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Donald Trump, Manhattan DA Alvin Bragg Clash Over Scope Of Gag Order Amid Ex-President's Attacks Against Judge's Daughter 2024-03-31 14:28:00+00:00 - Loading... Loading... In the lead-up to the hush money trial involving former President Donald Trump, a legal battle over the scope of a gag order has emerged. Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg's office is clashing with Trump's legal team over whether the order restricts Trump from targeting the family members of Judge Juan Merchan, who is presiding over the case. Trump has escalated his social media attacks against Judge Merchan's daughter in recent days following the judge's refusal to postpone the trial set to begin in less than three weeks. This has prompted the Manhattan district attorney's office to request a clarification of the gag order, The Hill reported. It argues that the order should protect the judge's family members from Trump's public attacks. The controversy centers on the gag order's limitations, which currently prevent Trump from making public statements about "the family members of any counsel or staff member" involved in the case. However, Trump's attorneys argue that the prosecutor's request to extend these protections to the judge's family amounts to expanding the order's original terms. Also Read: Marjorie Taylor Greene Claims She Has Proof That Votes For Donald Trump In 2020 Were 'Lost In The Mail': 'I Think He'll Be Vindicated Easily' Prosecutors have expressed concerns that Trump's continued attacks could potentially influence witnesses and jurors, noting that several potential witnesses have already voiced fears for their safety and that of their families. They have urged the court to sanction Trump if he violates the gag order. The case against Trump involves accusations of falsifying business records related to payments made to his former legal advisor, Michael Cohen, to silence porn star Stormy Daniels about an alleged sexual encounter. Trump, who denies the affair, has pleaded not guilty to the charges. As the trial date approaches, the dispute over the gag order's scope highlights the ongoing tension between Trump's aggressive public defense strategy and the legal system's efforts to ensure a fair trial. Now Read: Amid Donald Trump's Attacks On Judges And Prosecutors, Michael Cohen Says Ex-President Is Trying To 'Fuel Up His Supporters ... To Act No Differently And As Stupidly As They Did On January 6th' This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors. Photo: Shutterstock

Tim Cook's China Visit, Apple's 4GB iPhone Fetches $130K In Auction And More: Top Appleverse Updates - Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL), Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) 2024-03-31 14:15:00+00:00 - Loading... Loading... The week was an eventful one for Apple Inc. AAPL, with a multitude of happenings from a rare iPhone auction to CEO Tim Cook’s visit to China. Apple’s 4GB iPhone Fetches $130K in Auction. The week saw a sealed original 4GB iPhone, a much sought-after collector’s item, being auctioned off for a whopping $130,000, more than 260 times its original price. This significant sale underscores the high value that collectors attach to Apple memorabilia. Read the full article here. Tim Cook’s Visit to China Signals Apple’s Intention to Double Down. Amidst increasing regulatory pressure and a US Department of Justice’s (DOJ) antitrust lawsuit, Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook’s recent visit to China is seen as an indication that the company is planning to “double down” on its commitment to Beijing. Read the full article here. See Also: DEA Comes Out Of The Shadows To Ensure Cannabis Rescheduling Process Is Not Being Done Under ‘Shroud Of Secrecy’ Loading... Loading... iPhone 16 Pro May Bring Back iPhone 6s Vibes. Apple is reportedly planning to introduce new color variants for its upcoming iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro Max. The rumor from China suggests that the new models will feature ‘space black’ and ‘rose’ colors, bringing back the vibes from iPhone 6s released 9 years ago. Read the full article here. Apple Files Lawsuit Against Ex-Employee Over Leaks. Apple is suing a former employee, Andrew Aude, for allegedly leaking sensitive information about the company's first-generation mixed-reality headset, Vision Pro and Journal app. Read the full article here. Jim Cramer Questions Antitrust Lawsuits Against Big Tech. TV personality Jim Cramer has expressed skepticism over the government’s antitrust lawsuits against Big Tech giants, including Apple, Alphabet Inc. GOOGL, and Amazon.com Inc. AMZN. Read the full article here. Read Next: Trader Turns $3K Into $215K In Hours With Freshly Launched Dawkoin As ‘Father Of MEMEs’-Based Crypto’s Market Cap Skyrockets To $15M Photo via Shutterstock Engineered by Benzinga Neuro, Edited by Rounak Jain The GPT-4-based Benzinga Neuro content generation system exploits the extensive Benzinga Ecosystem, including native data, APIs, and more to create comprehensive and timely stories for you. Learn more.

Rep. Don Bacon: 'It’s possible' Mike Johnson could lose speakership over Ukraine 2024-03-31 13:35:00+00:00 - Rep. Don Bacon on Sunday warned that "it's possible" that Speaker Mike Johnson could face a vote to oust him if he moves to pass Ukraine aid in the House. "I'm not going to deny it," Bacon, R-Neb., said when asked by moderator Kristen Welker on NBC News' "Meet the Press" whether it's possible Johnson could lose his speakership over Ukraine aid. "We have one or two people that are not team players. They'd rather enjoy the limelight, the social media," Bacon added, though he did not name any members. "It's a very narrow majority, and one or two people can make us a minority," he said. Bacon favors some support for Ukraine and highlighted his partnership with Reps. Jared Golden, D-Maine, Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa., and Ed Case, D-Hawaii, on a Ukraine aid bill. "We put a bill together that focuses on military aid — a $66 billion bill that provides military aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan," Bacon told Welker, calling for a "bicameral, bipartisan solution." "If we do this bill, and I think we will, there's enough support in the House to get this done. And I want to make sure that we have support in the Senate," Bacon said. Bacon maintained that he hopes "the speaker prevails. He's doing the right thing." He also suggested that Democrats could join several Republicans in helping save Johnson's speakership. "I do think there will be Democrats, though, who do not want to see this dysfunction. And I think they'll probably vote present or maybe not be there for a vote," Bacon said. Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C., indicated earlier Sunday that there's a scenario in which Bacon could be correct. "Would you protect [Johnson] if there was a move to oust him for bringing Ukraine aid to the floor?" Welker asked Clyburn earlier on "Meet the Press." "I stand in support of our leader, [House Minority Leader] Hakeem Jeffries," Clyburn said, adding: "If he were to call me and say, 'Look, I would like to have your vote in support of Johnson,' he’s got it." Bacon also indicated to Welker that Ukraine aid is likely to be brought up for a vote, saying he has a "commitment from the speaker and the chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee that we’re going to put this on the floor and get a vote." A vote on Ukraine aid in the House could pose a risk to Johnson’s speakership, given the division within the House Republican conference over the topic and the razor-thin majority the party holds. Before the chamber left for a two-week recess ahead of Easter, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., submitted a motion to vacate, which could lead to a House vote to oust Johnson as speaker. Greene did not file the motion as privileged, though, which would have forced the House to vote on the motion within 48 hours. Shortly after she filed the motion, Greene warned, "He should not bring funding for Ukraine" to the floor. Another contentious issue that's dividing House Republicans is the state of the ongoing House impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, which is being led by House Oversight Chair James Comer. Bacon suggested Sunday that the investigation may not have uncovered criminal wrongdoing. "Right now, the lawyers in the committee that I talk to say there’s not a specific crime, and you need that for high crime or misdemeanor," Bacon said. The statement seemingly conflicts with recent actions taken by Comer, who said in a fundraising email last week that he is "preparing criminal referrals as the culmination of my investigation." In a statement, a spokesperson for the House Oversight Committee told NBC News, "The purpose of these updates is not to advise members on criminal laws. Committee staff provide members with updates on the transcribed interviews and evidence. We intend to issue a comprehensive report that will address criminal violations at the end of our investigation.” Despite his statement about potential criminality, Bacon said Sunday that the allegations "merited an investigation." "[Let’s] put the facts out, let the public look at it, make a determination. And I think it’s good to be transparent, especially — we’re in an election year," he added. But asked by Welker whether it’s time to stop investigating the president if there is no evidence of high crimes and misdemeanors, Bacon said, "I don’t know if it’s time right now, but I do think we’re probably nearing the conclusion of this investigation." The White House has denied wrongdoing by Biden and in December said House Republicans were continuing down a "path of failure" with their probe.

Special Easter Egg Exhibit at the White House in Collaboration with America's Egg Farmers Celebrates National Guard Children 2024-03-31 12:56:00+00:00 - Loading... Loading... "Colonnade of Eggs" Exhibit Honors First Lady Jill Biden's Commitment to Supporting Military-Connected Families WASHINGTON, March 31, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- As part of the many Easter traditions celebrated at the White House, America's egg farmers are proud to have collaborated with the White House on the "Colonnade of Eggs," celebrating First Lady Jill Biden's commitment to supporting those who serve our country and their families. Appearing in the East Colonnade of the White House, the exhibit features eggs designed by children from National Guard families across the country. 2024 "Colonnade of Eggs" Represents National Guard Families Across the United States Children from National Guard families across the nation submitted egg designs to be featured at the 2024 White House "Colonnade of Eggs" exhibit. Designs crafted by National Guard children from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands will be on display. "Dan and I are so proud of the children of our National Guard families who took the time to submit these wonderful designs. What an honor to have their artwork displayed at the White House East Colonnade. Thank you to America's egg farmers for this partnership," says Mrs. Kelly Hokanson, National Guard Bureau Senior Spouse. "And thank you to the First Lady, Dr. Jill Biden, and to her Joining Forces initiative, for always remembering our children and providing them this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity." "On behalf of the American Egg Board and America's egg farmers, we are proud to support those who serve our country and their families through this special exhibit and of course to highlight eggs and egg farmers," says Emily Metz, president and CEO of the American Egg Board. "Each handcrafted egg highlights the unique experiences and stories of these children for thousands of tourists to see during the Easter season at the White House." Youth Designs Brought to Life During Easter Season Talented egg artists from across the country brought each child's creative vision to life on a real hen egg. The egg artists use various mediums and techniques, from painted to dioramas, etched and carved eggs. The beautiful eggs are best described by the children whose egg designs are featured in the exhibit: Allyson (Ally) P ., Colorado , age 8: "I love my family and my country. My dad used to fly F-16s and my mom works in aircraft maintenance in the Colorado Air National Guard. Living in Colorado is the best: the sun, the mountains, the snow, the rain, and all the nice people." "I love my family and my country. My dad used to fly F-16s and my mom works in aircraft maintenance in the Colorado Air National Guard. Living in is the best: the sun, the mountains, the snow, the rain, and all the nice people." Michaela W., Michigan , age 16: "Growing up as a military child, I was very patriotic. The photo on the front of my egg is a picture of me wearing a uniform along with a backpack brought back from Afghanistan . The photo on the back is of me hugging my dad after a training." "Growing up as a military child, I was very patriotic. The photo on the front of my egg is a picture of me wearing a uniform along with a backpack brought back from . The photo on the back is of me hugging my dad after a training." Leeam M., Puerto Rico , age 9: "My drawing represents the National Army Guard of Puerto Rico with the elements of the coqui and the flag." History of the White House "Colonnade of Eggs" Annually for the last 47 years, the American Egg Board, on behalf of its egg farmers, has presented a Commemorative Egg to the First Lady that reflects each individual First Lady's passions, causes and contributions in service to the nation. These eggs are produced by talented egg artists identified from across the country by the American Egg Board. For the last three years, the American Egg Board has collaborated with the White House on larger exhibits that showcase egg art during the spring season. In 2022, the "Colonnade of Eggs" exhibit featured more than 40 years of past First Ladies' Commemorative Eggs, marking the first time First Ladies' Commemorative Eggs representing multiple presidential administrations were on display together. In 2023, the American Egg Board curated a series of Easter eggs designed by students from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Guam, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands. The 2023 First Lady's Commemorative Egg will be included in the exhibit. Themed "The United States of Possibility," selected student designs were brought to life on real hen eggs by talented artists specializing in egg artistry. Loading... Loading... The opportunity this year and in previous years has allowed for children to bring their creativity to life in a way that celebrates the joy of eggs and reflects the identified theme while remaining non-discriminatory and not showing preference to any individual religious or political viewpoints as the American Egg Board is prohibited from doing as a national Checkoff organization. About the American Egg Board Home of The Incredible Egg, the American Egg Board supports America's egg farmers in its mission to increase demand for U.S. eggs and egg products through research, education and promotion. For more, visit IncredibleEgg.org. About the National Guard The National Guard is the primary combat reserve of the Army and Air Force providing enduring, rotational, surge, and follow-on forces to meet any Joint Force mission. Unique to the National Guard is our ability to apply the training and equipment from our wartime missions to our state responses in the homeland. When disaster strikes in the homeland, the National Guard stands ready to deploy and serve at a moment's notice to protect life and property in our communities. Through 89 State Partnership Program Partnerships, the National Guard is engaged with 106 partner nations, 54% of the world's nations, and ensuring the Department of Defense has capable, trusted and interoperable partners at our side. Our role in the National Guard is unique—and it is critical to the National Defense Strategy, our national security, and our global stability. We don't just celebrate history—through our unique position, our abilities, and our partnerships, we help write it. Actively serving throughout the 54 states, territories, and the District of Columbia and across the globe, the National Guard is Always Ready, Always There. For more information visit: https://www.nationalguard.mil/. SOURCE American Egg Board

Frasers’ new director is boyfriend of owner Mike Ashley’s daughter 2024-03-31 12:33:00+00:00 - The owner of Sports Direct, Frasers Group, has promoted the boyfriend of Mike Ashley’s youngest daughter to the company’s board, it has emerged. David Al-Mudallal, 31, the chief operating officer at Frasers, has been appointed to the board of Frasers, making him one of the youngest directors of a FTSE 100 company. The Sunday Times reported that Al-Mudallal is in a relationship with Matilda Ashley, 27, whose father is the majority shareholder in the £3.6bn company. The appointment means that two of the 11 members of Frasers board are in relationships with Ashley’s daughters. Michael Murray, 34, who became chief executive at Frasers in 2022, is married to Anna Ashley. Frasers has not breached any rules by failing to disclose the relationship between Matilda Ashley and Al-Mudallal, and it told the Sunday Times that it took governance seriously. It said Al-Mudallal had a successful track record in business. According to his LinkedIn profile, Al-Mudallal joined Sports Direct in 2017 as its head of talent. He was then made chief of staff at Frasers in 2019, before moving up to group head of operations and then to the role of chief operating officer in August 2021. He was appointed to the Frasers board last month. Before starting at Sports Direct he was a project engineer at the building maintenance firm East West Connect, after a getting a degree in American studies at the University of Sussex. Frasers, which was founded by Ashley in 1982, began life as one shop in Maidenhead called Ashley Sports. The group now owns more than 1,500 stores across 20 countries. It owns a string of high street chains including House of Fraser, Sports Direct, Flannels, Evans Cycles and Jack Wills. Ashley stepped down from the board in 2022 but still owns 73% of the shares and holds a wide-reaching consultancy role. Under Frasers’ executive share scheme, Al-Mudallal could be eligible for a £9m bonus if the share price stays above £15 for 30 days and Frasers reports at least £500m of annual profit by October 2025. skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Business Today Free daily newsletter Get set for the working day – we'll point you to all the business news and analysis you need every morning Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion It has been reported that Frasers bought Double Take, a beauty business run by Matilda Ashley, for £1 last October without informing shareholders. She has resigned as a director of Double Take. In a response to the Sunday Times, Frasers said: “Al-Mudallal is a highly regarded professional who was appointed to his role as chief operating officer and the board entirely on his merits. He has a successful track record in business. We are proud to have him serve. It is laughable to suggest the business would promote figures who were anything other than extremely qualified to do their job well.” The Guardian has contacted Frasers for comment.

Taylor Swift fan sues Delta Air Lines after being sexually assaulted by mechanic on flight 2024-03-31 11:47:34+00:00 - A Taylor Swift fan is suing Delta Air Lines after she was sexually assaulted on a flight. The lawsuit was also filed against the perpetrator, who was a Delta mechanic. Officials have warned such incidents are on the rise. NEW LOOK Sign up to get the inside scoop on today’s biggest stories in markets, tech, and business — delivered daily. Read preview Thanks for signing up! Access your favorite topics in a personalized feed while you're on the go. download the app Email address Sign up By clicking “Sign Up”, you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy . You can opt-out at any time. Advertisement A woman is suing Delta Air Lines after she was sexually assaulted on a flight last year. The woman was flying from Phoenix to Seattle on her way back from attending a Taylor Swift concert when the incident occurred, according to a press release from Mark Lindquist Law, an aviation and personal injury firm representing the victim. The lawsuit was filed in King County, Washington, against Delta and the perpetrator, who was a Delta mechanic at the time of the incident, Newsweek reported. Duane Brick, 53, pleaded guilty to abusive sexual contact in March, admitting that during the flight, he had taken the victim's hand and placed it on his crotch, per the US Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington. Advertisement He also reached under her shirt and groped her breast while she appeared to be asleep, per the Attorney's Office statement. Brick now faces up to two years in prison. The new lawsuit says that "as a common carrier, Delta owes the highest duty of care and has a legal duty to provide airline passengers, including the Plaintiff, with a safe flight that is free from unauthorized and abusive sexual contact from other passengers, including from Delta's own employees." It claims that the flight crew "overserved alcohol to Mr. Brick, failed to adequately train employees on how to prevent and address sexual assaults, and failed to properly monitor the cabin and protect passengers." It adds that the victim and a witness reported the incident to staff, but Brick was allowed to remain in his seat for another 15 minutes. Advertisement "Everyone should feel safe to fall asleep on a plane without the risk of being groped and sexually assaulted," Lindquist, the victim's attorney, said. "Airlines can and should do more to stop these gross violations," he added. Related stories Business Insider has reached out to Delta for comment. Delta is facing another lawsuit from the family of a 13-year-old girl who was also sexually assaulted on a flight. Advertisement The suit claimed Delta staff "enabled" the assault by allowing the "visibly intoxicated" offender, Brian Patrick Durning, to board the flight and serving him alcohol throughout. A Delta spokesperson said the company would not comment on pending litigation" but had "zero tolerance for unlawful behavior on flights and in airports." Sexual assaults on planes are increasing in the US A woman on a moving walkway at an airport. FilippoBacci/Getty Images US Attorney Tessa Gorman said that "the Western District of Washington continues to see an alarming increase in sexual abuse cases aboard aircraft." "Last August we emphasized that we have zero tolerance for such assaults. Sadly, we continue to learn of new allegations and are investigating and charging those cases," she added. Advertisement Indeed, The US Attorney's Office for the Western District of Washington highlighted two other incidents in March in its jurisdiction. A 38-year-old Indian citizen was arraigned on a charge of abusive sexual contact for an assault on a teen sitting near him on an Emirates flight to Seattle, it said. Meanwhile, Jack Roberson, 69, entered a plea of guilty to simple assault for his contact with a 15-year-old seated next to him on a July 2023 flight from Atlanta to Seattle. Roberson faces up to a year in prison when sentenced on June 5, 2024, said the US Attorney's Office on March 8. Sexual assaults on aircraft are also increasing nationally, with the FBI last year noting a "disturbing increase" in incidents. Advertisement It said that in the first half of 2023, 62 cases were under investigation, up from 27 in the whole of 2018.

Can this ‘ethical capitalist’ solve the UK’s social housing crisis? | Richard Partington 2024-03-31 11:26:00+00:00 - Britain is a nation obsessed with home ownership. A fundamental necessity for all turned commodity to speculate on, it is featured on daytime TV as entertainment, the sure-fire profit-spinner open to anyone. The truth, as we all know, is that the prospect of home ownership is drifting increasingly out of reach for millions. Figures released last week show that as few as 7% of local authorities in England and Wales have homes that can be bought for less than five times workers’ earnings and are therefore deemed “affordable”. In 1997 the figure was 88%. We have had decades of spiralling prices, flatlining wage growth and a dearth of new supply in the private or social sector. The result: a collapse in home ownership among under-35s from a peak in 1989, an explosion in private renting, more than 1.2m households on social housing waiting lists and rising inequality, poverty and homelessness. Approaching a general election, this ought to be troubling the party of government. Not least for one that has claimed to be the party of home ownership. But after 14 years of false starts and failed policy reboots, the housing crisis has gone from bad to worse. Last week Michael Gove showed how far down the agenda housing has fallen, in buckling to pressure from Tory backbenchers to water down much-needed reforms aimed at protecting renters. The focus is instead turning to Labour. But while Keir Starmer says Labour will be the new party of home ownership through a planning revolution, critics say his promises lack the financial firepower needed to make a real difference. In a book published this month, the retail tycoon Julian Richer aims to push housing to the top of the agenda. The book, Our Housing Disaster – and what we can do about it, spells out the challenge for an incoming government. A landlord himself with more than 300 properties, the self-proclaimed “ethical capitalist” behind the Richer Sounds hi-fi chain wants to make business work better for society. He says housing will need much tougher action from government to fix and cannot be left to the market alone. “The politicians are frightened of the subject, it’s become toxic for them because it has such a failure rate,” he says. “We see this merry-go-round of ministers, looking over their shoulder for the next job. So this is a really long-term problem. Millions of people here are being shafted and screwed and having miserable lives because of it. Why can’t we fix it? Why don’t our MPs have a bit more compassion and have a bit more common sense? This is affecting millions.” The book makes calls for short-term action – with the priority to improve the lives of renters through tougher protections against substandard accommodation, unscrupulous landlords and “revenge” evictions. But there are also longer-term measures in Richer’s manifesto, to deliver a national renaissance in affordable housebuilding. At its core is a plea to prioritise social housing after decades of neglect, with a warning that the scale of our housing disaster is so severe that a council housebuilding programme on a par with the reconstruction efforts after the second world war is necessary. Over the past four decades successive governments have moved away from social housing provision, with more than 2m council homes sold under Margaret Thatcher’s right-to-buy scheme, mostly never to be replaced amid a collapse in construction by cash-starved local authorities and housing associations. Richer would scrap the policy, arguing that while some first-time owners made a lot of money from it, today’s young people on low or moderate incomes are paying the price. Labour has said it would oversee the biggest boost in affordable housing in a generation by getting tough on developers and reforming planning rules. It would aim to deliver 1.5m homes over five years, in effect reinstating a previous 300,000-a-year Tory target. View image in fullscreen Julian Richer advocates building 3m public-sector homes over a decade. Photograph: David Levene/The Guardian Part of this will include postwar-style new towns, with development corporations given power to compulsorily purchase land at a price that does not reflect the value of potential planning permissions. Under rules brought in by Harold Macmillan’s Land Compensation Act of 1961, local authorities acquiring land must take into account “hope value” in the purchase price, adding value in the expectation it will gain planning permission in future. Labour could benefit from reforms made last year to allow local authorities to acquire land for “public interest” projects, including social housing, without paying hope value. But without entirely repealing Macmillan’s law, the process could still be slowed down and mired in legal challenges. Improving the planning system alone is unlikely to yield a transformative increase in private-sector housebuilding, however. Rather than targeting 300,000 homes from any source, Richer believes that a stretching target should be set for all of them to be genuinely affordable, through turbocharged social housing construction of 3m homes over a decade. “Nothing else will solve the country’s severe housing crisis,” he says. It will require financial firepower. But the businessman makes a compelling argument that billions are already spent subsidising the private market – through schemes such as Help to Buy, and through more than £100bn spent on housing benefit between 2016 and 2020, funnelling public money into the pockets of landlords. It is clear that money is readily available, and it could be better spent by constructing an asset that the state would own and generate income from. Britain has not built 300,000 homes a year since the moon landings in 1969. Back then about half were from local authorities and housing associations, at the tail end of a postwar housebuilding boom, before a collapse in social construction rates to just a few tens of thousands. Transforming the housing situation can be done, Richer says, because it has been done before. By the mid-1960s, huge numbers of people were living in clean, modern homes, a world away from the slums they had grown up in. But it happened because the political will was there to do it.

They came for Florida’s sun and sand. They got soaring costs and a culture war. 2024-03-31 11:00:00+00:00 - One of the first signs Barb Carter’s move to Florida wasn’t the postcard life she’d envisioned was the armadillo infestation in her home that caused $9,000 in damages. Then came a hurricane, ever present feuding over politics, and an inability to find a doctor to remove a tumor from her liver. After a year in the Sunshine State, Carter packed her car with whatever belongings she could fit and headed back to her home state of Kansas — selling her Florida home at a $40,000 loss and leaving behind the children and grandchildren she’d moved to be closer to. “So many people ask, ‘Why would you move back to Kansas?’ I tell them all the same thing — you’ve got to take your vacation goggles off,” Carter said. “For me, it was very falsely promoted. Once living there, I thought, you know, this isn’t all you guys have cracked this up to be, at all.” Florida has had a population boom over the past several years, with more than 700,000 people moving there in 2022, and it was the second-fastest-growing state as of July 2023, according to Census Bureau data. While there are some indications that migration to the state has slowed from its pandemic highs, only Texas saw more one-way U-Haul moves into the state than Florida last year. Mortgage application data indicated there were nearly two homebuyers moving to Florida in 2023 for every one leaving, according to data analytics firm CoreLogic. But while hundreds of thousands of new residents have flocked to the state on the promise of beautiful weather, no income tax and lower costs, nearly 500,000 left in 2022, according to the most recent census data. Contributing to their move was a perfect storm of soaring insurance costs, a hostile political environment, worsening traffic and extreme weather, according to interviews with more than a dozen recent transplants and longtime residents who left the state in the past two years.

Trump’s ‘God Bless USA’ Bible isn’t about faith. It’s about revenge. 2024-03-31 10:25:28+00:00 - Just in time for Easter, cash-strapped Donald Trump’s new moneymaking scheme is a “God Bless the USA” Bible that, according to its sales website, is the only version endorsed by the former president. For anyone who believes that the holy book is the complete and infallible word of God (as Trump’s target audience claims to), Trump and his sidekick, country singer Lee Greenwood, have supplemented this very special edition with the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, the Pledge of Allegiance and the chorus lyrics to Greenwood’s alternative MAGA national anthem, “God Bless the USA.” Like all Trump merchandising schemes, this one is cringey and tacky and represents the greed, the grift and the grotesque that’s wrong with Trumpism. The God Bless the USA Bible is obviously and squarely aimed at Trump’s existing base of true believers. But it is also attempting to hide, in soft-focus God-and-country pabulum, Trump’s more sinister goals of exacting revenge and obliterating the rights and freedoms of anyone who is not on board with him ruling America with an iron fist, with the Christian right at his side. Trump knows that his supporters believe God ordained America as a Christian nation. The people most likely to want a Trump-branded Bible, presented with a blasphemous kitsch factor on par with a Jesus bobblehead, are Trump’s evangelical base. Surely Trump knows that most of them already have their own Bibles, but he’s counting on a good chunk of them forking over $59.99 (plus shipping) to have a version of God’s word endorsed by the arbiter of the “correct” or “only” Bible: the person they admire as much as or more than Jesus himself. Such customers are also unlikely to object to the glaring sacrilege of licensing his image to sell Bibles for quick cash. Nor will they mind that the cash crunch is fueled by civil judgments holding him liable for sexual abuse, defamation and fraud. (The God Bless the USA Bible website insists that none of the proceeds will go to the Trump campaign, but rather that it “uses Donald J. Trump’s name, likeness and image under paid license from CIC Ventures LLC,” which is, although the website doesn’t disclose it, a Trump-affiliated company.) White evangelicals, Trump’s most loyal followers, are unbothered by his legal travails. The fact that Trump is facing multiple civil and criminal trials is proof not of any wrongdoing, but of his persecution by malevolent forces. Out of curiosity, I put one of the Bibles in an online shopping cart, and was promptly offered add-ons of a Lee Greenwood “God Bless the USA” 40th Anniversary Coin (also $59.99) and a “Make America Pray Again” hat (discounted from $30 to $25). While these low, low prices weren’t quite generous enough to sway me, they were a reminder that Trump and his supporters really do want to make the rest of us do what they want. Trump knows that his supporters believe God ordained America as a Christian nation. They believe they are waging a spiritual war (both at Trump’s direction and on his behalf) to wrest a demeaned nation back from Joe Biden, the “deep state” and the Democratic Party, which Trump portrays as anti-American and, importantly, anti-Christian. Trump’s base believes they are fighting with him and for him, and that he is fighting with them and for them, to restore a country where everyone must have an all-in-one King James Version Bible, founding documents, and a patriotic song that has become synonymous with Trump. All for $59.99 plus shipping. In his Truth Social post promoting the venture, Trump described the Bible as his “favorite” book. It’s true that lately, as compared to his evident lack of familiarity with the book when he first ran in 2016, he has become more enamored of citing its contents. Recently, he posted about a note he’d received from a supporter who cited Psalm 109, a passage about praying for vengeance against enemies. “It’s ironic that Christ walked through His greatest persecution the very week they are trying to steal your property from you,” Trump said his correspondent wrote. “But have you seen this verse…?” Trump has successfully conflated his supposed persecution with the supposed persecution of Christians in America. Beyond the problematic likening of a civil fraud judgment to the persecution of Jesus, the former president’s obvious pleasure at receiving this note points to how he really sees his Bible ad. For Trump, the election is about him avoiding legal liability for myriad crimes, including attempting to overturn the 2020 election results. He views returning to office as an opportunity for retaliation on a massive scale. Because Trump has successfully conflated his supposed persecution with the supposed persecution of Christians in America, he can count on his base to support him as long as he pushes its theocratic agenda. Their toxic alliance is a threat to everyone else’s freedom — LGBTQ people, immigrants, non-Christians, anti-Christian nationalist Christians, women, academics, scientists, Trump critics and more. His endorsement of the God Bless the USA Bible signals not piety or patriotism but retribution.

Gmail revolutionized email 20 years ago. People thought it was Google’s April Fool’s Day joke 2024-03-31 09:27:56+00:00 - SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Google co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin loved pulling pranks, so much so they began rolling outlandish ideas every April Fool’s Day not long after starting their company more than a quarter century ago. One year, Google posted a job opening for a Copernicus research center on the moon. Another year, the company said it planned to roll out a “scratch and sniff” feature on its search engine. The jokes were so consistently over-the-top that people learned to laugh them off as another example of Google mischief. And that’s why Page and Brin decided to unveil something no one would believe was possible 20 years ago on April Fool’s Day. It was Gmail, a free service boasting 1 gigabyte of storage per account, an amount that sounds almost pedestrian in an age of one-terabyte iPhones. But it sounded like a preposterous amount of email capacity back then, enough to store about 13,500 emails before running out of space compared to just 30 to 60 emails in the then-leading webmail services run by Yahoo and Microsoft. That translated into 250 to 500 times more email storage space. Besides the quantum leap in storage, Gmail also came equipped with Google’s search technology so users could quickly retrieve a tidbit from an old email, photo or other personal information stored on the service. It also automatically threaded together a string of communications about the same topic so everything flowed together as if it was a single conversation. “The original pitch we put together was all about the three ‘S’s” — storage, search and speed,” said former Google executive Marissa Mayer, who helped design Gmail and other company products before later becoming Yahoo’s CEO. It was such a mind-bending concept that shortly after The Associated Press published a story about Gmail late on the afternoon of April Fool’s 2004, readers began calling and emailing to inform the news agency it had been duped by Google’s pranksters. “That was part of the charm, making a product that people won’t believe is real. It kind of changed people’s perceptions about the kinds of applications that were possible within a web browser,” former Google engineer Paul Buchheit recalled during a recent AP interview about his efforts to build Gmail. It took three years to do as part of a project called “Caribou” — a reference to a running gag in the Dilbert comic strip. “There was something sort of absurd about the name Caribou, it just made make me laugh,” said Buchheit, the 23rd employee hired at a company that now employs more than 180,000 people. The AP knew Google wasn’t joking about Gmail because an AP reporter had been abruptly asked to come down from San Francisco to the company’s Mountain View, California, headquarters to see something that would make the trip worthwhile. After arriving at a still-developing corporate campus that would soon blossom into what became known as the “Googleplex,” the AP reporter was ushered into a small office where Page was wearing an impish grin while sitting in front of his laptop computer. Page, then just 31 years old, proceeded to show off Gmail’s sleekly designed inbox and demonstrated how quickly it operated within Microsoft’s now-retired Explorer web browser. And he pointed out there was no delete button featured in the main control window because it wouldn’t be necessary, given Gmail had so much storage and could be so easily searched. “I think people are really going to like this,” Page predicted. As with so many other things, Page was right. Gmail now has an estimated 1.8 billion active accounts — each one now offering 15 gigabytes of free storage bundled with Google Photos and Google Drive. Even though that’s 15 times more storage than Gmail initially offered, it’s still not enough for many users who rarely see the need to purge their accounts, just as Google hoped. The digital hoarding of email, photos and other content is why Google, Apple and other companies now make money from selling additional storage capacity in their data centers. (In Google’s case, it charges anywhere from $30 annually for 200 gigabytes of storage to $250 annually for 5 terabytes of storage). Gmail’s existence is also why other free email services and the internal email accounts that employees use on their jobs offer far more storage than was fathomed 20 years ago. “We were trying to shift the way people had been thinking because people were working in this model of storage scarcity for so long that deleting became a default action,” Buchheit said. Gmail was a game changer in several other ways while becoming the first building block in the expansion of Google’s internet empire beyond its still-dominant search engine. After Gmail came Google Maps and Google Docs with word processing and spreadsheet applications. Then came the acquisition of video site YouTube, followed by the introduction of the the Chrome browser and the Android operating system that powers most of the world’s smartphones. With Gmail’s explicitly stated intention to scan the content of emails to get a better understanding of users’ interests, Google also left little doubt that digital surveillance in pursuit of selling more ads would be part of its expanding ambitions. Although it immediately generated a buzz, Gmail started out with a limited scope because Google initially only had enough computing capacity to support a small audience of users. “When we launched, we only had 300 machines and they were really old machines that no one else wanted,” Buchheit said, with a chuckle. “We only had enough capacity for 10,000 users, which is a little absurd.” But that scarcity created an air of exclusivity around Gmail that drove feverish demand for an elusive invitations to sign up. At one point, invitations to open a Gmail account were selling for $250 apiece on eBay. “It became a bit like a social currency, where people would go, ‘Hey, I got a Gmail invite, you want one?’” Buchheit said. Although signing up for Gmail became increasingly easier as more of Google’s network of massive data centers came online, the company didn’t begin accepting all comers to the email service until it opened the floodgates as a Valentine’s Day present to the world in 2007. A few weeks later on April Fool’s Day in 2007, Google would announce a new feature called “Gmail Paper” offering users the chance to have Google print out their email archive on “94% post-consumer organic soybean sputum " and then have it sent to them through the Postal Service. Google really was joking around that time.

Boots, Backpack and a Ubiquitous App 2024-03-31 09:01:14+00:00 - Close your eyes and imagine a stereotypical hiker. Do the words “rugged” and “built Ford tough” come to mind? Are they wearing khaki shorts? Is a tube attached to a CamelBak hanging from their mouth? Whatever you imagined, that hiker is probably using the app AllTrails. In fact, just about everyone is. Even people who don’t know what a CamelBak is or who have no idea what the term “out-and-back” means. In the world of AllTrails, a hiker of any skill level is still a hiker. Many of them find the app in the same way. “Just through Googling, how to get into hiking, AllTrails would just come up a lot,” said Jessica Wood, who co-owns French Custard, an ice cream shop in Kansas City, Mo. “It’s a free app, so we were like, ‘We’ll download it and see what happens.’ We never deleted it.”

As Graffiti Moves From Eyesore to Amenity, Landlords Try to Cash In 2024-03-31 09:00:50+00:00 - Julian Phethean’s first canvas in London was a shed in his backyard where he covered the walls with bold lettering in spray paint. When he moved his art to the city’s streets in the 1980s, it was largely unwelcome — and he was even arrested a few times. “We had nowhere to practice,” he said. “It was just seen as vandalism.” These days, the canvases come to Mr. Phethean, better known as the muralist Mr Cenz. Recent facades, which he shares with his sizable following, have included an abstract mural on a Tesla showroom and a portrait of Biggie Smalls, sponsored by Pepsi Max. “I never would have envisioned that I’d be able to do it for a living,” he said. Landlords wanting to attract young professionals once scrubbed off the rebellious scrawls. That was before graffiti moved from countercultural to mainstream. Now building owners are willing to pay for it. From Berlin to London to Miami, the wider acceptance of graffiti has attracted developers looking to expand into trendy areas, companies wanting to relocate to hipper neighborhoods and brands seeking creative ways to advertise their products.

Romania and Bulgaria partially join Europe’s Schengen travel zone, but checks at land borders remain 2024-03-31 08:21:56+00:00 - SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — Romania and Bulgaria partially joined Europe’s ID-check-free travel zone on Sunday, marking a new step in the two countries’ integration with the European Union. After years of negotiations to join the Schengen area, there is now free access for travelers arriving by air or sea from both countries. However, land border checks will remain in place due to opposition primarily from Austria which has long blocked their bid over illegal migration concerns. EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen hailed the change as a “huge success for both countries” and a “historic moment” for what is the world’s largest free travel zone. The Schengen Area was established in 1985. Before Bulgaria and Romania’s admission, it was comprised of 23 of the 27 EU member countries, along with Switzerland, Norway, Iceland and Liechtenstein. Around 3.5 million people cross an internal border each day. Austria vetoed Romania and Bulgaria’s admission into the Schengen zone at the end of 2022 but allowed Croatia full accession. Bulgaria and Romania joined the EU in 2007 and Croatia in 2013. Siegfried Muresan, a Romanian Member of the European Parliament, told The Associated Press that it is “an important first step” that will benefit millions of travelers annually. “Bulgaria and Romania have been fulfilling all criteria for joining the Schengen area for years — we are entitled to join with the terrestrial border as well,” he said, adding that it “will offer additional arguments to the last EU member state that has been vetoing the full accession.” Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu called it a “well-deserved achievement” for Romania that he said will benefit citizens who can travel more easily and will bolster the economy. “We have a clear and firmly assumed government plan for full accession to the Schengen Area by the end of the year,” he said. The EU’s executive branch, the European Commission, has said for more than a decade that Romania and Bulgaria both meet the technical criteria for full accession, which requires unanimous support from their partners. Both countries have agreed to implement random security screening at airports and maritime borders to combat illegal migration and cross-border crime. “Bulgaria’s full accession to Schengen will happen by the end of 2024,” Kalin Stoyanov, Bulgaria’s interior minister, told reporters on Sunday. “We showed and continue to show to illegal migrants that they should not take the road to Europe through Bulgaria.” The lifting of border control is expected to facilitate operations at Bulgaria’s four international airports, which in 2023 saw nearly 11 million passengers, according to official data. The airport in the capital, Sofia, serves as the biggest hub for Schengen flights which constitute 70% of all flights, airport representatives said. While the eased regulations are expected to positively impact the tourism sector, members of the European Parliament have voiced concerns about long queues at the EU’s land borders and the impact it can have on trade in the bloc’s single market, as well as the health and safety of drivers. Truck drivers are frequently stuck in kilometers-long queues at the borders of both Romania and Bulgaria. The Union of International Carriers in Bulgaria estimates delays cost the sector tens of millions of euros each year. ___ McGrath reported from Sighisoara, Romania.

Can We Engineer Our Way Out of the Climate Crisis? 2024-03-31 07:00:38+00:00 - On a windswept Icelandic plateau, an international team of engineers and executives is powering up an innovative machine designed to alter the very composition of Earth’s atmosphere. If all goes as planned, the enormous vacuum will soon be sucking up vast quantities of air, stripping out carbon dioxide and then locking away those greenhouse gases deep underground in ancient stone — greenhouse gases that would otherwise continue heating up the globe. Just a few years ago, technologies like these, that attempt to re-engineer the natural environment, were on the scientific fringe. They were too expensive, too impractical, too sci-fi. But with the dangers from climate change worsening, and the world failing to meet its goals of slashing greenhouse gas emissions, they are quickly moving to the mainstream among both scientists and investors, despite questions about their effectiveness and safety. First in a series on the risky ways humans are starting to manipulate nature to fight climate change. Once science fiction, today these ideas are becoming reality. Researchers are studying ways to block some of the sun’s radiation. They are testing whether adding iron to the ocean could carry carbon dioxide to the sea floor. They are hatching plans to build giant parasols in space. And with massive facilities like the one in Iceland, they are seeking to reduce the concentration of carbon dioxide in the air.

ExxonMobil accused of ‘greenwashing’ over carbon capture plan it failed to invest in 2024-03-31 06:01:00+00:00 - Motorists concerned about the impact on the planet of petrol and diesel cars may be comforted by Esso’s marketing campaign on “thoughtful driving”. One of its most eye-catching initiatives is a proposal to trap carbon dioxide at a vast oil refinery and petrochemical complex on the south coast and store it under the seabed of the English Channel. The oil refinery at Fawley, a village in Hampshire, is operated by the US firm ExxonMobil, Esso’s parent company. The oil firm says the scheme will mean drivers can “fill up with less impact” and make “a major contribution to the UK’s move to net zero”. But now the oil giant faces allegations of greenwashing as an investigation by openDemocracy reveals that the project may never get off the drawing board. It hasn’t received a licence or government support, and the company has not committed any of its own money to build it. Paul Greenwood, Exxon’s UK boss, has said a 2030 target to complete a first phase of construction may be hit only “if you wave a magic wand”. Doug Parr, chief scientist for Greenpeace UK, said carbon capture and storage was hailed by the oil industry as a “miraculous silver bullet”, but had failed to deliver. “Carbon capture and storage does not appear to be much closer to reducing carbon emissions, or being affordable, than it did 20 years ago,” he said. “This scheme stands out as greenwashing.” Carbon capture and storage (CCS) involves isolating and trapping CO 2 emissions where they are produced – such as at a power station, refinery or incinerator. The captured gas can either be used to make products, such as synthetic fuel or fizzy drinks, or it can be transported by pipeline or ship to a permanent storage site deep under the seabed. But the technology has developed “at a snail’s pace”, according to analysts. There were just 41 CCS plants operating globally by the end of last year, none of them in the UK. Collectively, they captured about 0.1% of annual global CO 2 emissions. Four industrial “clusters” in Scotland, north-west England, Teesside and the Humber have been selected for funding by the UK government, but final investment decisions have not been made on any of the schemes. Exxon’s plans for Fawley would see the company build a new “blue hydrogen” plant, which manufactures low-carbon hydrogen. The company claims it would capture 2.7m tonnes of CO 2 each year from the process. A Solent Cluster report funded by the company claims it could “begin operations” in 2030. The report also claims that the CO2 captured at Fawley would be piped under the seabed somewhere off the Isle of Wight. However, Exxon is yet to secure either a carbon storage licence for the English Channel site or government support for the project. The Solent Cluster, which Exxon co-founded, applied unsuccessfully for government funding for the Fawley scheme last year. Exxon helped launch the report in the House of Commons last month, at an event attended by the energy minister Martin Callanan. At the event, Greenwood was asked whether his company would be able to fulfil its claim that it could start capturing CO2 at Fawley by 2030. “We are not there yet,” he replied. “It depends on when you go through the investment decision. If you wave a magic wand and say ‘you’ve got all the investment that you need’, then you can hit that kind of timeline.” skip past newsletter promotion Sign up to Down to Earth Free weekly newsletter The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential Enter your email address Sign up Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy . We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. after newsletter promotion Exxon has so far refused to commit its own money to build it and has instead focused investment on increasing diesel production at the refinery, spending £800m to produce an extra 6m litres a day. The refinery is already the largest in the UK and provides fuels for the equivalent of one in every five vehicles on Britain’s roads. Dustin Benton, policy director of the Green Alliance thinktank and a member of Carbon Capture, Usage and Storage Council, a government-appointed advisory body, said: “[Carbon capture and storage] is likely to be necessary to reach net zero, but the technology can’t be used as an excuse to carry on drilling oil and gas, or expanding the production of petrol and diesel.” A spokesperson for the Solent Cluster claimed the Fawley project and other carbon capture and hydrogen projects in the area could secure 70,000 jobs. An Exxon spokesperson said the company was committed to playing a key role in the energy transition. “This transition takes time and is not a linear process, with pace and direction shaped by factors including technology advances, enabling policy, economy and public support. “We continue to engage positively with government to demonstrate our capabilities and the direct contribution we can make to net zero and are hopeful that these efforts will help The Solent Cluster gain support to deliver its potential.”

Extreme drought in southern Africa leaves millions hungry 2024-03-31 05:21:17+00:00 - MANGWE, Zimbabwe (AP) — Delicately and with intense concentration, Zanyiwe Ncube poured her small share of precious golden cooking oil into a plastic bottle at a food aid distribution site deep in rural Zimbabwe. “I don’t want to lose a single drop,” she said. Her relief at the handout — paid for by the United States government as her southern African country deals with a severe drought — was tempered when aid workers gently broke the news that this would be their last visit. USAID and the United Nations’ World Food Programme aim to help some of the 2.7 million people in rural Zimbabwe threatened with hunger because of the drought that has enveloped large parts of southern Africa since late last year. (March 31) (AP Video/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi and Kenneth Jali) Ncube and her 7-month-old son she carried on her back were among 2,000 people who received rations of cooking oil, sorghum, peas and other supplies in the Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe. The food distribution is part of a program funded by American aid agency USAID and rolled out by the United Nations’ World Food Programme. They’re aiming to help some of the 2.7 million people in rural Zimbabwe threatened with hunger because of the drought that has enveloped large parts of southern Africa since late 2023. It has scorched the crops that tens of millions of people grow themselves and rely on to survive, helped by what should be the rainy season. They can rely on their crops and the weather less and less. A woman sits a in wheelbarrow while waiting to receive food aid in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi) Women share peas during a food aid distribution in Mangwe district in southwestern Zimbabwe, Friday, March, 22, 2024. (AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi) The drought in Zimbabwe, neighboring Zambia and Malawi has reached crisis levels. Zambia and Malawi have declared national disasters. Zimbabwe could be on the brink of doing the same. The drought has reached Botswana and Angola to the west, and Mozambique and Madagascar to the east. A year ago, much of this region was drenched by deadly tropical storms and floods. It is in the midst of a vicious weather cycle: too much rain, then not enough. It’s a story of the climate extremes that scientists say are becoming more frequent and more damaging, especially for the world’s most vulnerable people. In Mangwe, the young and the old lined up for food, some with donkey carts to carry home whatever they might get, others with wheelbarrows. Those waiting their turn sat on the dusty ground. Nearby, a goat tried its luck with a nibble on a thorny, scraggly bush. Ncube, 39, would normally be harvesting her crops now — food for her, her two children and a niece she also looks after. Maybe there would even be a little extra to sell. The driest February in Zimbabwe in her lifetime, according to the World Food Programme’s seasonal monitor, put an end to that. “We have nothing in the fields, not a single grain,” she said. “Everything has been burnt (by the drought).” The United Nations Children’s Fund says there are “overlapping crises” of extreme weather in eastern and southern Africa, with both regions lurching between storms and floods and heat and drought in the past year. In southern Africa, an estimated 9 million people, half of them children, need help in Malawi. More than 6 million in Zambia, 3 million of them children, are impacted by the drought, UNICEF said. That’s nearly half of Malawi’s population and 30% of Zambia’s. “Distressingly, extreme weather is expected to be the norm in eastern and southern Africa in the years to come,” said Eva Kadilli, UNICEF’s regional director. While human-made climate change has spurred more erratic weather globally, there is something else parching southern Africa this year. El Niño, the naturally occurring climatic phenomenon that warms parts of the Pacific Ocean every two to seven years, has varied effects on the world’s weather. In southern Africa, it means below-average rainfall, sometimes drought, and is being blamed for the current situation. The impact is more severe for those in Mangwe, where it’s notoriously arid. People grow the cereal grain sorghum and pearl millet, crops that are drought resistant and offer a chance at harvests, but even they failed to withstand the conditions this year. Francesca Erdelmann, the World Food Programme’s country director for Zimbabwe, said last year’s harvest was bad, but this season is even worse. “This is not a normal circumstance,” she said. The first few months of the year are traditionally the “lean months” when households run short as they wait for the new harvest. However, there is little hope for replenishment this year. Joseph Nleya, a 77-year-old traditional leader in Mangwe, said he doesn’t remember it being this hot, this dry, this desperate. “Dams have no water, riverbeds are dry and boreholes are few. We were relying on wild fruits, but they have also dried up,” he said. People are illegally crossing into Botswana to search for food and “hunger is turning otherwise hard-working people into criminals,” he added. Multiple aid agencies warned last year of the impending disaster. Since then, Zambian President Hakainde Hichilema has said that 1 million of the 2.2 million hectares of his country’s staple corn crop have been destroyed. Malawian President Lazarus Chakwera has appealed for $200 million in humanitarian assistance. The 2.7 million struggling in rural Zimbabwe is not even the full picture. A nationwide crop assessment is underway and authorities are dreading the results, with the number needing help likely to skyrocket, said the WFP’s Erdelmann. With this year’s harvest a write-off, millions in Zimbabwe, southern Malawi, Mozambique and Madagascar won’t be able to feed themselves well into 2025. USAID’s Famine Early Warning System estimated that 20 million people would require food relief in southern Africa in the first few months of 2024. Many won’t get that help, as aid agencies also have limited resources amid a global hunger crisis and a cut in humanitarian funding by governments. As the WFP officials made their last visit to Mangwe, Ncube was already calculating how long the food might last her. She said she hoped it would be long enough to avert her greatest fear: that her youngest child would slip into malnutrition even before his first birthday. ___ Imray reported from Cape Town, South Africa. ___ The Associated Press receives financial support for global health and development coverage in Africa from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

China’s manufacturing activity expands in March after a 5-month lull 2024-03-31 04:46:10+00:00 - BEIJING (AP) — Manufacturing in China expanded in March after contracting for five consecutive months, according to an official survey of factory managers released Sunday, suggesting a rebound in industrial activities following the Lunar New Year holiday. The official purchasing managers index, or PMI, rose from 49.1 in February to 50.8 in March. The PMI is on a scale up to 100, where 50 marks the cutoff between expansion and contraction. The monthly manufacturing PMI has mostly been under 50 over the past 12 months: Other than this month, factory activities only recorded an expansion in September. National Bureau of Statistics senior statistician Zhao Qinghe said the market became more active as companies resumed and sped up production after the Lunar New Year holiday. Many factories stopped running during the holiday, with social media posts suggesting workers at some companies were off for as many as 140 days starting in late 2023 due to the lack of new orders. Zhao said the survey also showed some problems for companies remained, including increasing competition in industries and a lack of market demand. During the annual session of the National People’s Congress in March, China said it would encourage consumers to scrap old appliances and trade in their cars for electric vehicles to help spur more domestic demand. And it said 10.4 billion yuan ($1.4 billion) would go to upgrading industries and modernizing manufacturing. Zhao said the policies promoting the trade-ins of consumer goods and large-scale equipment upgrades still needed further implementation to support the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry. According to the survey released Sunday, the non-manufacturing PMI rose to 53 from 51.4 in February. The reading is the highest since June 2023. The recovery of the world’s second-largest economy following the shocks of the pandemic faced many obstacles, one of the largest being a downturn in the real estate industry after authorities moved to curb excess borrowing by property developers. The ruling Communist Party’s target is to grow the economy by about 5% this year, an ambition that economists say may be hard to attain.

‘I am so scared of them now’: Burned from overspending, some ‘buy now, pay later’ users warn others away 2024-03-30 23:12:00+00:00 - Many consumers find buying now and paying later a godsend when cash is tight. Others are wishing they’d paid upfront to avoid pain later. Tia Whiteside, 27, knew she was spending more than she would have without buy now, pay later services — the popular loans that let borrowers split purchases into installments with little or no interest. Planning a day trip to the beach with her 2-year-old son last year, she spent $800 on Amazon purchases including a tent, new outfits and a high-end sandcastle kit with the BNPL provider Affirm. Whiteside, a Greenville, South Carolina-based behavioral analyst who treats childhood autism, makes good money; she and her husband bring in about $110,000 per year combined. But the $6,000 in BNPL loans she’d racked up over roughly two years felt frivolous, she said, especially because they’re planning to buy their first home. “I was just seeing my paycheck continually eaten up,” said Whiteside, “and I was like, ‘Where’s my money going?’” The last straw was a $600 Dyson hair styler and dryer, which she’s used just once since purchasing it with Affirm at Neiman Marcus in early February. By mid-March, Whiteside said she’d deleted the Klarna and Afterpay apps from her phone — but held on to Affirm, because she still owes it money. BNPL services have taken off among shoppers across income and credit levels for various reasons. Many are seeking cover from high credit card interest rates. Some, having burned through traditional credit options, are desperate for financial lifelines. Others are simply looking to better manage their cash flow. The fastest uptake has been among consumers 35 and younger, who represent more than half of BNPL borrowers, LexisNexis Risk Solutions found late last year. Many are increasingly using the loans for daily essentials, not just big-ticket purchases. While some already see them as a routine tool in their wallets, others, like Whiteside, are turning away in alarm. “I can pay on my credit cards more freely if I don’t have that other consumer debt,” Whiteside has since realized, referring to her existing $10,000 card balance. After trimming her discretionary spending and sticking to home-cooked meals, she said she’s been able to whittle down her BNPL debt to about $1,200. Story continues As BNPL usage soars, financial experts and researchers have raised alarms about risky spending on the platforms, even though they can often be used responsibly. “I’m sure there are people who use it well, but on average, we feel it kind of replaces the credit card,” said Ben Lourie, an accounting professor at the University of California, Irvine. “People are consuming extra. There’s just no way around it.” Lourie and fellow researchers at UC Irvine, Stanford and Singapore Management University analyzed the bank and credit card data of nearly 11 million consumers. They found that BNPL users racked up at least $176 more per year in overdraft fees, credit card interest and late fees after starting to use the services. While the transaction data they scrutinized, in a paper released March 21, ranged from 2014 to 2021, Lourie said he suspects the overspending has “gotten worse.” But that may be difficult to gauge, in part because BNPL loans aren’t uniformly reported to major credit agencies, creating “phantom debt” that lenders aren’t always able to see. Some borrowers have been warning others on social media against buying now and paying later, with a few criticizing the services’ advertising practices. “I’ve got like 10 PayPal pay in 4 plans left (thankfully those are almost done) $500 in affirm plans, and $2k on credit cards,” one Reddit user wrote last year. “I just tried to get my parents off my student loans and was told I can’t due to my rotating debt to income ratio.” “I finally paid my Afterpay bill, and they immediately emailed me to purchase shoes on an installment plan,” a poster on X said in February. “What part of I’m poor do they not understand?” The services have drawn attention from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which found last year that most BNPL users had higher credit card utilization rates and lower credit scores than non-BNPL borrowers. Many appeared to be leaning on the installment loans while also shouldering high rates on revolving credit card balances, the agency said. That report also found Black consumers were 65% more likely to borrow on BNPL than the general population, followed by Hispanic consumers (47%) and female consumers (35%). After about three or four years of using BNPL services for designer clothes, handbags and Apple devices, Amy Baird, 39, was staring down more than $9,000 in debt. “It caught up to me,” said Baird, who lives in Dallas and works as a claims clerk for an insurance company. “I had put myself in a pretty big hole,” she said, adding that she found support in a subreddit focused on shopping addiction. Her boyfriend helped her secure a low-interest balance transfer card, making it easier to tackle the loans one provider at a time, she said. After paying off her other three major BNPL lenders, Baird said, her Affirm balance of about $1,200 is all that’s left. Financial planners often advise compulsive shoppers to take a beat after putting something in their online carts — to consider payment strategies or wait a day and come back. But BNPL platforms can make it hard to press pause, some borrowers and financial experts said. Whiteside recalled getting smartphone notifications from her Affirm app shortly after paying off a loan, telling her, “‘You’ve got this much pre-approved to spend,’ and that just feels kind of icky,” she said. Many consumer lending products, including traditional credit cards, regularly dangle promotions to attract and maintain borrowers. But Kevin Mahoney, a Washington, D.C.-based financial planner, said BNPL services are set up in ways that can feed habits his clients are working to break. “You don’t really have to do anything other than click ‘purchase,’” he said. That frictionlessness can be especially tempting “on days when people are tired or stressed and you just have less willpower,” said Mahoney, who works mainly with millennial consumers. Many younger borrowers — especially those with big, new financial obligations like student loans — find the extent of their overspending sneaks up on them suddenly, he said. Affirm didn’t comment on its advertising but said it underwrites every lending decision to help ensure users aren’t overextended. “You see exactly the total cost upfront before you decide whether or not to transact, and it doesn’t perpetuate these debt cycles with compounding interest or profiting from junk fees and complicated math,” a spokesperson said. Afterpay pointed to features designed to “safeguard” consumers, including the ability to lower their spending limits and customize notifications. PayPal said it emphasized “payment flexibility and choice” at checkout and factored borrowers’ repayment histories into its lending decisions. Klarna said it had responsible spending limits for its users, whose average outstanding balance is $150, compared to the more than $6,000 for credit card users. Some lawmakers have called for more scrutiny of BNPL services. Last fall, Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, who heads the Senate banking committee, joined Sens. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., and John Fetterman, D-Pa., in a letter urging the CFPB to ensure BNPL providers didn’t “take advantage of struggling consumers” ahead of the holiday season. “Aggressive advertising encourages consumers to use these plans for multiple purchases, at multiple online stores — racking up debt they cannot afford to repay,” Brown said in a statement to NBC News. Baird, for her part, acknowledged BNPL services can make inflation and high interest rates feel “easier” for those who can keep their shopping impulses under control. But she’s sworn them off for good and encourages others to proceed with caution. “I am so scared of them now,” she said. “I don’t need that in my life.” This article was originally published on NBCNews.com

AT&T Resets Millions of Passcodes After Customer Records Are Leaked 2024-03-30 21:05:28+00:00 - The telecommunications giant AT&T announced on Saturday that it had reset the passcodes of 7.6 million customers after it determined that compromised customer data was “released on the dark web.” “Our internal teams are working with external cybersecurity experts to analyze the situation,” AT&T said. “To the best of our knowledge, the compromised data appears to be from 2019 or earlier and does not contain personal financial information or call history.” The company said that “information varied by customer and account,” but that it may have included a person’s full name, email address, mailing address, phone number, Social Security number, date of birth, AT&T account number and passcode. In addition to those 7.6 million customers, 65.4 million former account holders were also affected. The company said it would be “reaching out to individuals with compromised sensitive personal information separately and offering complimentary identity theft and credit monitoring services.”

AT&T informs users of data breach and resets millions of passcodes 2024-03-30 19:47:00+00:00 - A look at what caused the massive AT&T outage nationwide What was behind the massive AT&T outage What was behind the massive AT&T outage AT&T said it has begun notifying millions of customers about the theft of personal data recently discovered online. The telecommunications giant said Saturday that a dataset found on the "dark web" contains information such as Social Security numbers for about 7.6 million current AT&T account holders and 65.4 million former account holders. The company said it has already reset the passcodes of current users and will be communicating with account holders whose sensitive personal information was compromised. It is not known if the data "originated from AT&T or one of its vendors," the company said in a statement. The compromised data is from 2019 or earlier and does not appear to include financial information or call history, it said. In addition to passcodes and Social Security numbers, it may include email and mailing addresses, phone numbers and birth dates. It is not the first crisis this year for the Dallas-based company. New York prosecutors said they are opening an investigation into a wireless network outage in February that left thousands of AT&T customers across the U.S. without cellphone service for roughly 12 hours. The outage, which also affected some Consumer Cellular, T-Mobile, UScellular and Verizon subscribers, led to widespread frustration by phone users and briefly disrupted 911 service in some communities. AT&T apologized for the network disruption and offered a $5 credit to customers.