he was worried about the weather. Not so much.

But, if the weather canceled his flight home, he thought that wouldn’t be so bad: maybe, just maybe, the idols would be stuck at the airport with him.
…

A Maryland man charged in 2019 with planning an Islamic State-inspired attack at a Washington, D.C., area shopping and entertainment complex pleaded guilty on Monday to engaging in a separate plot to drive a stolen van into a crowd of people at a nearby airport.

Rondell Henry’s plea agreement with Justice Department prosecutors could lead to his release from federal custody as soon as October, when a judge is scheduled to sentence him in the airport plot, which Henry abandoned. Henry, who has remained in custody for over four years, didn’t harm anybody before police arrested him.

Henry, 32, of Germantown, Maryland, pleaded guilty to attempting to perform an act of violence at an international airport, court records show.

Henry admits that he stole a U-Haul van from a parking garage in Alexandria, Virginia, drove it to Dulles International Airport in Virginia and entered a terminal building on March 27, 2019.

“Henry unsuccessfully attempted to follow another individual into a restricted area of the airport, but the other individual prevented Henry from entering the restricted area,” according to a court filing accompanying his plea agreement.

Henry later told investigators that he went to the airport because he “was trying to hurt people there” and “was going to try to drive through a crowd of people,” but ultimately left because “there wasn’t a big enough crowd” at the airport, according to the filing.

Henry pleaded guilty to a felony that carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years. But prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed that an appropriate sentence for Henry would be the jail time he already has served and lifetime supervised release with mandatory participation in a mental health treatment program, according to his plea agreement.

U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, who isn’t bound by that recommendation, is scheduled to sentence Henry on Oct. 23. He will remain jailed until his sentencing hearing.

Henry’s attorneys didn’t immediately respond Monday to an email seeking comment on his guilty plea and plea deal.

Henry was charged in 2019 with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, the Islamic State group. But the charge to which he pleaded guilty is unrelated to what authorities had said was a ISIS-inspired plot to carry out an attack at National Harbor, a popular waterfront destination in Maryland just outside the nation’s capital.

Monday’s filing doesn’t mention the Islamic State or specify any ideological motivation for an attack at the airport.

Henry left the airport and drove the stolen U-Haul to National Harbor, where he parked it. Police arrested him the next morning after they found the van and saw Henry jump over a security fence.

Henry told investigators he planned to carry out an attack like one in which a driver ran over and killed dozens of people in Nice, France, in 2016, authorities said. A prosecutor has said Henry intended to kill as many “disbelievers” as possible.

Monday’s court filings don’t explain why Henry didn’t plead guilty to any charges related to the alleged National Harbor plot.

The case against Henry remained on hold for years amid questions about his mental competency. Last year, Rondell Henry’s attorneys notified the court that he intended to pursue an insanity defense.

Xinis had ruled in February 2020 that Henry was not competent to stand trial. She repeatedly extended his court-ordered hospitalization.

But the judge ruled in May 2022 that Henry had become mentally competent to stand trial, could understand the charges against him and was capable of assisting in his defense. Xinis said a March 2022 report on Henry’s medical condition found experts had restored his mental competence.

Prosecutors have said Henry watched Islamic State group propaganda videos of foreign terrorists beheading civilians and fighting overseas. Investigators said they recovered a phone Henry had discarded on a highway in an apparent attempt to conceal evidence, including images of the Islamic State flag, armed Islamic State fighters and the man who carried out the 2016 Pulse nightclub massacre in Orlando, Florida.

Henry is a naturalized U.S. citizen who moved to the country from Trinidad and Tobago more than a decade ago.
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U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday promised survivors of Hawaii’s wildfires to help rebuild, nearly two weeks after the fires killed at least 114 people and destroyed thousands of homes and wiped out much of the historic town of Lahaina.

Biden and first lady Jill Biden visited the Hawaiian island Maui where they met with officials, including Gov. Josh Green, and thanked first responders for their work following the deadly fires.

“From stories of grief, we’ve seen so many stories of hope and heroism, of the aloha spirit. Every emergency responder put their lives on the line to save others,” Biden said. “Everyday heroes, neighbors helping neighbors, Native Hawaiian leaders offering solace and strength.”

Biden said the country grieves with the victims, and that his administration will do everything possible to help recovery efforts and to respect local cultural traditions as rebuilding takes place.

“For as long as it takes, we’re going to be with you,” Biden said, standing near a 150-year-old banyan tree in Lahaina that was burned, but was still standing. He said the “tree survived for a reason.”

“I believe it’s a very powerful symbol of what we can and will do to get through this crisis,” he said.

Biden was accused by some Republicans of not doing enough in the immediate aftermath of the fires.

Former President Donald Trump said it was “disgraceful” Biden did not respond more quickly. White House officials said the visit was delayed to avoid interfering with emergency response efforts, and that the president was in touch with Hawaii officials as the crisis unfolded.

There were signs some Hawaii residents are also unhappy with the president’s response. As Biden’s motorcade drove through an area scorched by the fires, most onlookers cheered, waved, and made a hand gesture for “aloha” – a Hawaii greeting. But news reports also said a few bystanders showed their displeasure with less friendly hand signals.

Bob Fenton, a regional leader at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, was named Monday as the lead coordinator for the federal response to the Maui wildfires, the White House announced.

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
…

As former President Donald Trump braces for two separate trials over his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, his lawyers are scrambling to come up with legal defenses that could test the limits of the law and the Constitution.

They’ve signaled that they will argue that Trump was merely exercising his First Amendment rights when he spread baseless claims that the election had been stolen and then pressed state officials to change the results in his favor.

They will contend that the former president was simply following the counsel of his lawyers who advised him he had the right to “petition” the officials to investigate fraud.

And they may even invoke the idea that as president he should be immune from prosecution, arguing that the actions he took after the election were related to his presidential duties.

But legal experts say when the case goes to trial the key question the jury will have to answer is: Did Trump know he had lost the election?

“A jury is not going to focus on whether he had a First Amendment right to petition for redress of grievances and [is] not going to focus on whether he had any executive privilege to meet with his vice president and urge him to not count the votes from the swing states that were contested,” said John Malcolm, a former federal prosecutor who is a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation. “They’re going to focus on the president and his belief.”

Election indictments

Trump faces two separate indictments in connection with the 2020 election scheme that culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

On Aug. 1, a federal grand jury in Washington issued a four-count indictment, accusing Trump of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy against the rights of citizens, obstructing an official proceeding and conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding.

Then last week, a grand jury in Georgia indicted Trump and 18 others for racketeering and a raft of other crimes in connection with efforts to overturn the election outcome in that state.

While the state and federal cases are different in scope, they both alleged election fraud and require that prosecutors prove “mens rea” or criminal intent on the part of Trump, according to legal experts.

“In both jurisdictions, general principles of criminal law in the U.S. probably are quite relevant,” said Morgan Cloud, a professor of law at Emory University in Atlanta. “Not all, but most crimes, including felonies like the ones charged in these current federal and state indictments… require proof of… mens rea.”

Trump has long claimed that he lost the 2020 election fraudulently, despite no evidence of that assertion, and his lawyers are now challenging prosecutors to disprove his sincerity.

“I would like them to try to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Donald Trump believed that these allegations were false,” John Lauro, who represents Trump in the special counsel case, told Fox News after special counsel Jack Smith announced the federal charges against Trump.

Circumstantial evidence

Proving criminal intent can be challenging but it’s not impossible, according to legal experts.

To prove criminal intent, prosecutors can use two types of evidence: direct and circumstantial.

Direct evidence shows a defendant’s state of mind or actions, while circumstantial evidence can imply a guilty mind.

In Trump’s case, direct evidence could include testimony about his private admission that he had lost the election. At least two former White House aides have come forward with claims to that effect. One of them, Cassidy Hutchinson, testified before Congress last year that she was told by her boss, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, that “a lot of times (Trump will) tell me that he lost, but he wants to keep fighting it.”

Prosecutors can also marshal circumstantial evidence to prove Trump knew he had lost. Among other things, they can cite testimony by senior Justice Department officials, White House aides, and Trump’s own campaign staff who told Trump that they had found no evidence of widespread fraud.

Though circumstantial, this kind of testimony can persuade a jury that Trump knew he had lost the election.

A “myth I think people have is that you have to have the smoking gun, the guy on the audiotape saying, ‘I did it,” but you don’t,” said Kimberly Wehle, a former federal prosecutor now a professor of law at the University of Baltimore. “You can prove crimes beyond a reasonable doubt with circumstantial evidence.”

Yet Trump, notorious for rejecting expert advice, could claim he was swayed by other advisers who insisted the election was stolen.

“I don’t think there’s any question that there were people around former President Trump at the time who were telling him that he was not wrong, and that the election really had been stolen,” Malcolm said.

Without proving Trump’s criminal intent, Malcolm said, “the case collapses.”
…

U.S. regulators on Monday approved the first RSV vaccine for pregnant women so their babies will be born with protection against the respiratory infection.

RSV is notorious for filling hospitals with wheezing babies every fall and winter. The Food and Drug Administration cleared Pfizer’s maternal vaccination to guard against a severe case of RSV when babies are most vulnerable — from birth through 6 months of age.

The next step: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention must issue recommendations for using the vaccine, named Abrysvo, during pregnancy. (Vaccinations for older adults, also at high risk, are getting underway this fall using the same Pfizer shot plus another from competitor GSK.)

“Maternal vaccination is an incredible way to protect the infants,” said Dr. Elizabeth Schlaudecker of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, a researcher in Pfizer’s international study of the vaccine. If shots begin soon, “I do think we could see an impact for this RSV season.”

RSV is a cold-like nuisance for most healthy people but it can be life-threatening for the very young. It inflames babies’ tiny airways so it’s hard to breathe or causes pneumonia. In the U.S. alone, between 58,000 and 80,000 children younger than 5 are hospitalized each year, and several hundred die, from the respiratory syncytial virus.

Last year’s RSV season was extremely harsh in the U.S., and it began sickening tots in the summer, far earlier than usual.

Babies are born with an immature immune system, dependent for their first few months on protection from mom. How the RSV vaccination will work: A single injection late in pregnancy gives enough time for the mom-to-be to develop virus-fighting antibodies that pass through the placenta to the fetus — ready to work at birth.

It’s the same way pregnant women pass along protection against other infections. Pregnant women have long been urged to get a flu shot and a whooping cough vaccine — and more recently, COVID-19 vaccination.

Pfizer’s study included nearly 7,400 pregnant women plus their babies. Maternal vaccination didn’t prevent mild RSV infection — but it proved 82% effective at preventing a severe case during babies’ first three months of life. At age 6 months, it still was proving 69% effective against severe illness.

Vaccine reactions were mostly injection-site pain and fatigue. In the study, there was a slight difference in premature birth — a few weeks early — between vaccinated moms and those given a dummy shot, something Pfizer has said was due to chance. The FDA said to avoid the possibility, the vaccine should be given only between 32 weeks and 36 weeks of pregnancy, a few weeks later than during the clinical trial.

Cincinnati’s Schlaudecker, a pediatric infectious disease specialist, said both the new antibody drug and the maternal vaccine are eagerly anticipated, and predicted doctors will try a combination to provide the best protection for babies depending on their age and risk during RSV season.

Another Cincinnati Children’s physician who’s cared for seriously ill RSV patients volunteered to participate in Pfizer’s vaccine study when she became pregnant.

“The last thing a parent wants to see is their kid struggling to breathe,” Dr. Maria Deza Leon said. “I was also at risk of being the person that could get RSV and give it to my son without even realizing.”

Deza Leon received her shot in late January 2022 and her son Joaquin was born the following month. While she hasn’t yet learned if she received the vaccine or a dummy shot, Joaquin now is a healthy toddler who’s never been diagnosed with RSV.
…

Just days before the first debate of the Republican presidential primary, a new poll shows that former President Donald Trump maintains a commanding lead among GOP voters in the state of Iowa, the first state to vote in the party’s selection of a nominee for the 2024 election.

The poll, sponsored by the Des Moines Register and NBC News, found that Trump is the first choice for the nomination of 42% of Republicans likely to participate in the state’s January Republican caucus. Trump’s nearest challenger, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, has the support of 19% of Iowa Republicans, while none of the other 12 candidates mentioned in the poll were able to break into double digits.

Trump is feeling enough confidence in his position in the primary that he confirmed over the weekend that he will not participate in Wednesday’s debate, scheduled to take place in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

The former president’s strength in Iowa is all the more remarkable given that in the 2016 primary, during his first run for the presidency, he only managed a tie for second place in the state.

Indictment may have helped

In news that may bode even more poorly for Trump’s adversaries, the former president’s support in Iowa remained strong even though his indictment in Georgia on charges of conspiring to subvert the results of the 2020 presidential election was announced August 15, while the poll was in the field.

When the results of the poll were analyzed, they revealed that 38% of respondents polled in advance of the indictment’s release supported Trump. After the indictment, support for the former president rose to 43%.

Because the caucus remains several months away, the poll also set out to measure the firmness of candidates’ support by asking respondents whether they feel that their minds are already made up, or if they could still be persuaded to change their allegiance. The results suggest that Trump’s support is firmer than that of DeSantis, with 66% of the former president’s supporters saying their minds are made up, versus 31% of the Florida governor’s backers.

Remaining field

Of the remaining 12 Republican candidates who have declared their candidacy for the nomination, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott performed the best, with 9% of the vote. Former Vice President Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley each earned 6% of the vote, while former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie took 5% and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy received 4%. No other candidate received more than 2% of the vote.

Kyle Kondik, managing editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, told VOA that while the results of the Des Moines Register poll are similar to other results recorded by pollsters in Iowa, it carries more weight because it was conducted by J. Ann Selzer, president of Selzer & Co., who has a reputation for accuracy in the state.

“She’s a very respected pollster, and so that is why this particular survey is getting a lot of attention,” Kondik said.

Kondik pointed out that Trump’s performance in Iowa is actually somewhat weaker than it is in national polling, where he regularly leads DeSantis by margins of more than 40 points. However, he said, the fact that Trump is doing so well in Iowa after losing the 2016 caucus there, speaks to the former president’s overall strength.

“Trump is probably weaker in Iowa than he is nationally, but he’s still really pretty strong,” Kondik said.

Kondik urged some caution when it comes to analyzing the apparent surge the former president enjoyed after the August 15 announcement of his Georgia indictment.

“The indictments have not hurt Trump amongst Republicans, and in fact, arguably, may have helped by prompting people to ‘rally around the flag’ for him,” Kondik said. “Maybe over time, you see that reverse, and maybe people get cold feet about Trump and are concerned about him as a general election candidate. But again, there’s really no evidence from this poll or other polls to suggest that that’s happened.”

Evolution of the GOP

The fact that Trump has moved from an undistinguished second-place finish in Iowa eight years ago to a double-digit lead today highlights the degree to which the former president has remodeled the Republican party in his own image, said William A. Galston, a senior fellow in the Brookings Institution’s Governance Studies program.

“Donald Trump’s presidency, including its very, very troubled ending in January of 2021, succeeded in cementing the intense relationship he has with the base of the Republican Party,” Galston told VOA. “As far as they’re concerned, he can do no wrong. He has been forgiven sins that would sink any other candidate.”

Galston said that the poll results also cast serious doubt on the ability of DeSantis to mount a serious challenge to Trump.

“Ron DeSantis, who was supposed to be his principal challenger, has not succeeded in strengthening his position in recent months,” Galston said. “If anything, he has weakened, very, very significantly, opening the door for someone else to emerge as the leading challenger.”

He added, “the field could consolidate enough around someone not named Ron DeSantis to pose a significant challenge to Donald Trump down the road.”

Why Iowa matters

Iowa has long had an outsized role in the process by which the U.S. selects its president, even though it is both smaller than most states, and has a population that is 83% white, making it one of the least diverse.

Traditionally, the Iowa caucuses have been seen as a vital early test of presidential candidates — one that puts a premium on face-to-face interactions with voters. The caucus format requires voters to assemble at designated sites across the state and to publicly declare their support for a specific candidate, a level of commitment not required in most states, where primary votes are conducted via secret ballots.

Iowa voters do not have a particularly good track record of choosing the ultimate GOP nominee. Trump tied for second place in the 2016 caucus, and the party’s eventual nominee has not won a well-contested Iowa caucus outright since 2000. (Trump won 97% of the vote in 2020, facing only a handful of little-known challengers.)

However, what Iowa has often done is serve as the first cut in culling over-large primary fields. In past years, many candidates that performed poorly in the states have terminated their campaigns within days of the vote.
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Iran said Monday it could take up to two months to complete a prisoner swap it has agreed to with the United States. 

“A specific time frame has been announced by relevant authorities, and it will take a maximum of two months for this process to take place,” Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani told a news conference. 

Tehran and Washington reached an agreement earlier this month in which both pledged to release five of each country’s citizens they have been holding. In addition, the U.S. agreed to release $6 billion in Iranian assets that have been held in South Korea. 

The Iranian assets were transferred to Switzerland’s central bank last week for exchange and transfer to Iran, South Korean media reported Monday. 

Iran has moved four detained U.S. nationals it has held at Tehran’s Evin prison into house arrest, a lawyer for one of them said. A fifth was already under home confinement. 

Some material in this report came from Reuters. 
…

A summer heat wave is increasing the risk of wildfires in California, and state officials are considering various methods to prevent them, including using artificial intelligence and goats. Angelina Bagdasaryan has the story, narrated by Anna Rice.
…

Public utility regulators in Iowa will begin a hearing Tuesday on a proposed carbon dioxide pipeline for transporting emissions of the climate-warming greenhouse gas for storage underground that has been met by resistant landowners who fear the taking of their land and dangers of a pipeline rupture.

Summit Carbon Solutions’ proposed $5.5 billion, 3,219-kilometer pipeline network would carry CO2 from 34 ethanol plants in five states to North Dakota for storage deep underground — a project involving carbon capture technology, which has attracted both interest and scrutiny in the U.S.

North Dakota regulators earlier this month denied a siting permit for Summit’s proposed route in the state, citing myriad issues they say Summit didn’t appropriately address, such as cultural resource impacts, geologic instability and landowner concerns. On Friday, Summit petitioned regulators to reconsider.

Other similar projects are proposed around the country, including ones by Navigator CO2 Ventures and Wolf Carbon Solutions, which would also have routes in Iowa.

Here is what to know about Summit’s project as more proceedings begin.

What is carbon capture?

Carbon capture entails the gathering and removal of planet-warming CO2 emissions from industrial plants to be pumped deep underground for permanent storage.

Supporters view the technology as a combatant of climate change. But opponents say carbon capture and storage isn’t proven at scale and could require huge investments at the expense of cheaper alternatives such as solar and wind power, all at a time when there is an urgent need to phase out all fossil fuels.

Carbon capture also is viewed by opponents as a way for fossil fuel companies to claim they are addressing climate change without actually having to significantly change their ways.

“I think there’s a recognition even in the fossil fuel industry that, whether you like it or not and agree or not, (climate change) is a reality you’re going to deal with from a regulatory standpoint, and you’d better get out in front of it or you’re going to get left behind,” said Derrick Braaten, a Bismarck-based attorney involved in issues related to Summit’s project.

New federal tax incentives have made carbon capture a lucrative enterprise. The technology has the support of the Biden administration, with billions of dollars approved by Congress for various carbon capture efforts.

High-profile supporters of Summit’s project include North Dakota Republican Gov. Doug Burgum, a presidential candidate who has hailed the state’s underground CO2 storage ability as a “geologic jackpot,” and oil magnate Harold Hamm, whose company last year announced a $250 million commitment to Summit’s project.

“Carbon capture and storage is going to be more and more important every day as we go forward in America,” Hamm has said.

What is happening in the five states?

The Iowa Utilities Board begins its public evidentiary hearing Tuesday in Fort Dodge, a hearing “anticipated to last several weeks,” according to a news release. The board’s final decision on Summit’s permit request will come sometime after the hearing.

Minnesota’s Public Utilities Commission has a hearing set for Aug. 31 in which the panel “will make decisions about the scope of environmental review” regarding Summit’s permit application for its pipeline in two counties, said Charley Bruce, an energy facilities planner with the commission.

A Summit attorney recently indicated to Minnesota that North Dakota regulators’ decision to deny a permit will not affect the company’s plans, including for other proposed routes in southern Minnesota.

The South Dakota Public Utilities Commission is set to begin its evidentiary hearing for the project on Sept. 11 and expects to make a final decision by Nov. 15.

Nebraska has no state-level regulatory authority for CO2 pipelines. Summit is working with counties individually in Nebraska.

Counties don’t approve or deny a route, but can institute ordinances’ setbacks for land-use purposes that can dictate where a pipeline may go, and can enter into road haul agreements and road crossing permits, said Omaha-based attorney Brian Jorde. He represents more than 1,000 landowners opposed to CO2 pipeline projects in four states.

Summit hasn’t hit “an insurmountable legal obstacle” in North Dakota regulators’ denial “because they literally said, ‘Try again,’” Braaten said.

“If they get over themselves I think that they could do it and get approved, but I think they certainly shot themselves in the foot and they’re making it much harder in those other states because they’re going to come in with those commissioners there looking at them with a certain level of skepticism because you literally just got denied a permit in North Dakota,” he said.

Why are landowners opposed?

Landowners have raised concerns about the pipeline breaking, as well as eminent domain, or the taking of private land for the project, with compensation.

Eminent domain laws vary state by state, said Jorde, who represents hundreds of people Summit has sued in South Dakota to take their land for its pipeline.

“When you have the power of eminent domain like a hammer over a landowner’s head, you can intimidate them into doing things they wouldn’t otherwise do, which is sign easements, which Summit then turns around and says, ‘Look at all these “voluntary” easements we have. Look at all the “support” we have,’ which is completely false,” Jorde said.

Summit has submitted eminent domain requests to the Iowa board. A Summit spokesperson did not specifically address the company’s intentions related to eminent domain when asked by the AP.

“Our team remains incredibly encouraged that Iowa landowners have signed voluntary easement agreements accounting for nearly 75% of the proposed pipeline route,” spokesperson Sabrina Ahmed Zenor said in an email. “This overwhelming level of support is a clear reflection that they believe like we do that our project will ensure the long-term viability of the ethanol industry, strengthen the agricultural marketplace for farmers, and generate tens of millions of dollars in new revenue for local communities across the Midwest.”

What about underground storage?

Summit submitted a draft application for underground storage to a three-member state panel which Burgum chairs and includes the attorney general. The timeline for a hearing and decision by the panel is unclear.

Last year, Summit and Minnkota Power Cooperative agreed to “co-develop” CO2 storage facilities in central North Dakota. Their agreement gives Summit access to Minnkota’s storage site and sets a framework for jointly developing more CO2 storage nearby.

Minnkota is pursuing Project Tundra, a project to install carbon capture technology at a coal-fired power plant.

Braaten views Summit’s Minnkota partnership as a backup plan, to “piggyback on a sure thing,” he said.

A North Dakota landowners’ group is suing over the state’s process for allowing CO2 and gas storage on private land, and land survey laws.

Braaten said the lawsuit, which would affect the permitting of a Summit storage site in North Dakota, is not directed at Summit but is tied to longtime legal battles related to landowner rights.
…

Valerie Laveus remembers when she first heard about an immigration program designed to allow people to come to the U.S. from four countries, including her native Haiti.

“I said, ‘Whoa! This seems like it would work well for bringing my nephew and my brother into the country,'” said the Florida teacher, who received a WhatsApp message in January and verified with an immigration lawyer that the program was real.

After years of trying to get a green card, her brother arrived with her nephew in early August, ready to start a new life. They are two of the roughly 181,000 people who have entered the U.S. under the humanitarian parole program since President Joe Biden launched the initiative.

But 21 Republican-leaning states threaten to end the program through a lawsuit to determine its legality, which is set to be heard in a Texas court beginning Thursday, with a decision coming later.

If the Biden administration loses, it would undercut a broader policy seeking to encourage migrants to use the administration’s preferred pathways into the U.S. or face stiff consequences. The administration has said it had to act in the absence of congressional action to overhaul the nation’s immigration system.

But much of the administration’s strategy is just one lawsuit away from collapse.

In the Texas trial, Republican states are expected to argue the Biden administration is basically usurping the power of Congress by allowing up to 360,000 people annually into the U.S. from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela under the humanitarian parole program. They say the program is an overreach of a parole power meant to be used on a case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.

The administration argues it has the power to use humanitarian parole in this way and credits the initiative with drastically reducing illegal border crossings by immigrants from those four countries. Program applicants must pass background checks and have a financial sponsor in the U.S. who vouches for them. If approved, they must fly into a U.S. airport instead of crossing at the southern border. They can then stay in the U.S. for two years and get a work permit.

Immigrant rights groups successfully petitioned to join the legal proceedings on behalf of Laveus and six other people who are sponsoring migrants. Esther Sung, an attorney for Justice Action Center, said the groups want to show the real people who have volunteered to be sponsors and how ending the program would affect them.

Blas Nuñez-Neto, assistant secretary for border and immigration policy with the U.S.

Department of Homeland Security, said in a recent conference call that the government is worried about the upcoming trial and will appeal if the administration loses.

The case is scheduled to be heard by Judge Drew Tipton in Victoria, Texas, a Donald Trump appointee who has ruled against the Biden administration on who to prioritize for deportation. The federal government pushed unsuccessfully to have the humanitarian parole case transferred from Tipton’s courtroom after suggesting the Republican states filed in Victoria because they were seeking a favorable judge.

The U.S. used its humanitarian parole powers to grant entry to tens of thousands of Ukrainians when Russia invaded, but the Republican states’ lawsuit does not challenge that decision.

Just about anyone can be a sponsor provided they fill out the paperwork. Many, like Laveus, are sponsoring relatives who have no other way to come to the U.S.

Laveus said her brother was approved for a green card a few years ago, but the immigration system’s quotas meant his arrival was estimated to be delayed another six years. In the meantime, she supported relatives from afar as they tried to survive in a country plagued by economic instability and largely controlled by gangs.

A former opposition political leader and human rights activist from Nicaragua, who was jailed in his homeland for his activities, was sponsored by his brother, a U.S. citizen living in El Paso, Texas. The man, who wanted his identity withheld to protect his family in Nicaragua, came to the U.S. in July and plans to work in construction.

“I wanted to take this opportunity to save my life,” he said in Spanish.

Members of churches, synagogues and mosques have joined to sponsor people they don’t know out of religious belief to help others.

Eric Sype is sponsoring a member of a family he stayed with when he lived and worked in Nicaragua as a college student in 2014. Sype is one of seven sponsors represented by immigrants rights groups in the legal challenge.

The person he is sponsoring plans to work in the U.S. for two years, then return to Nicaragua to be with his wife and two children. Sype said his friend will stay in Sype’s childhood home in Washington state, where a cousin has offered him a job at an orchard growing pears, cherries and apples.

Sype said he had no hesitation about sponsoring the man, whom he said is part of his “chosen family.” Sype has spent major holidays including Christmas with the family in Nicaragua and they talk or message weekly.

“I just can’t really imagine how this program is doing anything but benefiting folks, bringing people back together,” he said.

The Biden administration’s program appears to be one of the largest single uses of the humanitarian parole authority, but it is certainly not the only administration to use it.

The authority has been used repeatedly in large and small ways including providing entry to Vietnamese, Cambodians and Laotians in the late 1970s, Iraqi Kurds who helped the U.S. in the 1990s Gulf War and Cubans fleeing their country at various times, according to data from the Cato Institute.

The Biden administration started the program for Venezuelans in October 2022 and added Cubans, Haitians and Nicaraguans in January.

Still, some who are generally supportive of the program have concerns. Critics say the need to have a financial sponsor essentially favors more affluent, well-connected migrants, while also fearing the program could be used to exploit migrants.

Muriel Sáenz, who helps immigrants through Nicaraguans Around the World, a Texas-based group, said it can be difficult to find sponsors for migrants who don’t already have family ties in the U.S. She encourages U.S. citizens to sponsor people they don’t know, which can be a harder sell.

“It is too much responsibility,” Sáenz said. “Legally you are adopting people for two years.”
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Tropical Storm Hilary brought flooding rains to southern California and Nevada as forecasters warned of life-threatening and catastrophic conditions from the rare storm as it moved inland. 

The U.S. National Weather Service urged people to stay off roads in the Los Angeles area due to dangerous flooding. 

Many of the areas in the path of the storm, which was expected to weaken to a tropical depression as its center moved into Nevada later Monday, are not used to seeing the type of rainfall associated with a tropical storm. 

Forecasters said some desert areas could end up with 12 to 25 centimeters of rain. 

“In some places in the desert, that’s a year’s worth,” Alex Tardy, a senior meteorologist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in San Diego, told a news briefing. “The normal rainfall in Southern California and San Diego is nothing in August. So, a very unusual event is unfolding here.” 

California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a state of emergency to help with response and recovery efforts. 

U.S. President Joe Biden said his administration stood ready to provide assistance to California, Nevada and Arizona. 

The storm forced the cancellation of flights in Los Angeles, San Diego and Las Vegas, while schools in Los Angeles and San Diego were closed Monday. 

The last tropical storm to strike California came in 1977. 

Tropical Storm Hilary made landfall Sunday in Mexico’s Baja California peninsula.  

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters 
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U.S. President Joe Biden travels Monday to the Pacific island state of Hawaii to meet with officials and survivors and survey damage from wildfires that devastated Maui.

The White House said Biden and first lady Jill Biden will “see firsthand the impacts of the devastating wildfires as well as discuss the recovery effort.

The fires earlier this month left widespread destruction in the seaside town of Lahaina, killing at least 114 people. Gov. Josh Green has said the toll is expected to rise with efforts to find missing people still in progress.

Green told CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday that search teams had gone through 85% of the search zone, but that the remaining sections could take weeks. He said more than 1,000 people were still unaccounted for.

“Tomorrow the president arrives, and I’ll be making the case to make sure our recovery comes as quickly as possible,” Green said in a video posted late Sunday.

He also referenced concerns about rebuilding in Lahaina and respecting Native Hawaiian culture, saying that his administration “will listen to the voices of Lahaina to tell us how and when we rebuild.”

Some information for this story came from The Associated Press and Reuters
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The language is stark: People in torched areas of Maui should not try to filter their own drinking water because there is no “way to make it safe,” Maui County posted on its Instagram account this week.

The message reached Anne Rillero and her husband, Arnie in Kula, who were eating yet another meal of frozen pizza. The couple feels incredibly lucky they and their home survived the fires that raced across Maui in recent days, wiping most of Lahaina off the map. The number of confirmed fatalities was raised on Friday to 114 people.

When a neighborhood organization alerted them not to drink their water and to air out the house even if they run the tap, the couple decided to eat off paper plates to avoid exposure. No washing dishes.

“It’s alarming that it may be in the water system for a while,” said Rillero, a retired conservation communication specialist who has lived on the island for 22 years.

Brita filters, devices connected to refrigerators or sinks and even robust, whole-home systems are unlikely to address the “extreme contamination” that can happen after a fire.

“They will remove some of it, but levels that will be acutely and immediately toxic will get through,” said Andrew Whelton, a Purdue University researcher and expert in water contamination after wildfires in urban areas.

The Maui fires damaged hundreds of drinking water pipes, resulting in a loss of pressure that can allow toxic chemicals along with metals and bacteria into water lines.

“You can pull in contaminated or dirty water from the outside, even when those lines are underground,” said David Cwiertny, a civil and environmental engineering professor at the University of Iowa.

Hundreds of families could be in the same situation as the Rilleros in the Lahaina and Upper Kula areas, where people have been told to minimize any contact with county water including showers. In Lahaina alone, aerial imagery and damage assessment data generated by Vexcel Data show 460 buildings apparently undamaged by the fires. These are places where people are returning.

For now, the county has told people to use bottled water for all their needs or to fill jugs at tankers called water buffaloes, which have been brought in near the burns.

The state health department’s environmental health division told Maui County, which operates water delivery systems for most residents, to test for 23 chemicals. Those are just the ones for which the federal government has set limits for drinking water.

These warnings reflect new science and are intended to avoid the whiplash of conflicting information received by people impacted by the 2018 Camp Fire in California, who received messages from four different agencies.

New discoveries

Until a few years ago, wildfire was only known to contaminate drinking water at the source, such as when ash runs into a river or reservoir. California’s Tubbs Fire in 2017 and the Camp Fire “are the first known wildfires where widespread drinking water chemical contamination was discovered in the water distribution network,” according to a recent study published by several researchers including Whelton with the American Water Works Association.

After the Camp Fire destroyed Paradise, California, officials didn’t initially understand that smoke and chemicals had leached into the water through broken and melted water pipes. So they did what was standard after other fires: they told people to boil water before use.

Concerned about benzene contamination, the Paradise Irrigation District water utility then changed the order and told people to avoid the water, district Assistant District Manager Mickey Rich said.

Four days later, the California State Water Resources Control Board announced people could drink it as long as it didn’t smell. Two and a half weeks later, that agency announced there was benzene in the water.

Two months after that, a third agency, a county health department, told the public the water was unsafe and not to attempt to treat it on their own.

“There were a lot of unknowns,” Rich said. “When the scientists came six months into the recovery, they really answered a lot of questions that we wish we would have had at the beginning.”

Other chemicals

New contaminants also have been discovered recently. The chemicals that Hawaii’s state government told Maui County to test for are called volatile because they tend to become airborne, like gasoline that turns to vapor when it drips from the pump onto your car.

But Whelton’s new research on the Marshall Fire in Boulder County Colorado, shows a group of heavier compounds, called “semi-volatile,” can contaminate damaged water lines as well, even when benzene and other better-known chemicals are not there.

“We found SVOCs leaching from damaged water meters into drinking water,” Whelton said. “You can’t use VOCs to predict whether SVOCs are present.”

For people on Maui who get their water from private wells, now would be a good time to get it tested, said Steve Wilson, a groundwater hydrologist at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

If fire burns near a well, it can damage the cap, which keeps out debris. Plastic in the lining can even melt, releasing hazardous fumes into the well.

“In the case of a fire, it may look fine, but it’s hard to know,” Wilson said. “It might have affected something on the inside.”

Experts caution complete restoration of safe water will take a long time.

“I would implore anybody not to make a decision about lifting the water safety order until you have repeated validation that there is no contamination that poses a health risk,” Whelton said.
…

President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden are scheduled to visit Maui Monday to assess the impact of wildfires that reduced parts of Hawaii’s second largest island to smoldering ash. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more on the devastation and how some residents are coping.
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