In rural Ohio, two supporters of solar power step into a roomful of opposition

Some of the few backers of a solar development in Williamsport stick together.

ByDan Gearino

August 14, 2022, 

This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News. It is the second in a series about the conflict over solar power in Williamsport, Ohio, reported in partnership with ABC News. It is republished with permission. Sign up for ICN’s newsletter here.

On a weekday morning in May, Mark Schein drove his truck about a mile up the road and rang the doorbell of Melvin Steck and his son and caretaker Doug Steck. Mark stepped into the kitchen, saw Melvin, who is 101, and let out a joyous, “Hey there.”

Melvin, who is hard of hearing and doesn’t talk much, smiled and offered Mark some peanut M&M’s from a giant-sized bag that was in its usual place in the middle of the table.

Melvin Steck, 101, in his kitchen. He has farmed since he was 8, and now lives on the farm. His son, Doug, serves as a live-in caretaker.

Dan Gearino

Melvin is the last of a generation that farmed alongside Mark’s father, and someone who can remember an era when farm families and communities relied on each other as a matter of economic survival.

Of the dozen or so property owners who leased land for the proposed Chipmunk Solar project, only three live on the land, including the Schein and Steck families. The rest of the properties are owned by out-of-town family estates.

These solar supporters knew they were outnumbered in the community by people who oppose the project, but remained steadfast in their belief that they should be able to do what they choose with their land, and were counting on lease payments from the project to provide financial stability.

Mark, 68, is a retired farmer. Doug, 72, owns a small trucking company. Unlike Mark, Doug is eager to engage with people about the project, including the opponents. This has led to some tense moments, like an argument that ended with Doug nose to nose with a solar opponent at a township meeting.

“I just want them to use facts,” Doug said. “Don’t embellish. Don’t quote somebody else. Use facts.”

The Chipmunk Solar project proposed by EDF Renewables.  ABC

He took a seat at the table and shared an important accessory: his three-ring binder, packed with academic papers, news articles, spreadsheets and notes from government meetings.

He aimed to be the community’s fact-checker, but found that some opponents of solar viewed him as self-serving rather than helpful. It was indicative of a broader conflict in rural America over what to believe as renewable energy developers seek vast quantities of land for projects and some residents resist.

EDF Renewables is working to develop the 400-megawatt Chipmunk project, a small part of which would be on the Steck farm. The company has an application pending before the Ohio Power Siting Board; one of the state office’s key questions is whether the community wants the project.

A well-organized campaign has sought to answer with an emphatic, “No.” Opponents have printed yard signs and pamphlets and bought newspaper ads, all arguing that solar would ruin the region’s agricultural character and tank property values.

Notably absent from the debate was almost any mention of climate change.

An upcoming public hearing was an opportunity for the opponents to show their strength, and Doug and Mark planned to be there.

‘Life Is Not Perfect’

Melvin began farming when he was eight, walking behind mules in his parents’ fields. Doug, his only son, grew up driving a tractor and feeding livestock.

Doug knows the feeling of precarity that comes with a life in agriculture. He once had his own farm, separate from his father’s, only to lose it in the early 1980s amid high interest rates and punishing weather.

Doug Steck at his family’s farm near Williamsport, Ohio. His family has agreed a lease to allow development of some of the property for solar power.

Dan Gearino

He remembers a summer day when a dark cloud rolled in and hail began to fall. His corn had been 8 feet tall, and he watched from his house as the balls of ice leveled the crop, killing all of it in less than an hour.

“I had spontaneous shaking, crying, vomiting for three years,” he said. “I’ve already been through the stress of cycles of knowing how bad it can get. Life is not perfect.”

His experience losing the farm is one of the reasons he was receptive to the solar company’s offer of a guaranteed income that would last for decades, an income that would be about five times more than the family would make from renting the land to other farmers.

The project’s opponents have included other families who argue that solar is an industrial use for farmland that will harm the community. But many of the opponents are people who have houses in farm country but are not farmers and do not own farmland.

MORE: Harvard doctor on study claiming climate change intensifies pathogens

EDF has led a low-key campaign to build support for the project. There are no pro-solar signs to compete with the anti-solar ones.

EDF said in an email that it has “been very involved in the community by way of solar education, consistent project updates at local township and county meetings, public information meetings” and $50,000 in donations to local civic and charitable groups.

While EDF is taking those steps, the land owners who would host the project have not been a big part of the public outreach. As Mark puts it, “I’m gonna keep my yap shut.”

Objections, Rebuttals and Hypocrisy

Doug opened his binder to a page that summarized objections to the project that he tallied from November 2021 to January 2022, based on comments submitted to the Ohio Power Siting Board and spoken at public meetings.

The top objection, mentioned in one form or another 30 times, was that people don’t like the change to the visual landscape.

The second most common objection, mentioned 26 times, was that the presence of solar would lead to a decrease in property values.

Next, with 17 mentions, were concerns about the loss of farmland. This was nearly tied with concerns about the loss of wildlife.

After that, with 15 mentions, was a category Doug summarized as “environmental concerns.”

Officials from the Ohio Power Siting Board preside over a public hearing in the auditorium at Circleville High School in Circleville, Ohio. The May 25 hearing was about the Scioto Farms solar project, but many of the people there spoke about solar in general...

Dan Gearino

He said his goal was to understand and investigate the objections with an open mind. For example, he understood the perspectives of people who don’t like the idea of a major shift in the view out their back door. But he noted that only a tiny share of the population lives within sight of the project.

Meanwhile, the worries about a major drop in property values were bogus, he said. Key studies on the subject found that solar development leads to, at worst, small decreases in property values.

As for environmental concerns, this was where he saw hypocrisy. Depending on the manufacturer, solar panels may contain some harmful materials. But there was little evidence that the panels would leak those materials into the environment at a scale that would affect human or animal health.

The hypocrisy was that many opponents of the project were talking about leaks from solar panels while they had no problem dumping tons of fertilizers and chemicals on farmland, practices that are much more destructive to the environment. He made this point with a spreadsheet showing the tonnage of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides placed on his family’s 285 acres over a 10-year period.

“That’s all poison,” he said.

Doug was hopeful that having a solar array on the land would allow for a much-needed period for the soil to recover as native grasses grow underneath and reduce harmful runoff.

Mark and Doug felt like the case for solar was so strong that some neighbors could be convinced, and wondered if objections were coming from a vocal minority.

They were about to find out.

Feeling Outnumbered

On a Wednesday in May, Doug and Mark walked into the Circleville High School auditorium. Circleville, known for its annual pumpkin festival, is a short drive from Williamsport. The school was hosting a public hearing held by the Ohio Power Siting Board to aid in its decision about the region’s solar projects.

Officially, this hearing was about the Scioto Farms solar project, one of the five proposed or under construction in the region, but many people wanted to talk about other projects, like Chipmunk.

A 1970 Chevrolet C50 truck is one of the vehicles parked in the garage at the Steck farm. The truck still runs and the family uses it for occasional chores.

Dan Gearino

The crowd was teeming with solar opponents.

The third person to speak was Garrett Wells, 12, an opponent of the project who was shorter than the microphone stand.

“We love where we live,” he said. “My family has always farmed, and I hope to one day grow up and farm.” The crowd roared with applause.

Some speakers broke down in tears, talking about how their property values will plummet and they will have nothing to leave to their children and grandchildren.

Some talked about health effects, including Chris Weaver, who lives about 100 yards from the project.

“I'm a firm believer in property owners being able to do what they want with their property,” Weaver said. “Until it defaces my property (and) quite possibly destroys my health.”

MORE: In rural Ohio, the energy transition runs into a ditch

Doug and Mark exchanged glances and sunk into their seats. The opponents outnumbered the supporters nearly 10 to 1.

Neither Doug nor Mark signed up to talk because they thought the comments would be limited to the Scioto Farms project. Mark could feel the hostility all around him.

He nudged Doug and turned his head to motion toward the door. Doug nodded yes.

“I’d seen enough,” Mark said the next day.

A decision on the Chipmunk project is likely to come by early 2023. But that night, it was clear that the opponents were winning.

They had succeeded in casting solar, an essential resource for the transition to clean energy, as a destroyer of community, and Doug wondered if there was any way back from that.

Grow it here, do it right: The case for safe, sustainable, local seafood

BY IMANI BLACK AND ANDREW ZIMMERN, OPINION CONTRIBUTORS - 08/13/22
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL

FILE – A sailfish jumps out of the water. (Getty Images)

It’s August in America, which means that the sound you hear is the sizzling of millions of pounds of delicious salmon, striper, and cod on American grills. August also means it’s hot—and due to climate change, it’s getting hotter. A warming world threatens the very fish we rely on for quintessential American traditions like Midwestern fish fries. But there is a solution right here in our own waters. By leading with science and carefully expanding aquaculture farms into federal waters, America can grow its seafood supply, boost coastal economies, and, yes, ensure summers are always full of seafood. That’s why we’ve launched the Coalition for Sustainable Aquaculture (CSA). 

We’re proud to be founding members of this diverse, groundbreaking coalition. Imani is a former oyster farmer and the founder of Minorities in Aquaculture, an organization that works to expand economic opportunity for minority women by lowering barriers to entry and educating them on the benefits of local and global aquaculture. Andrew is a chef, restaurateur, a United Nations World Food Programme global ambassador, and an award-winning television producer and host who has seen firsthand in over 150 countries the growing consumer demand for safe, locally sourced seafood. 

Now we’re working with our Coalition partners to meet that demand. Together with marine research centers, industry experts, leading environmental organizations, and the most forward-thinking chefs in the country, CSA is charting a path towards a safe and homegrown aquaculture industry that will create sustainable seafood here in America—the right way. That’s why we’re pushing for thoughtful studies and pilot programs so we can close knowledge gaps and learn best practices to build an offshore industry that complements well-managed traditional fisheries—and that’s sustainable from the start. And that’s an economic development plan that also means jobs. 

It’s taken decades of hard work to restore America’s wild-capture fisheries after generations of overfishing and mismanagement. Thanks to congressional action and science-based policies, those fisheries have largely recovered. Now they face a new threat: climate change is warming waters, shifting fish stocks, and putting pressure on fishers and the coastal economies that rely on them. In fact, even with the best fishery management, studies suggest that climate change may greatly harm our seafood supply. 

Lessons from nearshore do offer some hope. Since we started farming oysters and clams in coastal waters, nearshore farmers have grown more seafood while simultaneously reducing pollution and environmental impact. Many of these lessons can be applied to a future offshore industry.  

There are still things we don’t know, and we don’t take the ecological risks of offshore aquaculture lightly. Fish escapes and equipment failures could interfere with wild fish and marine mammal populations, while improper waste management could upset delicate ecosystems. Additionally, we need to make sure aquaculture feed is produced using ingredients that are themselves sustainable. 

We also cannot exclude traditionally marginalized communities from a new and promising industry, especially when offshore aquaculture farms are placed in areas that have been fished for generations by Black, Hispanic, and Native peoples. That’s why, beyond important pilots and studies, CSA is also advocating for aquaculture hubs that can pool resources, expand opportunity, and ensure the industry is built on equity and benefits everyone.     

Sustainable aquaculture will bring in the dough. Coastal economies will have a new, innovative industry protected from the traditional ebbs and flows of wild-capture fish stocks. And what’s more, increased supply could eventually bring down prices for consumers.  

Offshore aquaculture has the potential to make the United States’ food supply more secure and sustainable even as it becomes more climate resilient. If we get it right, aquaculture will even help increase seafood production despite climate change. 

We know the stakes. Now, we need the legislation. CSA stands ready to unite behind policies that put science first and prioritize inclusivity in the aquaculture industry. Ideal legislation will encourage industry leaders to innovate while they close knowledge gaps and learn what it will take to make offshore aquaculture truly sustainable. 

When we succeed, we’ll have more seafood that consumers want, and chefs are proud to prepare—and more Augusts full of the delicious sizzling sounds we should be able to count on when we sit down to our tables. 

Imani Black is founder of Minorities in Aquaculture and Andrew Zimmern is an Emmy-award winning chef. 

NASA might cancel mission to massive ‘gold mine asteroid’ — here’s why it shouldn’t

BY MARK R. WHITTINGTON, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 08/14/22 
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL

iStock

NASA had planned to send a probe to the asteroid 16 Psyche in 2022. It is sometimes called “the golden asteroid” because many people believe it contains an abundance of valuable metals. Unfortunately, NASA recently announced a launch delay because of the need to review software. The probe may launch in 2023 or 2024 to arrive at 16 Psyche in 2029 or 2030, respectively. The mission may be canceled altogether since the delay would cause further cost.

Regardless of the extra cost, the mission to 16 Psyche should proceed as soon as possible for two reasons: scientific and commercial.

According to NASA, scientists believe that the asteroid may be “the partial core of a shattered planetesimal — a small world the size of a city or small country that is the first building block of a planet. If it is, asteroid Psyche can offer a close look at the interior of terrestrial planets like Earth that is normally hidden beneath layers of mantle and crust.” In other words, by studying 16 Psyche close up, scientists will be able to uncover insights about other rocky worlds, including Earth.

The second case for proceeding with the mission is commercial, presuming 16 Psyche is a treasure trove of metals and other resources that would be useful for maintaining technological civilization here on Earth. Here, however, the case is a little more complicated, thanks to recent scientific studies.

Until recently, scientists thought that 16 Psyche was a solid hunk of metal, iron, nickel, gold and platinum. A recent article in Smithsonian suggested that the market price of the asteroid’s metals is $10 quintillion, hence the name “golden asteroid.” Other estimates have gone as high as $700 quintillion.

According to Interesting Engineering, a recent paper published in the Journal of Geophysical Research has cast some doubt in the original model of 16 Psyche as a giant hunk of metal. The original model was derived from the amount of light reflected off of the asteroid. However, scientists from Purdue University and Brown University suggest, using measurements of the interaction between 16 Psyche and other nearby space objects, that the “golden asteroid” is less dense than previously believed.

The authors of the study suggest that 16 Psyche is actually a rocky object covered with a layer of metal that has welled up over billions of years from volcanic activity. Some scientists have therefore marked down the market value of the metal on 16 Psyche to about $11.65 trillion, still a considerable amount but not as eye-popping as previous estimates.

The conflicting evaluations of just what 16 Psyche is further make the case for sending a probe to orbit the asteroid and to characterize its surface and composition. Not only would scientists be able to gain insights into the formation of planets, but potential asteroid miners would be able to evaluate 16 Psyche for future resource extraction.

The probe that NASA has planned to send to 16 Psyche will contain several instruments that can uncover the asteroid’s secrets. These include a multispectral imager, a gamma ray and neutron spectrometer, a magnetometer, and an X-band gravity science investigation instrument, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

If 16 Psyche is worth mining, when could such operations proceed? Citigroup thinks that space mining, including from the moon and asteroids, will be a $100 billion-per-year business by 2040. Launch costs will continue to decrease and experience in operating in space will continue to expand until such a business makes economic sense.

How would one mine 16 Psyche? One could imagine a SpaceX Starship being dispatched to the asteroid, going into orbit around it and then sending mining robots to its surface. The robots would mine valuable minerals and then bring them back to the orbiting Starship. The SpaceX rocket ship would be able to carry as much as 100 metric tons of ore to facilities in low-Earth orbit for processing and to use as raw materials to manufacture products. Alternatively, mining 16 Psyche and other asteroids would supply SpaceX CEO Elon Musk’s dreamed-of Mars settlement.

Space mining will be a new, lucrative business for the 21st century. Sixteen Psyche could be a space equivalent of El Dorado for that enterprise.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of space exploration studies “Why Is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon? and “The Moon, Mars and Beyond.”

The Inflation Reduction Act may save the fossil fuel industries

BY PAUL BLACKBURN, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR - 08/14/22 
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL

FILE – A motorist fills up the tank on a sedan, July 22, 2022, in Saratoga, Wyo. The average U.S. price of regular-grade gasoline plunged 32 cents over the past two weeks to $4.54 per gallon. Industry analyst Trilby Lundberg of the Lundberg Survey says Sunday, July 24, 2022 that the continued decline comes as crude oil costs also fall. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, file)

The Inflation Reduction Act moved through Congress quickly, passing the Senate last week and the House on Friday — allowing for little time to understand the importance of tax credits for fossil fuel companies.

The bill includes amendments to the federal 45Q tax credit program for carbon capture use and sequestration (CCUS) and their implications for fossil fuel industries and the U.S. budget. By indiscriminately ramping up the 45Q program’s carbon credits by 70 percent across the board, the bill threatens to hand out tens of billions of dollars in windfall tax credits to oligarchs and provide decades of public subsidies to all fossil fuel industries. After a review of this program’s potential impacts on specific CCUS projects, it appears it would serve as a means for carbon dioxide (CO2) emitting industries and their oligarch investors to claim to be reducing greenhouse gas emissions — while simultaneously subsidizing the fossil fuel industry and supporting the next wave of oil development, at taxpayer expense, while bulldozing pipelines through local communities across America using eminent domain.

The federal 45Q tax credit program allows participants to reduce their federal taxes based on the amount of CO2 they are able to extract from the air pollution that comes from smoke stacks. Under existing law, for each metric ton of carbon captured, as of 2027 the program provides $50 per metric ton if the carbon is simply pumped underground (sequestered), and $35 per metric ton if the carbon is used in enhanced oil recovery operations (EOR). The use of carbon dioxide in EOR is based on the fact that liquid carbon dioxide is a very good solvent, so it can be used to dissolve oil that is trapped in rock deep underground.

The Inflation Reduction Act would indiscriminately increase the 45Q program tax credits to $85 per metric ton for sequestration and $60 per metric ton for EOR — a 70 percent increase that would be provided regardless of project cost. This one-size-fits-all tax credit means that lower-cost carbon capture projects (e.g. ethanol plants) will win the lottery.

For example, the existing 45Q program would provide up to $2 billion in tax credits per year to the Summit Carbon Solutions, Navigator CO2 Ventures and ADM/Wolf CCUS projects.The bill would increase this amount to $3.4 billion dollars per year. It is important to understand that the developers of these pipelines considered these projects economically viable and profitable without the Inflation Reduction Act’s proposed 70-percent increase. This means that the bill would provide up to $1.4 billion in additional tax credits to these projects beyond cost and current profits.

The $85 per metric ton sequestration credit appears to provide tax credits in excess of 200 percent of the capital costs of carbon capture at ethanol plants, and possibly in excess of 150 percent of the costs of capture at coal power plants. Since simply sequestering carbon does not generate cash, if CO2 is to be sequestered then the 45Q tax credits must be high enough to financially support the entire cost of capture and sequestration projects. This being said, CCUS projects may also receive cash from California’s low-carbon fuel program or from selling CO2 to EOR projects, meaning that some CCUS projects will likely be able to earn money in addition to the tax credits.

Now, let’s consider how the Inflation Reduction Act would impact the coal industry. Given the variable costs of carbon capture, the 45Q program could provide tax credits of 18 percent to 113 percent above breakeven costs — or depending on the size of the plant, from $13 million to $500 million per year, per plant, above breakeven. CCUS cost data for coal power plants indicates that the bill would make CCUS economically viable at a large proportion of coal plants in the U.S. and potentially provide tax benefits far in excess of CCUS project costs, meaning the 45Q tax credit could directly subsidize the coal industry.

With regard to the oil industry, it turns out that fluid CO2 is good at dissolving oil out of the rock pores in legacy oilfields, but for CO2 EOR to work huge amounts of it are needed. For decades, the oil industry has used CO2 EOR to increase the amount of oil pumped from legacy oilfields by 50 percent or more, but use of EOR has been relatively rare because it is costly. The oil industry sees CO2 EOR as its next major development wave that will grow as fracking declines. The problem is that the oil industry has fully exploited naturally occurring CO2 deposits. Therefore, the primary obstacle to increased expansion of CO2 EOR is not technical challenges — it is a lack of access to huge amounts of affordable CO2. The only way to do this is to use federal subsidies to capture CO2 at industrial facilities and ship it to oilfields.

The oil industry needs federally subsidized carbon capture projects to keep the oil flowing. This is why the CEO of Exxon recently described carbon capture as the “holy grail” and called for the 45Q program tax credit to be increased to $100 per metric ton. Carbon capture certainly is the holy grail for converting federal tax credits into future oil industry profits. Even oil industry supporters should pause and consider what it means to make future U.S. oil production dependent on massive federal subsidies and construction of a national carbon pipeline network entirely dependent on eminent domain.

From a climate change perspective, subsidized CO2 EOR could result in a huge amount of additional crude oil being pumped and burned, both in the U.S. and globally. Typically, the emissions from burning EOR oil exceed the amount of CO2 left in the ground, often by a ratio of at least two to one.

The Inflation Reduction Act is being rushed through Congress, yet it has the potential to provide truly massive subsidies and eye-watering windfall tax benefits to CO2 emitting industries. And those massive investments will surely be used down the road as arguments for why CCUS projects — and the facilities that emit captured CO2 — should be kept in operation, so that the federal tax credit gravy train keeps a-rollin’ indefinitely.

No wonder Congress is rushing. 

Paul Blackburn is an attorney specializing in pipeline law who has represented community and environmental groups including Bold Alliance for over a decade on pipeline projects. He previously worked for a number of environmental organizations, as well as in renewable and fossil fuel energy project

Literacy is an economic growth engine – will we seize it?

BY BRITISH A. ROBINSON AND MIKE ROGERS, OPINION CONTRIBUTORS

 - 08/13/22 
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL

 The Rose Main Reading Room of the New York Public Library’s main branch appears on Oct. 5, 2016, in New York. 

(AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)

Everywhere in our economy, there are shortages – in skills, workers and opportunities. Employers say they can’t find the workers they need. And yet, tens of millions of workers are stuck in low-wage, low-growth jobs, with limited economic potential and little opportunity to pursue the American dream.

Some say the only answer is more robots, self-serve kiosks and other technology to replace the workers employers say they can’t find.

1/3 OF AMERICANS ARE ILLITERATE!

There is a better option — and one that we should all get behind: helping roughly 130 million Americans develop the literacy skills they need to apply for and fill those available jobs.

These are the overlooked and often underserved American adults who struggle with low literacy. While they can read basic words and sentences, anything complex — this opinion piece, for example — is too challenging for them.

Even basic forms and job applications are a challenge for them. COVID-related health advisories and hospital forms leave them confused about what to do and how to stay safe. They have a hard time reading an election ballot, reviewing teachers’ notices from their kids’ school, or writing a basic email.

These Americans are not hopeless. They are often hard-working, holding down multiple jobs — just not well-paying ones. The average annual income of an adult with what’s called Level 0 or Level 1 proficiency is just over $34,000 — equivalent to earning the minimum wage. If they move up to Level 2 proficiency — still below basic literacy — their average income rises to $48,000. At Level 3 proficiency — which is the minimum level required in our society — their average income rises to $63,000.

And it’s not just what they could earn that matters. When someone can read better, they have more options in life. Someone stocking shelves in a warehouse today could be reviewing and inputting inventory — a bigger responsibility. A hospital staffer who lifts patients out of their beds today could be part of their clinical team, working with doctors and nurses. A mom who can’t help her kids with their homework today could be reviewing college applications and scholarship requirements. There is dignity in all work, but there is something special about reaching our potential and gaining new responsibilities — and that’s only possible with literacy.

What’s more, increased literacy will boost our economy and global competitiveness. A Gallup study commissioned by the Barbara Bush Foundation showed that getting all adults to Level 3 literacy would generate an additional $2.2 trillion in annual economic activity — a 10 percent boost that is equivalent to Italy’s entire economy.

Literacy isn’t just about words and sentences: It’s about opportunity. It’s about closing economic and social gaps. And it’s about the communities so often left behind. The states and regions hardest hit by low literacy are Southern states, metro areas and notably, communities with significant or majority African American and Hispanic American neighborhoods.

Addressing this national challenge can’t be the work of one foundation and a few committed individuals. We need a broader coalition of willing employers, corporations, philanthropists and others to step up and promote literacy programs that work.

We start by recognizing that for many Americans, literacy is not a given. If you grow up in a home where reading is rare and books even rarer, the path to literacy is difficult. The good news is that today’s digital platforms have the power to erase the barriers of yesterday, helping families learn anytime, anywhere.

Mobile apps can deliver learning in short, convenient lessons. Even a subway or bus can become a classroom when someone takes 10 minutes of their commute to learn on their mobile phone. Artificial intelligence tools that turn learning into a game can make reading lessons more personalized, fun and engaging — encouraging parents and kids alike to learn together. The possibilities are endless if we all commit to investing in adult literacy — both a preventative and a responsive accelerant for our economic recovery.

What matters is commitment, and that often starts by recognizing the nature of the challenge. This is bigger than the challenge of finding workers for a few companies. This is a national emergency: roughly 54 percent of Americans earn and do less than they could and should because they simply can’t read at a basic level.

Just as great is the opportunity. Unleashing the full potential of those 130 million citizens and empowering them to pursue their American dream would be an economic bonanza unlike anything we have seen in our lifetimes. We would go from a skills shortage to a talent surplus, and a boom in the earnings and productivity of our country’s most untapped resource: the American people.


British A. Robinson is the president and CEO of the Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy. Mike Rogers is the founder of Leadership to Ensure the American Dream (LEAD), and a former U.S. representative from Michigan. Along with his wife, Kristi Rogers, Mike is also co-chair of the Barbara Bush Foundation’s 2023 National Celebration of Reading.

THE IRONY IS THAT LITERACY HAS LONG BEEN THE UNDERPINNING OF ALL REVOLUTIONARY SOCIAL MOVEMENTS BEGINING WITH THE NARODNIKI IN RUSSIA.

THE AVERAGE TABLOID NEWSPAPER USA, UK, CANADA IS WRITTEN FOR A GRADE SIX READER.

THIS ARTICLE IS WRITTEN AT A UNIVERSITY LEVEL

Extremism experts warn of echoes of Jan. 6 in rightist FASCIST response to FBI Mar-a-Lago raid

Caitlin Dickson

·Reporter

Sat, August 13, 2022 

Days before he was killed by police after allegedly firing a nail gun into an FBI field office in Cincinnati, the man whom officials have identified as Ricky Walter Shiffer appears to have posted online about wanting to kill FBI agents after the search at former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate.

Screenshots taken from Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social, show that an account using Shiffer’s name, which appears to have been removed, posted a “call to arms” on Tuesday morning, hours after Trump confirmed the raid had taken place at his Florida residence a day earlier.

“We must not tolerate this one,” read one of the posts, which urged others to “be ready for combat” and to “respond with force.

“Kill the F.B.I. on sight,” the post said.

The same account appears to have posted its final “Truth” on Thursday morning, shortly after the attempted breach of the FBI’s Cincinnati office. Authorities said that Shiffer, who was wearing body armor and is believed to have been armed with an AR-15 as well as a nail gun, fled the scene after activating an alarm and led law enforcement officers on a chase that ended in a cornfield, where after a lengthy standoff, authorities say he was fatally shot by police.

The New York Times reported Friday that, for months before he attempted to attack the FBI office in Ohio, federal authorities had been looking into whether Shiffer, 42, of Columbus, had been involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

Whether the Truth Social account with Shiffer’s name belonged to him has not yet been confirmed. But extremism experts and some federal law enforcement officials said the Cincinnati incident demonstrates the potential harm that can come from the kind of violent rhetoric that has been circulating online in the wake of the FBI’s search at Mar-a-Lago.

“The online trail left by the individual who engaged in that attack illustrates vividly how this type [of] rhetoric can motivate individuals toward real-world violence,” said Jared Holt, a senior research manager at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue.

Holt told Yahoo News that he’s "observed high levels of apocalyptic, violent and conspiratorial rhetoric present in online pro-Trump communities following the search, contributing to a general environment of rage that is not dissimilar to the lead-up to the Capitol riot.

“Similarly to that period,” Holt said, “these expressions of anger are happening in plain sight online and being regurgitated by powerful Trump supporters in government and media.”

Supporters of former President Donald Trump gather near his residence at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Fla., on Aug. 9. (Giorgio Viera/AFP via Getty Images)

Minutes after Florida Politics first reported Monday evening that the FBI had executed a search warrant at Mar-a-Lago, Trump, who was in New York City at the time, took to Truth Social to announce that his “beautiful home” and private club in Palm Beach, Fla., was “currently under siege, raided and occupied by a large group of FBI agents.”

In a lengthy statement, the former president went on to decry the search and declare, without evidence, that he was the victim of “prosecutorial misconduct, the weaponization of the Justice System, and an attack by the Radical Left Democrats who desperately don't want me to run for President in 2024."

News outlets soon reported that the raid had been related to an investigation into Trump's potential mishandling of classified documents. In May, a federal grand jury began investigating whether he had mishandled top-secret documents, including taking 15 boxes of material to the Florida resort.

Nonetheless, Trump’s outrage quickly reverberated across the right, with Republican lawmakers and conservative commentators echoing his claims of persecution.

It didn’t take long for some of the rhetoric around the Mar-a-Lago raid to turn violent. Within hours of Trump’s statement announcing the raid, social media users from Twitter to fringe platforms like Gab, Telegram and Truth Social were issuing calls for civil war and vowing to take up arms. Much of the vitriol was targeted at the FBI, prompting the head of the the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association to issue a statement Wednesday denouncing “the extreme threats of violence levied against agents at the Federal Bureau of Investigation this week.”

The federal magistrate judge who signed off on the warrant authorizing the search of Trump’s home also quickly became a target after his name was revealed in news reports.

Ben Popp, an investigative researcher with the Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism, said that he conducted an analysis of various platforms popular with extremists, such as image boards like 4chan and 8kun, Telegram groups and TheDonald, and found that use of the term “civil war” spiked on Aug. 9 — the day after the FBI’s search.

“The last time it spiked like that was, interestingly enough, in November 2020,” Popp said, after the contentious presidential election in which the incumbent, Trump, ultimately lost to Democrat Joe Biden. Popp said the recent resurgence in civil war discourse suggests that the search of Trump’s residence is serving as a similar rallying cry for his supporters.

Former President Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla. (Charles Trainor Jr./Miami Herald/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

In both scenarios, Popp said, the violent rhetoric spreading across fringe spaces could be traced directly to the baseless conspiracy theories and apocalyptic narratives promoted by Trump and his allies in mainstream forums, from Fox News to Twitter, which seek to paint Republicans as victims, whether of the biased media, vote-rigging Democrats or a politically motivated FBI.

Popp noted a tweet by Charlie Kirk, the founder of conservative advocacy group Turning Point USA, which described the search of Mar-a-Lago as “a military operation against a political dissident.” He described it as just one example of the kind of “apocalyptic narrative” apparently inspiring more explicit calls for violence.

While such “rhetoric is not violent in nature, it’s certainly fueling the violent comments we’re seeing in different spaces online,” Popp said.

Kirk’s tweet was in line with calls to dismantle the FBI from far-right Republican lawmakers like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., and Rep. Paul Gosar, R-Ariz., or Florida Sen. Rick Scott’s comments comparing the FBI to the Gestapo in an interview with Fox Business. Moderate Republicans who have previously acknowledged how Trump’s words can inspire harm in the real world were also willing to jump to the former president’s defense.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., who said immediately after Jan. 6 that Trump “bears responsibility” for the Capitol riot, issued a statement Monday declaring that the Justice Department had “reached an intolerable state of weaponized politicization,” and threatening to launch an investigation if Republicans win back control of the House in the upcoming midterm elections. Even former Vice President Mike Pence, who was personally targeted by the violent mob on Jan. 6, expressed “deep concern” at what he called the “appearance of continued partisanship by the Justice Department.”

This persecution narrative has formed the basis for a variety of violent posts that have popped up on many of the websites where Trump supporters discussed plans for Jan. 6, such as the pro-Trump message board TheDonald. It also seems to be drawing in some of the same people.

In addition to Shiffer, who had not been charged in connection to Jan. 6, NBC News revealed that at least one user who posted about “civil war” on TheDonald following Monday’s raid is currently awaiting sentencing for his participation in the Capitol riot.

“I think these insurrectionist attitudes haven’t gone away since Jan. 6, it just takes events like this for that to bubble back to the surface,” said Popp.

Popp and Holt, however, noted that there are some key differences between the violent rhetoric stemming from the FBI search and that seen in the lead-up to Jan. 6, 2021, when Trump called his supporters to come to Washington for a “wild” protest to oppose the congressional certification of Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.

Most notably, in contrast to Jan. 6, the violent discourse in recent days has not focused on a singular event or call to action. Popp and Holt predict that any action inspired by the raid is likely to be smaller and less concentrated than the insurrection that drew hundreds to the Capitol last year.

“My leading concern at this time is that the hyperbolic rhetoric could motivate individuals to act violently while believing they are doing so for a broader cause, as we have already witnessed in the attempted breach of an FBI facility in Cincinnati on Thursday,” Holt said.

U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland delivers a statement at the Department of Justice on Aug. 11. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

Federal law enforcement officials are equally concerned.

“[The] bureau is on edge,” said an FBI source, who spoke to Yahoo News on background after the attempted attack on the FBI office in Ohio. “We are all on edge.”

Another official with the Department of Homeland Security said the incident in Cincinnati was “just further evidence that false narratives can lead to real threats and violence.”

FBI Director Christopher Wray issued a statement Thursday condemning the “unfounded attacks on the integrity of the FBI,” which he said “erode respect for the rule of law and are a grave disservice to the men and women who sacrifice so much to protect others.”

Attorney General Merrick Garland echoed Wray’s statement at a press conference Thursday, where he announced that the Justice Department had submitted a motion to unseal a search warrant and property receipt from the FBI’s search of Trump’s Florida home.

“I will not stand by silently when their integrity is unfairly attacked,” said Garland, who noted that he “personally approved the decision to seek a search warrant in this matter.”

Ari Lightman, professor of digital media and marketing at Carnegie Mellon University’s Heinz College, said the violent rhetoric stemming from the Mar-a-Lago raid is just the latest escalation of an extreme polarization on the right that has been on the rise since at least 2008, with the election of former President Barack Obama.

Lightman told Yahoo News that while talk of a new civil war is “really troubling,” perhaps more troubling is the rhetoric from lawmakers and right-wing media figures eroding public trust in all government institutions, whether the FBI or the public school system.

This lack of trust, he said, fuels extremism and perpetuates the notion that “the only way through this is not through discussion or debate, it's through violence.”

Even after a man was killed after attempting to break into the FBI office in Cincinnati, the current campaign to condemn the FBI showed no signs of slowing down. At a press conference on Capitol Hill on Friday morning, members of the House Intelligence Committee’s Republican minority struggled to strike a balance between condemning violence and expressing support for rank-and-file FBI agents, while simultaneously accusing the agency’s leadership of “brazen politicization.”

Meanwhile, rather than release the search warrant himself, Trump spent Friday suggesting that the FBI planted evidence on his property and demanding the release of the documents related to the search of Mar-a-Lago, while pre-emptively attempting to discredit any damning information they may reveal.

By the time the judge ordered the release of documents related to the raid on Friday afternoon, the discussion on platforms like Truth Social and others that hosted some of the most violent rhetoric in the immediate aftermath of the search had turned to a new conspiracy theory positing that such threats, and the attempted attack on the FBI office in Ohio, had been part of a “false flag” orchestrated by the FBI itself.

The goal of such an operation, according to users, was to create a pretext for President Biden to declare martial law and, ultimately, incite a civil war.

Jana Winter contributed reporting.