Amazon's HQ2 was a showdown between a union city and a tech giant

FOLKS DON'T ASSOCIATE THE BIG APPLE WITH TRADE UNIONISM BUT SAMUEL GOMPERS FIRST PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN FEDERATION OF LABOR STARTED OUT AS A CIGAR MAKER UNION ORGANIZER IN NYC.

Max Zahn Reporter Yahoo Finance February 15, 2019

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Jeff Bezos headshot, as Amazon founder and CEO, watches on stage during a news conference unveiling the new Blue Origin rocket at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, graphic element on gray. Source: Associated PressMore


Amazon gave up its Big Apple dreams on Thursday—even though a poll released two days earlier showed a majority of city and state residents supported the plan for a headquarters in Long Island City, Queens.

The incongruity left many scratching their heads, but the cause is clear: a months-long opposition campaign that pressured the tech giant to make concessions or leave.

The outcome shows the strength of labor unions, which represent a greater proportion of workers in New York than any other state in the country. Even though organized labor split over the project, many of the community groups and elected officials at the heart of the anti-HQ2 campaign have close ties to the state’s most powerful and well-funded unions. The showdown between a bastion of organized labor and one of the nation’s largest companies will likely ripple through business and political circles nationwide for years to come.

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Protesters carry anti-Amazon signs during a coalition rally and press conference of elected officials, community organizations and unions opposing Amazon headquarters getting subsidies to locate in the New York neighborhood of Long Island City, Queens, Wednesday Nov. 14, 2018, in New York. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews)More

The company’s unwillingness to promise neutrality toward a union drive at its Staten Island warehouse became a lightning rod for critics, with talks between the company and labor leaders on the issue reportedly continuing on Wednesday morning, a day before Amazon’s decision to pull out of New York.
Unions were divided over Amazon HQ2

“Clearly, it was decisive,” said Shaun Richman, program director of the Harry Van Arsdale Jr. Center for Labor Studies at SUNY Empire State College and a former organizing director with the American Federation of Teachers, of the role of organized labor.

“There was the idea that it would be unacceptable to the labor movement—and to politicians loyal to the labor movement—for Amazon to come into New York City and operate on a completely non-union basis.”

But unions in New York have been divided over the HQ2 project since soon after it was announced last November, showing that some of the political players fostered and even funded by the unions were more resolutely opposed than the unions themselves.

SEIU 32BJ, an influential local that represents over 163,000 property service workers, supported the deal in part because a reported agreement with developers at the headquarters would have added members to the union. Hector Figueroa, president of SEIU 32BJ, also lauded the improvements the project could bring to New York City, saying the city’s progressive politics could optimize the benefits of the deal.

The Building and Construction Trades Council also vowed support for HQ2, celebrating the construction jobs that it would create and acknowledging the group had reached a deal with Amazon.

Union opposition to HQ2 was led by the Retail, Wholesale, Department Store Union (RWDSU), which had launched a union drive at an Amazon warehouse facility in Staten Island. For months, RWDSU President Stuart Appelbaum criticized the nearly $3 billion in city and state tax subsidies and Amazon’s labor practices, especially its unwillingness to remain neutral toward the Staten Island unionization effort.

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George Miranda, vice president of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, left, and Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail Wholesale Department Store Union (RWDU), speak during a protest against Amazon outside of City Hall in New York, U.S., on Wednesday, Jan. 30, 2019. Photographer: Sangsuk Sylvia Kang/Bloomberg via Getty ImagesMore

A tentative plan was settled between RWDSU and Amazon on Wednesday morning to address the neutrality concerns, Appelbaum told Bloomberg. Even RWDSU, it appears, was coming around to a deal, though the price may have been too great for Amazon.
‘We work closely with all unions’

But the support of some unions for the deal was outweighed by a political environment that they themselves helped create: one replete with pro-labor allies at the grassroots level and in elected office who led the opposition to the headquarters.

Three of the citywide community groups at the forefront of the anti-HQ2 campaign—ALIGN, Make the Road New York, and New York Communities for Change—receive funding from the state’s largest unions and tout their relationships with labor.

Appelbaum, the RWDSU president, is on the board of ALIGN.

“We work closely with all unions,” ALIGN Executive Director Maritza Silva-Farrell said. “Building trades, [SEIU]32BJ, RWDSU, public sector unions. We have longstanding relationships with many unions in the state.”

“This is a union town,” Silva-Farrell added. “You can’t come to New York and say we’ll build with union jobs and try to pin unions and community against each other.”

Similarly, advocacy group Make the Road New York looked past the divide among labor unions in its opposition to HQ2.

“What we saw here was first RWDSU really taking a stand,” said Co-executive Director Deborah Axt, adding that “[SEIU] 32BJ is a close ally of ours and stands for the same things that most do on issues. I believe their commitment is incredibly strong to transforming this country.”

Axt said funding from unions makes up “a tiny, tiny percentage of our budget, but we’re grateful for it.”

The most outspoken critics of HQ2 in elected office also retain close ties with organized labor.

In 2018, labor unions made tens of thousands in donations to the campaign fund of State Senator Mike Gianaris, a vocal opponent of HQ2 who serves the Long Island City-neighborhood that was set to host Amazon. In recent months, Gianaris has repeatedly called the company “anti-union.”

Queens City Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer, who has received large donations from top unions and has aggressively criticized the HQ2 project, tweeted on Thursday, “Jeff Bezos clearly couldn’t handle talks of unionization,” in reference to the labor neutrality discussions that happened the day prior.

Mark Jaffe, president of the Greater New York Chamber of Commerce, lamented the loss of HQ2 and blamed the advocacy groups and elected officials for Amazon’s departure, calling them “a very small percentage of elected officials and community advocates that feel billionaires should pay for all their programs.”

But even he acknowledged the influence of unions in New York.

“Labor is a strong, powerful group,” he said. “It knows how to organize.”

Read more:

Amazon’s decision to ditch H2Q is a black eye for NYC’s tech scene

Amazon and the brewing war on corporate America

Amazon’s breakup with New York sets other cities up for gains

Max Zahn worked at New York Communities for Change in 2012.

He is a reporter for Yahoo Finance.

Colombia protests to intensify this year, union leader says
By Luis Jaime Acosta,Reuters•January 17, 2020

BOGOTA (Reuters) - Protests against the social and economic policies of Colombian President Ivan Duque will restart with more intensity this year, a top union leader said.

Marchers in the Andean country held mass demonstrations in November and December last year to demand a varied laundry list of concessions from Duque's right-wing government.

New protests will open on Tuesday with cacerolazos, Central Union of Workers (CUT) chief Diogenes Orjuela told Reuters late on Thursday, referring to a traditional Latin American form of dissent.

"I think (the protests) will be stronger. When we say stronger, they are demonstrations and strikes far from any violent intent," Orjuela said. "The first strong action - like the one on Nov. 21, it will be similar - will take place in March."

Protests last year were largely peaceful, but were marked by looting and attacks against public transport during their first few days, leading Cali and Bogota to institute curfews.

Five people died in connection with the demonstrations, which followed upheaval in other Latin American countries such as Ecuador, Chile and Bolivia.

The death of teenage protester Dilan Cruz, injured by a projectile fired by riot police, became a rallying cry for many marchers, who have demanded the force be dissolved. The squad is now banned from using the weapon that killed Cruz.

The National Strike Committee, comprising unions like the CUT and student groups, initially presented the government with 13 demands in talks - including stepped-up efforts to stop the murder of human rights activists and implement a peace deal with leftist rebels.

Protesters had asked the government scrap a tax reform proposal, especially a provision to cut taxes for corporations, but the bill was passed by Congress just before Christmas.

Demonstrators also opposed rumored increases to the pension age and cuts to the minimum wage for young people - policies Duque denies supporting.

The committee later increased its demands to 104 points, including opposition to fracking.

Most demands are things already agreed with students, indigenous communities and other groups, but not implemented, Orjuela said.

The committee has demanded one-on-one talks with the government, but Duque has insisted on wider participation by civil society, including business groups.

"What the strikes and marches have expressed is there is another opinion in Colombia," Orjuela said. "It is very important for us that the government understand it must listen to that opinion."

The committee and the government may meet in the coming days, he added.


(Reporting by Luis Jaiem Acosta; Writing by Julia Symmes Cobb; Editing by Richard Chang)

Chile's Pinera announces key pension fund reform after protests

AFP•January 16, 2020


Demonstrators run as a riot police vehicle sprays water during a protest against Chilean President Sebastian Pinera's government in Santiago on January 10 (AFP Photo/CLAUDIO REYES)More

Santiago (AFP) - Chile's President Sebastian Pinera has announced plans to reform the country's pensions system, a key measure aimed at easing the South American country's three-month old social crisis.

In an address to the nation late Wednesday, Pinera said he will send a bill to Congress this week that proposes a gradual increase of mandatory contributions from 10 to 16 percent, with employers contributing the increase.

The move "will mainly benefit women, middle class and older adults with severe dependence," Pinera said in the address.

A 2018 proposal to raise pensions by four percent was rejected as insufficient.

The new measures seek to improve the plight of cash-strapped Chilean pensioners who on average receive pensions equivalent to between 30 and 40 percent of their final salary.

The majority of pensioners have to live on around $400 a month in retirement, below the minimum wage.

Pinera's proposal comes almost three months to the day after the eruption in mid-October of widespread, often-violent social protests that left 29 dead and thousands injured.

One of the key demands of protesters was reform of the pensions system, managed by for-profit Pension Fund Administrators.

Pinera said that the reform would increase pensions by around $91 a month for women, and about $73 for male pensioners.

In the midst of the crisis in early December, Congress passed a bill proposed by Pinera to gradually increase minimum pensions by 50 percent.


Chile's Pinera proposes reform of pension system that has fueled protests

By Fabian Cambero, Reuters•January 15, 2020


FILE PHOTO: Chile's President Sebastian Pinera addresses the 74th session of the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters in New York City, New York, U.S.More

By Fabian Cambero

SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Chilean President Sebastian Pinera said on Wednesday that he will send a bill to Congress this week to reform the country's pension system, which leaves many retirees living in poverty and has been one of the main complaints of protesters in months of demonstrations.

In a radio and television broadcast, Pinera said he will propose a 6% increase in the pension contribution per worker.

Chile's pension system is a defined contribution scheme in which workers pay at least 10% of their wages each month to for-profit funds, called the Pension Fund Administrators (AFPs). The proposed adjustment implies a 3% increase in the employer's contribution.

In addition, employers would contribute another 3% to a state fund that would go toward improving current and future pensions.

The pension system and the AFPs have been harshly criticized in protests that began in mid-October and have left at least 27 people dead, thousands arrested and swaths of property damaged.

Many Chileans live on pensions that are significantly lower than the minimum wage, even if they have worked for most of their lives.

Pinera said the reform would mean that no pensioner will now fall below the poverty line and no one who has paid into the pension system for more than 30 years will be living on amounts below the present minimum wage.

"This new reform represents a structural change and creates a new pension system," Pinera said, adding that it will benefit a million pensioners.

Pinera, whose brother introduced the present system during the era of Augusto Pinochet, said soon after the protests began that he would increase the ambition of an existing pension reform bill making its way through Congress.

Pinera said that reform also opens the opportunity for new pension bodies to compete with the criticized AFPs.

In his address on Wednesday, Pinera said the reform would imply a "significant" cost for the state, without disclosing the figures.

(Reporting by Fabian Cambero; additional reporting by Aislinn Laing; writing by Cassandra Garrison; Editing by Leslie Adler)

Chile president launches health care reform project

AFP•January 5, 2020


Chile's President Sebastian Pinera has announced a raft of measures aimed at appeasing protesters and ending months of chaos (AFP Photo/HO)More

Santiago (AFP) - Chile's President Sebastian Pinera launched on Sunday a reform project to create a "universal health plan" following months of protests against social inequality and his leadership.

"This plan is based on what the people have asked us for," said Pinera as he presented the project.

A poor public health system and sky-high private costs were among the main gripes of demonstrators.

Congress sat on Sunday to deal with a number of projects as part of Pinera's "social calendar" aimed at appeasing protesters.

The new health plan would benefit the 14.5 million people who rely on public services as well as the three million using private care.

Congress has tried to rush through social projects to help defuse the protest movement that began on October 18, initially as a reaction to a modest metro fare hike.

Twenty-nine people have died during the worst social unrest to hit Chile since the Augusto Pinochet dictatorship ended 30 years ago.

One of Pinera's main policy changes has been to enact a law allowing the South American country to hold a referendum on changing the Pinochet-era constitution.

His new health plan will include "a guaranteed maximum waiting time (and) a drop in the price of medicines," as well as other changes, Pinera said.

He said the government would subsidize "the 200 main" medicines used for chronic conditions such as hypertension and diabetes, resulting in a 60 percent reduction in costs.

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Climate change is cost of society’s ‘addiction to coal and oil,' says Robert Kennedy Jr.
Max Zahn  Reporter, Yahoo Finance•January 16, 2020

Environmental advocates have sounded an urgent alarm about the climate crisis for decades. In recent days, the business community voiced a similarly strident tone, as BlackRock (BLK) CEO Larry Fink warned climate change will reshape global finance and a World Economic Forum survey of hundreds of businesspeople put the issue at the top of a list of current economic risks.

In a newly released interview, longtime environmental lawyer Robert Kennedy Jr. warns it’s nearly too late.

Kennedy Jr. castigates fossil fuel companies, throws his support behind the Green New Deal, and says that every Democratic presidential candidate has an environmental agenda better than that of President Donald Trump.

“There are going to be major disruptions not just to humanity, but ultimately to civilization,” says Kennedy Jr, the son of former U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy and nephew of former President John F. Kennedy. “This is part of the cost that we're paying for our longtime deadly addiction to coal and oil.”

“Right now, we have a market that is governed by rules that were written by the carbon incumbents to reward the dirtiest, filthiest, most poisonous, most toxic, most war-mongering fields from hell, rather than the cheap, clean, green, wholesome and patriotic fields from heaven,” Kennedy adds.

On climate change, Kennedy Jr. voiced his support for a Green New Deal proposal put forward by Queens Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez but primarily called on governments to divest from fossil fuels and impose a tax for carbon emissions.

“I think the Green New Deal — and all that stuff — is important,” Kennedy Jr. says. “We ought to be pursuing it. My approach is more market-based than kind of top down dictates. You know, I believe that we should use market mechanisms like carbon taxes and the elimination of subsidies.”

Last October, a study released by the climate advocacy and research firm Climate Accountability Institute found that the 20 largest fossil fuel companies — among them Chevron (CVX), Exxon (XOM), and BP (BP) — have accounted for 35% of global carbon emissions since 1965. An International Monetary Fund report put out last year estimated a total of $5.2 trillion in fossil fuel subsidies distributed in 2017 alone.

17-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg, who will speak at the World Economic Forum conference in Davos, Switzerland next week, called on all participating public and private sector institutions at the conference to divest from fossil fuels.

Kennedy Jr. made the comments during a conversation that aired in an episode of Yahoo Finance’s “Influencers with Andy Serwer,” a weekly interview series with leaders in business, politics, and entertainment. 

For over three decades, Kennedy Jr. served as a chief prosecuting attorney for top environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and Riverkeeper, an organization dedicated to the protection of the Hudson river. More recently, Kennedy Jr. has questioned the safety of vaccines and campaigned against their use.

Kennedy Jr. sharply criticized the environmental record of President Donald Trump, calling it a “cataclysm” but attributing it to a shift within the Republican Party over the past several decades.

“He’s simply the radical step of a process that's been happening in our country and in the Republican Party from the past — really, since 1980 — which is a growing hostility towards the environment, a growing orientation to representing the concentrated corporate power and power, particularly of the oil industry and the chemical industry and some of the other large polluting industries.”

Each of the Democratic presidential candidates has a better environmental policy agenda than Trump, Kennedy Jr. said.

“All of them have a better environmental platform than the current president,” he says. “I think all of them would do well on the environment.”

“Most Democrats are just looking for a candidate who is able to beat Donald Trump, which is a very formidable task,” he adds.

Attorneys Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. arrives for a hearing challenging the constitutionality of the state legislature's repeal of the religious exemption to vaccination on behalf of New York state families who held lawful religious exemptions, during a rally outside the Albany County Courthouse Wednesday, Aug. 14, 2019, in Albany, N.Y. (AP Photo/Han Pennink

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From Chile to Hong Kong, the World Saw a Lot of Protests in 2019. Here's Why That Trend Is Going to Continue

Ciara Nugent, Time•January 16, 2020




With high-profile protests raging across Chile, Colombia, Hong Kong, Sudan, Algeria, Lebanon, India, Spain, France and more, last year it often felt as if much of the world was out in the streets.

A lot of it was. A report published Thursday by risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft finds that a quarter of the world’s countries experienced a “surge” in civil unrest in 2019. And, the report’s authors say, that unrest is unlikely to die down in 2020.

Last year’s protests, spanning South America, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Europe, have been compared to the late 1960’s, when civil rights, anti-war and anti-colonial movements, combined with the growth of a youth-led counter culture, prompted dramatic street protests in dozens of countries.

To understand what’s driving the current wave of discontent, and why it’s unlikely to recede this year, Verisk Maplecroft looked at what happened before protests broke out in the 47 countries that experienced an uptick of unrest in 2019.
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Governments in many of those countries implemented similar policies in the run up to the unrest, which could help to predict future outbreaks. The weakening of mechanisms for expressing discontent — such as restrictions on labor unions, or attacks on freedom of the press — was the number one predictor, taking place in 12 of the 47 countries. A series of authoritarian measures introduced in Russia in 2019, including a new law tightening restrictions on the internet and new limits placed on opposition candidates in local elections, inspired the country’s largest demonstrations in eight years.

The second most common indicator that people were about to take to the streets was cuts to fuel or food subsidies, with governments in 9 of the 47 countries making these. In Haiti, the government’s plans to lower fuel subsidies, which meant a 38% hike in gasoline prices and 47 % increase for diesel, set off anger over a long-running corruption scandal. In Iran, a fuel price hike prompted by U.S. sanctions sparked protests in a dozen cities, resulting in a bloody government crackdown.

As in Russia, Haiti and Iran, the protests in most countries have underlying causes that long pre-date triggers such as subsidy cuts or crackdowns. Often these grievances were very specific to the context and history of an individual country — as in Hong Kong’s pro-democracy movement, where fears that Beijing is seeking to undermine the territory’s special freedoms from China fueled outrage over a proposed bill to allow Hong Kong residents to be extradited to the mainland.

But many of the grievances are linked to global political and economic trends, Miha Hribernik, head of Asia Research at Verisk Maplecroft, tells TIME. “Stagnating incomes, growing income inequality, corruption, the loss of faith in established elites, and the erosion of civil and political rights were all among concerns that motivated people to protest in the 47 countries, although to varying degrees.”

Those issues may have boiled over in 2019, but they are “deeply entrenched” and it’s going to be hard for governments to address them, Verisk Maplecroft’s analysts found. “Policymakers across the globe have mostly reacted with limited concessions and a clampdown by security forces, but without addressing the underlying causes,” the report finds.

Some governments, as in Russia and Spain, have rejected protesters’ central demands outright: greater freedoms for dissent opposition parties and the option for the Catalan region to secede from Spain. Others have tried to mollify protesters by reversing the moves that triggered outrage — such as the Haiti’s fuel price hike, Hong Kong’s extradition bill, or Lebanon’s plan to tax WhatsApp calls.

But few leaders have offered the fundamental improvements on economic equality, corruption, political freedoms that many of the protest movements are demanding. Chile’s government has called a referendum on remaking the country’s dictatorship-era constitution in response to student-led protests over inequality and high costs of living. Even there, though, analysts say unrest will continue; the socioeconomic situation is unlikely to change enough to satisfy protesters in the short term, while fierce repression by security forces has angered the public further.

“According to our predictions, on average, 80% of [the 125 countries Verisk Maplecroft analysed] will see an uptick in protests over the next two years,” Hribernik says.

Already in the first two weeks of 2020, mass protests have returned to Chile, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Hong Kong, France, India and more. Last year’s global unrest may be about to become the new normal.

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Winter storm to make travel 'hazardous' across U.S.

After walloping the West Coast with rain and snow as a "bomb cyclone," the storm will move across the Plains, Midwest and the Northeast, forecasters said.

What the forecasts say »

THEY WILL BLAME CANADA FOR WHAT WE KNOW IS AN ARCTIC BLAST
FROM THE POLAR VORTEX WE HAVE BEEN UNDER FOR A WEEK NOW

Alberta's 'fair deal' could hurt Calgary, says Nenshi

 CBC

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Mayor Naheed Nenshi says the province's 'fair deal' panel might not be so fair for Calgary.

On Thursday, the city's Intergovernmental Affairs Committee, chaired by Nenshi, passed three recommendations the city will submit to the Alberta government's panel.

The city doesn't want the promise to "emulate" the legal requirements in Quebec, where municipalities must get approval from the province before entering into agreements with the federal government.

It also asks that the city is involved when it comes to changes made to secure a fair deal within the Confederation and that the province ensures any major change is also fair for Alberta's two biggest cities.

Nenshi said those proposals would negatively affect the city, like preventing the city from making deals with the federal government and preventing the city from getting federal funding.

"That would leave hundreds of millions or billions of dollars on the table, it would lead to enormous administrative inefficiencies and huge red tape," Nenshi said.

"Certainly there are things in there that could actually hurt Calgary," Nenshi said.

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney created the panel in the fall to consider recommendations on how to best advance the province's economic interests within Confederation, considering nearly a dozen proposals including the creation of an Alberta pension plan, a provincial police force, a tax collection agency, a chief firearms officer and a formalized provincial constitution. 

The panel travelled throughout the province over the last two months holding public forums.

Thursday's Airdrie stop was postponed due to the death of panel member Jason Goodstriker, the Alberta government announced in a press release on Friday afternoon.

The panel will be in Medicine Hat on Friday evening, which was to be its last stop, but the release stated that the Airdrie visit would be rescheduled.

In December, nearly 500 people showed up to have their say in front of the fair deal panel in northeast Calgary. Most supported the Alberta government's call for more power while others called the panel a sideshow that distracted from provincial budget cuts.

On Thursday, Coun. Druh Farrell echoed the latter sentiment that and said she questions the motivation behind the panel.

She said Calgary and the province need to come up with solutions rather than "live on anger."

"Yes we should always be trying to get a better arrangement with our federal partners as the City of Calgary should always be trying to get fairness incorporated in decision making in the province," Farrell said.

"But I wonder if this is simply a distraction."

Meanwhile, Coun. Sean Chu disagreed with his colleagues and said the city should not be taking on responsibilities outside of its jurisdiction.

"They set out the panel to do the fair deal for Alberta," Chu said. "How can the panel itself (be) a bad thing?"

The recommendations were passed on Thursday with just one small amendment — that the word 'direct' be substituted by the word 'request'.

THANK YOU DON'T COME AGAIN

Hank Azaria says he won't voice Apu on The Simpsons anymore after controversy


Amy Sussman/Getty Images


Some major changes are apparently coming to Springfield.

Hank Azaria has revealed he'll longer voice Apu on The Simpsons, telling /Film, "All we know there is I won't be doing the voice anymore, unless there's someway to transition it or something."

The Simpsons faced renewed criticism over Apu since the release of the 2017 documentary The Problem with Apu, in which comedian Hari Kondabolu and others discuss the character who Kondabolu has described as "a white guy doing an impression of a white guy making fun of my father."

The documentary sparked a conversation about whether The Simpsons should write out the character some view as an offensive Indian stereotype, though others suggested keeping Apu but recasting Azaria with an Indian voice actor. Azaria, who also voices other characters on the show like Moe and Chief Wiggum, appeared to allude to that option Friday by referencing a possible "transition." But while Azaria said it's "up to them and they haven't sorted it out yet," he made clear that "I won't do the voice anymore," also saying, "We all made the decision together."

The Simpsons previously addressed the criticism over Apu in a meta 2018 episode, in which Lisa, looking directly at the camera, says, "Something that started decades ago and was applauded and inoffensive is now politically incorrect." She then looks at a picture of Apu and asks, "What can you do?" Marge and Lisa, again addressing the audience, promise this will be "dealt with at a later date," "if at all." That later date is evidently coming up.

Azaria previously expressed his willingness to step down from the role of Apu, saying on The Late Show, "the idea that anybody who is young or old, past or present, was bullied or teased based on the character of Apu, it just really makes me sad." No official announcement about the future of the character has been made. Brendan Morrow

White House violated law by withholding Ukraine aid, watchdog concludes

The White House violated the law when it withheld aid to Ukraine, a nonpartisan government agency concluded on Thursday. The Government Accountability Office said the Office of Management and Budget's withholding of Ukraine aid that Congress had appropriated was not lawful. "Faithful execution of the law does not permit the president to substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law," the Government Accountability Office said. "Therefore, we conclude that OMB violated the [Impoundment Control Act (ICA)]." The withholding of aid to Ukraine in July 2019 was at the center of President Trump's impeachment, which alleged Trump froze the aid to pressure Ukraine into announcing an investigation that might benefit him in the 2020 presidential election. An OMB spokesperson said "we disagree with GAO's opinion."

Source: Politico

TRUMP LIES

11 Americans were injured in recent Iran strike

Eleven Americans were injured in Iran's recent missile strike on the Al Asad Air base in Iraq, which President Trump and the Pentagon previously said resulted in no injuries. The military confirmed Thursday that 11 Americans were treated for concussions after Iran last week struck two Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops; the concussion symptoms emerged several days later. "While no U.S. servicemembers were killed ... several were treated for concussion symptoms from the blast and are still being assessed," said a United States Central Command spokesperson. The attack on the bases came in response to a U.S. drone strike that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani. CNN's Jim Sciutto said the update indicated "that the Iranian missile strike was a nearer miss than advertised."

Source: The New York Times, CNN