The Kyiv Independent
Ukraine targets Russia’s ammunition depots, undermining its artillery advantage
It is an almost everyday occurrence in the Russian-occupied parts of eastern and southern Ukraine.
Russia’s ammunition depots blow up, with large fires erupting as tons of ordnance detonate for hours. Some of these incidents cause giant blasts with a radius of hundreds of meters.
Now that Ukraine has acquired advanced Western artillery and rocket systems, it has gradually begun a campaign to take out Russia’s key military infrastructure. Over the last four weeks, nearly 20 Russian ammunition depots in Russian-occupied Donbas and Ukraine’s south, including some of the largest, have been hit or completely destroyed.
Deutsche Welle
Putin warns Russian actions in Ukraine 'haven't even started' yet — live updates
[…] Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that Russia had barely started its actions in Ukraine and urged Kyiv and its Western allies to reach a deal with Moscow.
Putin accused the West of wanting to "fight [Russia] until the last Ukrainian" in providing military and economic support to Kyiv.
"It's a tragedy for the Ukrainian people, but it looks like it's heading in that direction… Everybody should know that largely speaking, we haven't even yet started anything in earnest," Putin warned.
Russia's president said that the Kremlin was ready to sit down for peace talks, and stressed that "those who refuse to do so should know that the longer it lasts the more difficult it will be for them to make a deal with us."
AP News
Russia taking ‘operational pause’ in Ukraine, analysts say
Foreign analysts say Russia may be temporarily easing its offensive in eastern Ukraine as the Russian military attempts to reassemble its forces for what it hopes could prove decisive new assault on its neighbor. Russian President Vladimir Putin warned menacingly on Thursday that his forces “haven’t even started” to fight.
Russian forces made no claimed or assessed territorial gains in Ukraine on Wednesday “for the first time in 133 days of war,” according to the Institute for the Study of War. The Washington-based think tank suggested Moscow may be taking an “operational pause,” but said that does not entail “the complete cessation of active hostilities.”
“Russian forces will likely confine themselves to relatively small-scale offensive actions as they attempt to set conditions for more significant offensive operations” and rebuild the necessary combat power, the institute said.
Euronews
Finland passes a new law to boost border security with Russia
The Finnish parliament amended its laws on Tuesday, to strengthen the fences along the country's border with Russia, as the Nordic nation continues the process of joining NATO.
After Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine on 24 February, Finland decided to formalise it's decades-long close partnership with NATO and apply to join the military alliance.
Motivated by concerns that Moscow will use migrants to pressure Helsinki, new amendments to Finland's border guard law will make it easier to build stronger barriers along the 1,300-kilometre border Finland shares with Russia.
Houston Chronicle
Brittney Griner's guilty plea doesn't mean what you think it does. A legal expert explains.
American basketball star Brittney Griner’s Thursday admission of guilt before a Russian court of drug charges is being called a guilty plea, but an expert on Russian law says that’s not an accurate term for what happened.
Griner actually is not “pleading” guilty in direct exchange for a lesser sentence, as happens in the U.S., said William Butler, a law professor at Pennsylvania State University and expert in Russian law
“What she did was acknowledge her guilt. It has no effect on the burden of proof the prosecution has to satisfy,” Butler said… During the Stalin era, authorities frequently tortured suspects to coerce confessions. So under current Russian law, the courts must consider whether prosecutors have evidence of the crime independent from whether there’s any confession.
Reuters
WHO reports two new monkeypox deaths, cases in new areas
The World Health Organization reported two new deaths from monkeypox since its previous disease update on June 27, bringing the total to three since the start of the year and said the disease had spread to new areas.
Cases have shot up 77 percent since the last report to 6,027, the WHO said, with the bulk of them reported in the European region. However, all three deaths have been reported in Africa, the report showed. […]
"The outbreak continues to primarily affect men who have sex with men who have reported recent sex with one or multiple male partners, suggesting no signal of sustained transmission beyond these networks for now," it said.
Los Angeles Times
California deepens water cuts to cope with drought, hitting thousands of farms
California regulators have begun curtailing the water rights of many farms and irrigation districts along the Sacramento River, forcing growers to stop diverting water from the river and its tributaries.
The order, which took effect Thursday, puts a hold on about 5,800 water rights across the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers’ watersheds, reflecting the severity of California’s extreme drought.
Together with a similar order in June, the State Water Resources Control Board has now curtailed 9,842 water rights this year in the Sacramento and San Joaquin watersheds, more than half of the nearly 16,700 existing rights.
“The need to take these curtailment actions is in many ways unprecedented. And it reflects just how dry things have been in California over the last three years,” said Erik Ekdahl, deputy director of the state water board’s water rights division. “After three years of really unprecedented drought, reservoir storage is at record lows for much of the state. And there’s just simply not enough water to go around.”
The Seattle Times
Earthquake would trigger 20-foot tsunami in Seattle within 3 minutes: state report
A tsunami triggered by a major earthquake beneath Puget Sound would arrive at our shores sooner and reach farther inland than previously understood, according to a study published Thursday by the Washington State Department of Natural Resources.
Models showed a tsunami following a magnitude 7.5 quake would inundate Seattle’s shoreline under more than 20 feet of water, and reach parts of Bainbridge Island, Elliott Bay and Alki Point within three minutes.
Waves could reach a staggering 42 feet at the Seattle Great Wheel and reach as far as Lumen Field and T-Mobile Park.
“Three to five minutes is all that separates a seismic event from the arrival of tsunami waves,” said Public Lands Commissioner Hilary Franz on Thursday during a news conference on the Seattle waterfront. “Which is why we do this research now so everyone is aware of it, so our local state government is aware of it, and we can start to prepare and plan and take all precautions necessary.”
Arizona Republic
Recordings within 8 feet of police illegal in Arizona under bill signed into law by Ducey
People will no longer be allowed to take close-range recordings of Arizona police under a new bill signed into law by Gov. Doug Ducey on Wednesday.
House Bill 2319, sponsored by Rep. John Kavanagh, makes it illegal for anyone within 8 feet of law enforcement activity to record police. Violators could face a misdemeanor, but only after being verbally warned and continuing to record anyway.
Exceptions were made for people at the center of an interaction with police, anyone standing in an enclosed structure on private property where police activity was occurring and occupants of a vehicle stopped by police as long as recording in those instances didn't interfere with police actions.
It goes into effect on Sept. 24.
Jewish Telegraph Agency
Tennessee court dismisses Jewish couple’s lawsuit alleging religious bias in adoption law
Tennessee judges have dismissed a lawsuit filed by a Jewish couple who said a state-supported Christian adoption agency discriminated against them as they sought to adopt a child.
Elizabeth and Gabriel Rutan-Ram’s lawsuit, filed in January, challenged a 2020 Tennessee law that allows religious adoption agencies to deny service to people seeking to adopt based on their religious beliefs. The law was designed to allow agencies not to place children with same-sex couples; the Rutan-Rams charged that an adoption agency had told them it went against the agency’s values to place the child in a non-Christian home.
In dismissing the lawsuit, which the Rutan-Rams filed with the support of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the judges did not rule on the Tennessee law itself, though they wrote that it “does not single out people of the Jewish faith as a disfavored, innately inferior group,” according to an Associated Press report.
Lexington Herald Leader
McConnell briefly floated a national abortion ban. Democrats have seized on that.
Mitch McConnell’s suggestion that Republicans could pursue federal legislation to ban abortion everywhere has supplied potent political ammunition to Democrats’ midterm campaign strategy.
The Kentuckian’s brief comments – made during an interview with USA Today in May, prior to the overturning of Roe v. Wade – are now being featured in television advertising and messaging of Democratic candidates across the country. […]
McConnell conveyed that even if an outright ban made it through a Republican-led House, the Senate couldn’t muster the votes. “It takes 60 votes in the Senate for either side to prevail on this issue,” McConnell said, according to The Cincinnati Enquirer.
Still, distrust of McConnell runs deep in the veins of Democrats, leaving some to believe that his election year rhetoric can’t be trusted [if] he regains power.
Louisville Courier Journal
'It's been plenty of time.' Kentucky governor urges Biden to rescind anti-abortion GOP judge pick
Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday it's past time for the White House to withdraw the name of anti-abortion Republican Chad Meredith as a potential nominee for federal judge in Kentucky.
"It's been plenty of time," Beshear said at his press conference. "And by now, they should be telling us that it's going to be rescinded." […]
Beshear and U.S. Rep. John Yarmuth, D-Louisville, were among the Democrats astonished and outraged by the pick, with Yarmuth and other officials telling The Courier Journal that Biden must have worked a deal with U.S. Sen Mitch McConnell so he wouldn't hold up future White House nominations. […]
The Courier Journal asked Beshear at his press conference if the White House revealed its motivation for nominating Meredith or if there was a deal in place with McConnell. Beshear said he hadn’t received “any definitive reason” for the pick and would not comment “on any other discussions we have with the White House.”
Vox
Senate Democrats slowly consider their options after Roe
When the draft Supreme Court opinion on Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health leaked in early May, Democratic lawmakers in the Senate scrambled to figure out a response. […]
Two months later, the Supreme Court has overturned Roe v. Wade. But Democrats in Congress are still negotiating their next move to protect abortion rights.
Democratic senators, led by Patty Murray (WA) and Elizabeth Warren (MA), have been pushing for a bolder response from the executive branch. Aside from pressuring the administration, the closest thing congressional Democrats have to a strategy is asking voters to help them maintain their House majority and elect two more senators in November. If they do, Democrats could scrap the filibuster for abortion bills, surmounting both Republican opposition and resistance from Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ).
The Nation
Mystal: The Hyde Amendment Is Not an Excuse to Do Nothing to Protect Abortion Rights
One particularly maddening aspect of our current politics is that Democrats feel beholden to rules that Republicans feel entitled to burn. Democrats creatively interpret rules in ways that inevitably frustrate their ability to wield power, while Republicans creatively use their power to get around the rules. […]
Nowhere is this asymmetry more evident than in the reactions to the leaked Supreme Court draft overturning Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v. Casey. There are things President Joe Biden could do to counteract the Supreme Court’s decision to force people to carry pregnancies to term against their will. There are things his administration should be doing already in Texas, where constitutional (for the moment) abortion services have been denied to people since September. I’ve outlined some of these executive actions here and elsewhere, but in brief: Abortion services should be provided on federal lands; abortion providers should be deputized by the federal government to protect them from state bounty hunters; people seeking abortion services should be granted safe passage to these facilities, or out of state if need be. […]
But every time I or anybody else makes arguments for strong executive action to protect people from Republicans, somebody, often a liberal or Democrat, says that the Hyde Amendment prevents the federal government from funding abortions. […]
The idea that the Hyde Amendment restricts all federal action for abortion services is a clear misreading of the amendment.
Inforum
Fargo clinic files lawsuit challenging North Dakota abortion ban
North Dakota's only abortion clinic has filed a lawsuit against the state over a ban on the procedure due to take effect later this month.
The Red River Women’s Clinic in Fargo announced Thursday, July 7, it had filed a legal challenge to North Dakota's ban on abortion, which Republican Attorney General Drew Wrigley has said will become active July 28.
In 2007, the North Dakota Legislature passed a "trigger" bill sponsored by former Democratic Rep. James Kerzman that would ban abortion in the state within 30 days if the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision.
The Dallas Morning News
Most Texans disapprove of trigger law banning abortion, say state is on wrong track
A majority of Texans disapprove of the state’s trigger law, which will ban almost all abortions, new polling shows.
The Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin shows 54% of respondents said they disapprove of the trigger law, and 37% approve. The law will go into effect in the coming weeks.
The poll was conducted from June 16-24, just before the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs. Wade, the landmark case that established the constitutional right to an abortion.
Mother Jones
If Republicans Retake Congress In November, Here’s What Their Agenda Will Look Like
[…] You don’t have to wait until after the November midterm elections to know what a huge faction of Republicans have in mind. A little-noticed budget document, the Blueprint to Save America, released in June by the Republican Study Committee, details the group’s priorities. Since nearly 75 percent of Republican House lawmakers are RSC members, these priorities are shared by a majority of the GOP caucus. […]
- Raising the Social Security eligibility age
The RSC calls for raising the retirement age by three months per year through 2040, at that point the new age requirement to receive full Social Security benefits for people born after 1978 would be 70. After 2040, the group recommends linking the new retirement age to modern life expectancies, noting increasing life expectancies since monthly Social Security payments were first distributed in 1940. […]
- Blocking prescription drug pricing reform
- Ending birthright citizenship
- Eliminating government agencies
- Kneecapping the EPA and rolling back climate change initiatives
- Restricting abortion nationwide
- Reversing federal recognition of transgender Americans
- Expanding gun rights
- Slashing programs that help low-income families
Military.com
Army Cuts Off More Than 60K Unvaccinated Guard and Reserve Soldiers from Pay and Benefits
Some 40,000 National Guard and 22,000 Reserve soldiers who refused to be vaccinated against COVID-19 are no longer allowed to participate in their military duties, also effectively cutting them off from some of their military benefits, Army officials announced Friday.
"Soldiers who refuse the vaccination order without an approved or pending exemption request are subject to adverse administrative actions, including flags, bars to service, and official reprimands," an Army spokesperson said in a statement. […]
If the soldiers continue to refuse the vaccine, the consequences could be even more dire. "In the future, Soldiers who continue to refuse the vaccination order without an exemption may be subject to additional adverse administrative action, including separation," the Army spokesperson said.
AP News
Slow pace for youngest kids getting COVID vaccine doses
Nearly 300,000 children under 5 have received COVID-19 shots in the two weeks since they became available, a slower pace than for older groups. But the White House says that was expected for the eligible U.S. population of about 18 million kids.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was to publish initial data on shots for the age group later Thursday, reflecting doses administered since regulators authorized them on June 18. The first vaccinations didn’t begin until several days later because the doses had to be shipped to doctors’ offices and pharmacies.
The Economist
Democrats have a Hispanic problem
Southern Texas, a heavily Hispanic region along the American border with Mexico, was once a Democratic stronghold as reliable as any urban core. But it now appears to be crumbling. Last month a special election was held to pick the next representative for the state’s 34th congressional district, which snakes 250 miles (400km) down from the San Antonio exurbs to the border city of Brownsville and the southernmost tip of the state. Some parts of the district have been represented continuously by Democrats since 1870. Barack Obama carried it by 23 percentage points in 2012. It is 85% Hispanic.
Yet it was a Republican, Mayra Flores (pictured), who triumphed. The first Mexican-born congresswoman in American history is hardly a moderate. She is a pro-life, anti-vaccine-mandate Republican who is searingly critical of illegal immigration (and married to a Border Patrol agent, to boot).
Democrats are starting to realise that they have a Hispanic problem. Party strategists who hoped that Donald Trump’s racially incendiary rhetoric, his campaign pledge of a big, beautiful border wall and the fiasco of his family-separation policy might have pushed more Hispanic voters into the Democratic camp found the opposite.
The Detroit News
Ryan Kelley, Michigan governor candidate, pleads not guilty to Jan. 6 charges
Ryan Kelley, a Republican candidate to be Michigan's next governor, pleaded not guilty Thursday to four misdemeanor charges tied to his alleged actions during the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. […]
Federal court records have described Kelley as being an active participant in the Jan. 6, 2021 attempted insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, encouraging yelling, gesturing to participants and removing a covering from a temporary structure outside the building.
The Philadelphia Inquirer
Seven Pa. lawyers involved in Trump’s legal fight to overturn the 2020 election are hit with ethics complaints
A legal advocacy group formed in hopes of disbarring and disciplining lawyers who aided Donald Trump’s push to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election filed complaints Thursday with the Pennsylvania Supreme Court against seven lawyers in the state for their involvement in the former president’s legal efforts.
The list of those targeted by the 65 Project include bit players like attorney and conservative talk show host Marc A. Scaringi, of Harrisburg, who sponsored Rudy Giuliani to argue on behalf of the Trump campaign in Pennsylvania’s federal courts, as well as some of the most in-demand GOP elections lawyers in the state, like Ronald Hicks and Carolyn McGee, who most recently represented Republican Senate candidate David McCormick in recount litigation during his primary campaign against Mehmet Oz.
Additionally, the group filed complaints against three out-of-state lawyers who participated in Pennsylvania election litigation — including Trump attorney Jenna Ellis, who is now serving as a senior legal adviser to state Sen. Doug Mastriano, the Republican nominee in this year’s governor’s race.
All of them, the organization said in their filings, lent their “law license and the legal profession’s integrity and power to an orchestrated effort to undermine our nation’s elections.”
NBC News
Senate Democrats reach an agreement to raise taxes on some high earners
Senate Democrats have reached an agreement to raise taxes on some high earners who they say are abusing a loophole to slash their tax bills, two sources familiar with the discussions said.
The lawmakers, the sources said, plan to close the tax break for those earning more than $400,000 a year, requiring them to pay 3.8% in taxes on certain income from pass-through businesses, in what is effectively a slimmed-down package after the Build Back Better Act stalled last year.
They project that closing the tax loophole would raise about $200 billion over a decade, a source said, which would be used to pay for Medicare through 2031 in an effort to keep the federal health care program from going bankrupt.
Without congressional intervention, the program’s hospital insurance trust fund is poised to begin running out of money by 2028.
The Daily Beast
Herschel Walker Lied About His Secret Kids to His Own Campaign
When Herschel Walker’s campaign aides approached him this winter to discuss whispers that Walker had a secret child, the Georgia GOP’s Senate candidate told his campaign the rumors were false.
Walker’s aides already knew he was lying.
They had expected him to lie, and had obtained documents in advance of that conversation verifying that Walker did indeed have another child, The Daily Beast has learned. They handed the documents to him, and after some more back and forth, Walker finally admitted it was true. His aides asked if there were any other children they needed to know about. Walker insisted this was it.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Controversies mount for Herschel Walker, but impact is questionable
Growing questions about U.S. Senate hopeful Herschel Walker’s credibility threaten his campaign at a time when Republicans want nothing more than to talk about high inflation and economic uncertainty. […]
Walker has falsely claimed that he worked in law enforcement, asserted that he graduated from college when he has not, exaggerated his business record and made bizarre statements promoting a phony coronavirus cure and questioning the science that underpins the theory of evolution.
Warnock’s campaign has tried to make sure those falsehoods and misstatements come back to haunt him, including airing a June ad that replays Walker’s false claim in 2020 that he had a mist that would “kill any COVID on your body, EPA-FDA approved.”
It should translate into a boost for Warnock. But even some Democrats are skeptical the mounting attention on Walker’s controversies will realign a race that could center on President Joe Biden’s handling of the economy and the U.S. Supreme Court’s momentous decisions on abortion and gun rights.
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Derek Chauvin sentenced to more than 20 years in federal civil rights case
A federal judge sentenced Derek Chauvin on Thursday to more than 20 years in prison for violating the civil rights of George Floyd and a Black Minneapolis teen, less than the term he is already serving on state murder charges for killing Floyd in 2020.
Senior U.S. District Judge Paul Magnuson sentenced the former Minneapolis police officer to 245 months, to be served concurrently with his 22-1/2-year state prison sentence for Floyd's murder. He will also serve five years of supervised release when he leaves custody in roughly 17 years.
"I really don't know why you did what you did," Magnuson told Chauvin before imposing the sentence. "But to put your knee on another person's neck until they expire is simply wrong, and for that conduct you must be substantially punished."
Cleveland Plain Dealer
Timothy Loehmann, who killed Tamir Rice, resigns from tiny Pennsylvania police department after protests
Timothy Loehmann, the former Cleveland police officer who shot and killed Tamir Rice, has left the small department in Pennsylvania that hired him this week.
Loehmann resigned Thursday morning, hours after media outlets reported that the borough of Tioga had hired him. Residents even protested the move at the town’s offices. […]
Subodh Chandra, the attorney for the Rice family, praised the move.
“While it is welcome news that Loehmann won’t be inflicting himself on the people of Tioga, the officials of that town need to be held accountable for their atrociously poor judgment,” Chandra said.
Orange County Register
Newsom: California to develop low-cost insulin
California is ready to make its own insulin.
Included in the recently signed budget package was nearly $101 million to develop and manufacture low-cost biosimilar insulin products. The undertaking is designed to increase the affordability and availability of insulin in California.
“In California, we know people should not go into debt to receive life-saving medication,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a video Thursday.
CNN
An 8-year-old boy is paralyzed from the waist down after getting shot in the chest in Highland Park parade attack
An 8-year-old boy who was attending the Highland Park Fourth of July parade with his parents and twin brother was shot and is now paralyzed from the waist down, family spokesperson Anthony Loizzi told CNN on Thursday.
Cooper Roberts was shot in the chest and suffered several significant injuries, including a severed spinal cord, Loizzi said in a virtual news conference earlier Thursday. […]
“It’s going to be a new normal for him moving forward,” Loizzi said. “It sounds (like) he’ll have significant issues moving forward, especially with walking.”
Cooper and his twin, Luke, loved the parade, Loizzi said. […]
Luke suffered injuries from shrapnel, was treated and released and is now recovering at home, Loizzi said. Their mother, Keely Roberts, “was shot in the leg and foot area” and underwent several surgeries, the spokesperson added.
The Guardian
Gone but not gone: Boris Johnson quits but clings on to power
Boris Johnson dramatically quit as prime minister after a mass walkout of MPs finally sealed his fate, signalling an end to one of the most divisive and turbulent periods in British politics.
In a speech outside Downing Street on Thursday that was tinged with bitterness, he blamed ministers for turning on him but expressed neither regret nor contrition for his mistakes.
The abrupt denouement kicked off a scramble among contenders to take over in Downing Street – and demands from some MPs that he go now and not wait until the leadership election has finished. […]
His premiership, which will have lasted just three years, was overshadowed by the catastrophic Covid crisis, and marred by persistent claims of sleaze, which saw two ethics advisers resign.
But in his speech, delivered as his wife, Carrie, stood nearby holding their young daughter, Johnson called his colleagues’ decision to dislodge him “eccentric”, suggesting they had been driven by a herd mentality.
Ars Technica
Energy charter treaty makes climate action nearly illegal in 52 countries
Five young people whose resolve was hardened by floods and wildfires recently took their governments to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Their claim concerns each country’s membership of an obscure treaty they argue makes climate action impossible by protecting fossil fuel investors.
The energy charter treaty has 52 signatory countries which are mostly EU states but include the UK and Japan. The claimants are suing 12 of them including France, Germany and the UK—all countries in which energy companies are using the treaty to sue governments over policies that interfere with fossil fuel extraction. For example, the German company RWE is suing the Netherlands for 1.4 billion euros ($1.42 billion) because it plans to phase out coal. […]
Money spent compensating fossil fuel investors will deprive investment in renewable energy and other things vital to the green transition, such as public transport.