TRUMP NASAL PROBLEMS
Researchers: Cocaine abuse can be mistaken for non-threatening nasal disease


 Photo by stevepb/Pixabay

April 4 (UPI) -- A new paper by British researchers found that cocaine abuse in the nasal area often can be mistaken as a non-threatening nasal disease, resulting in patients receiving potentially dangerous treatments.

The paper detailing the research was posted Tuesday in the scientific journal Rheumatology Advances in Practice, published by Oxford University Press.

Authors of the paper conducting a retrospective review of patients who visited clinics at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham and the Royal Free Hospital in London found cocaine abuse being misdiagnosed at times.

The abuse was mistaken as granulomatosis with polyangiitis, a nasal disease that causes inflammation of the blood vessels and commonly results in symptoms in the sinuses, throat, lungs and kidneys.

RELATED Overdose deaths among seniors soar over past 2 decades, UCLA study finds

The researchers said that many patients identified with the sinus and nasal limited form of the disease actually may have been suffering from nasal damage from cocaine use.

The authors said that while granulomatosis with polyangiitis, of GPA, is rare, affecting about three out of every 100,000 people, they believe that the possibility for misdiagnosis is serious because common treatments for GPA may be ineffective -- and even dangerous -- for ongoing cocaine users.

"This is an important paper that has changed our practice," said Aine Burns, one of the paper's authors. "We now include urine samples for drugs of abuse in our initial investigations of patients with GPA and in those who appear not to be responding to treatment."

In their review, researchers found out of the 42 patients with GPA, cocaine use was common among them. Urine tests confirmed 86% tested positive for cocaine.

"Sadly, we have seen young people with life-changing disfigurement because of cocaine-induced granulomatosis with polyangiitis. A better understanding of this condition prevents us from potentially harming patients further by administering inappropriate, potentially toxic, and futile treatments."

Burns said there currently needs to be a heightened awareness of the possible misdiagnosis among users, the public and healthcare professional

In Britain, cocaine is the second most abused drug with 2.6% of the population using it from the ages of 16 to 59. Cocaine can cause significant health problems, including cocaine-induced midline destructive lesions and various other health problems.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, cocaine was involved in nearly 1 in 5 overdose deaths in 2019. More than five million U.S. residents reported current cocaine use in 2020, which is almost 2% of the population.


Non-Hispanic Black persons experienced the highest death rate for overdoses involving cocaine in 2019.

Both cocaine and GPA have similar general symptoms, such as arthralgia, fatigue, and skin rash, making it difficult to initially diagnose for physicians.

DNA: Woman was on famed 17th century Swedish warship

By JAN M. OLSEN

The royal warship Vasa is seen at the Vasamuseet museum in Stockholm, April 24, 2011. A U.S. military laboratory has helped Swedes confirm what was suspected for years: A woman was on the famed 17th-century warship that sank on its maiden voyage and is on display in a popular Stockholm museum, the museum said Tuesday April 4, 2023. (AP Photo/Scanpix Sweden, Anders Wiklund, File)

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) — A U.S. military laboratory has helped Swedes confirm what was suspected for years: A woman was among those who died on a 17th-century warship that sank on its maiden voyage, the museum that displays the ship said Tuesday.

The wreck of the royal warship Vasa was raised in 1961, and was remarkably well-preserved after more than 300 years underwater in the Stockholm harbor. It has since been place at the Vasa Museum, one of Stockholm’s top tourist attractions where visitors can admire its intricate wooden carvings.

Some 30 people died when the Vasa keeled over and sank just minutes after leaving port in 1628. They are believed to have been crew members and most of their identities are unknown.

For years, there were indications that one of the victims, known as G, was a woman, because of the appearance of the hip bone, Fred Hocker, research leader at the Vasa Museum, said in a statement.

Anna Maria Forsberg, a historian with the Vasa Museum, told The Associated Press that women were not part of the crew in the Swedish navy in the 17th century, but they could be on board as guests. Seamen were allowed to have their wives with them onboard unless the ship was going into battle or going for a long journey.

“We know from written sources that around 30 people died that day,” Forsberg said. “It is thus likely that she was a seaman’s wife who wanted to come along on the maiden journey of this new, impressive ship.”

She said the exact number of people on board that day was not known “but we think there were around 150 people. An additional 300 soldiers were supposed to board further out in the archipelago,” she said.

Since 2004, the Vasa Museum collaborated with the Department of Immunology, Genetics and Pathology at Uppsala University, which examined all the skeletons on Vasa in order to find out as much as possible about the various individuals on the doomed vessel.

“It is very difficult to extract DNA from bones that have been on the seabed for 333 years, but not impossible,” Marie Allen, professor of forensic genetics at Uppsala University said in the statement. “Simply put, we found no Y chromosomes in G’s genome. But we couldn’t be completely sure and we wanted to have the results confirmed.”

So they turned to the Delaware-based Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory. And thanks to the forensics laboratory specializing in DNA profiling at the Dover Air Force Base, “we have been able to confirm that the individual G was a woman, using the new test,” Allen said.

The Vasa which was supposed to go to a naval base outside Stockholm to wait for the boarding of the soldiers, is believed to have sunk because it lacked the ballast to counterweigh its heavy guns.

Britain fines TikTok $16M for misuse of child data; Australia announces ban on federal devices



Both Britain and Australia took regulatory action against TikTok on Tuesday. 

File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

April 4 (UPI) -- Both Britain and Australia took action against TikTok on Tuesday as Western nations continue to crack down on the Chinese-owned video-sharing app over privacy concerns.

Britain's privacy regulator fined TikTok $15.8 million for unlawful use of the data of children younger than 13 and failure to carry out adequate checks to identify and remove more than a million underage children from the platform.

British data protection law says that organizations that use personal data to provide information services to children under 13 must have consent from their parents or caretakers.

"There are laws in place to make sure our children are as safe in the digital world as they are in the physical world. TikTok did not abide by those laws," said Information Commissioner John Edwards.

RELATED Arkansas sues Meta, TikTok over putting children, personal data at risk

"As a consequence, an estimated one million under 13s were inappropriately granted access to the platform, with TikTok collecting and using their personal data. That means that their data may have been used to track them and profile them, potentially delivering harmful, inappropriate content at their very next scroll.

"TikTok should have known better. TikTok should have done better," Edwards said.

The ICO said TikTok allowed around 1.4 million children 13 and younger to use its platform in 2020 -- in breach of its own rules prohibiting children of that age from creating an account.

ICO originally notified TikTok that it intended to impose a $34 million fine, but reduced it to $15.8 million following negotiations.

Pointing out that the fine related to a period between 2018 and 2020, TikTok said it had since "invested heavily" to prevent under-13s from accessing the platform.

"Our 40,000-strong safety team works around the clock to help keep the platform safe for our community," a spokesperson said.

The fine came hours after Australia became the latest country to prohibit the use of TikTok on federal government-issued devices on security grounds, following the United States, Britain, Canada, New Zealand, France and EU institutions.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus issued a mandatory directive banning TikTok from devices issued by Commonwealth departments and agencies after receiving advice from intelligence and security agencies.

"The TikTok application poses significant security and privacy risks to non-corporate Commonwealth entities arising from extensive collection of user data and exposure to extrajudicial directions from a foreign government that conflict with Australian law," the directive says.

The ban will come into effect as soon as practicable and exemptions would only be granted on a case-by-case basis and with appropriate security mitigations in place, Dreyfus said.

People will still be able to use TikTok on their privately-owned personal devices.

TikTok expressed "extreme disappointment" at the decision alleging that it was "driven by politics, not by fact."

"We are also disappointed that TikTok, and the millions of Australians who use it, were left to learn of this decision through the media, despite our repeated offers to engage with government constructively about this policy," TikTok Australia and New Zealand General Manager Lee Hunter told UPI.

"Again, we stress that there is no evidence to suggest that TikTok is in any way a security risk to Australians and should not be treated differently to other social media platforms."

The ban is also likely to be adopted by the country's six states and two territories, but only Victoria has said it will follow suit so far.

"We've always said we'll follow the Commonwealth's guidance when it comes to cybersecurity -- and we'll now work on implementing these changes across the public service as soon as possible," said a spokesperson for Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews.

A spokesperson from the Australian Capital Government government in Canberra said the territory government would work with the Commonwealth to adopt restrictions.

"Based on the Commonwealth's advice, and the desirability of national cybersecurity consistency, the Australian Capital Territory government will consider similar restrictions on territory government devices at a security and emergency management meeting of Cabinet tomorrow."

TikTok has come under increased scrutiny after an investigation by BuzzFeed last year revealed that employees at its parent company ByteDance had repeatedly accessed personal data from U.S.-based users of the app. An internal review that was commissioned by ByteDance revealed that employees had spied on journalists in the United States.

In late February the White House gave federal agencies 30 days to remove TikTok from all government devices amid mounting fears that U.S. data may end up in the hands of Chinese Communist Party members via the Chinese-owned social media platform.

Since then the Biden Administration has been ramping up pressure on TikTok's Chinese owner to sell its stake in the company and has reportedly threatened to implement a broader ban on the app.

Britain announced a ban on TikTok last month as part of a plan to strengthen its policy on the management of other third-party applications on government devices citing the "potentially sensitive nature of information" that they may hold.

"TikTok requires users to give permission for the app to access data stored on the device, which is then collected and stored by the company. Allowing such permissions gives the company access to a range of data on the device, including contacts, user content, and geolocation data," the government said in a statement.

The ban does not apply to government employees' personal devices but the Cabinet Office advised individuals to "be aware of each social media platform's data policies when considering downloading and using them."

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

Founder of student-aid website accused of fraud by SEC

Charlie Javice, the founder of the student aid website Frank, was accused of fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday, in connection with its acquisition by JP Morgan. File photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo


April 4 (UPI) -- Charlie Javice, the founder of defunct student loan assistance company Frank, was charged with fraud by the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday.

Frank was sold to JP Morgan in 2021 for $175 million. However, the agency alleges that Javice falsely said that Frank had access to valuable data on more than 4 million students, when the actual number was less than 300,000.

Javice allegedly paid a data science professor to manufacture data to make it appear that Frank had 4.25 million customers, according to the SEC.

"She lied about Frank's success in helping millions of students navigate the college financial aid process by making up data to support her claims, and then used that fake information to induce JPMC to enter into a $175 million transaction," Gurbir S. Grewal, Director of the SEC's Division of Enforcement, said in a statement. "Even non-public, early stage companies must be truthful in their representations, and when they fall short we will hold them accountable as in this case."

RELATEDJP Morgan shuts down student-aid website over its user base claims

In January, JP Morgan shut down Frank and sued Javice, alleging that the company fabricated the amount of students it served.

A spokesperson for JP Morgan told CNBC that the organization believed it was helping Frank grow and "deepen" its relationship with borrowers, believing it was the "fastest-growing college financial planning platform."

Javice filed a countersuit against JP Morgan, accusing the financial giant of terminating her without cause and launching an undue investigation into her activities.

"After JPMC rushed to acquire Charlie's rocketship business, JPMC realized they couldn't work around existing student privacy laws, committed misconduct and then tried to retrade the deal," said Alex Spiro, an attorney for Javice.

Student aid startup founder arrested on fraud charges

By LARRY NEUMEISTER

TODAY

The Department of Justice emblem at the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Florida in downtown Miami is pictured on Jan. 25, 2023. On Monday, April 3, Charlie Javice, the founder of Frank, a student loan assistance startup company that J.P. Morgan Chase acquired for $175 million two years ago, was arrested on charges that she duped the financial giant by dramatically inflating the number of customers her company had, authorities said Tuesday, April 4. (D.A. Varela/Miami Herald via AP, File)


NEW YORK (AP) — The founder of Frank, a student loan assistance startup company that J.P. Morgan Chase acquired for $175 million two years ago, has been arrested on charges that she duped the financial giant by dramatically inflating the number of customers her company had, authorities said Tuesday.

Charlie Javice, 31, of Miami Beach, Florida, was arrested Monday night in New Jersey on conspiracy, wire and bank fraud charges.

A charging document in Manhattan federal court said she claimed her company had over four million users when it had fewer than 300,000 customers.

Authorities said Javice, who appeared on the Forbes 2019 “30 Under 30” list, would have earned $45 million from the fraud.

A message seeking comment was sent to an attorney for Javice, who was expected to make an initial appearance in court later in the day.

In a release, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said Javice “engaged in a brazen scheme” to defraud the acquiring financial company by fabricating data to support lies she told in a bid to make tens of millions of dollars from the sale of her company.

“This arrest should warn entrepreneurs who lie to advance their businesses that their lies will catch up to them,” he said.

According to a criminal complaint, Javice in 2017 founded TAPD Inc., which operated under the name Frank, to provide an online platform to simplify the process of filling out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, a free federal government form used by students to apply for financial aid for college or graduate school.

In 2021, Javice sought to sell her company in her role as its chief executive to a large financial institution, the complaint said.

When JPMC sought to verify that her company had 4.25 million customers, Javice asked her company’s director of engineering to create an artificially generated data set, but the individual declined, it said.

She then hired an outside data scientist to create the synthetic data set as she purchased for $105,000 on the open market real information for over 4.25 million students, the complaint said. But it added that the data she purchased did not contain all of the information she had told JPMC was maintained by Frank.

In a civil complaint filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission, the regulatory agency alleged that Javice made numerous misrepresentations about Frank’s alleged millions of users to entice JPMC to purchase the now shuttered Frank.

Gurbir S. Grewal, director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement, said in a release that “even non-public, early-stage companies must be truthful in their representations.”

He added: ““Rather than help students, we allege that Ms. Javice engaged in an old school fraud: she lied about Frank’s success in helping millions of students navigate the college financial aid process by making up data to support her claims, and then used that fake information to induce JPMC to enter into a $175 million transaction.”

Jeju Island mourns historic massacre victims amid controversy

By Darryl Coote 

1/8
Several people perform a memorial service for their deceased family member before a tombstone in the Tombstone Park for the Missing at the Jeju 4.3 Peace Park in Jeju City, South Korea on Monday.

 Photo by Darryl Coote/UPI  

JEJU ISLAND, South Korea, April 3 (UPI) -- South Korea on Monday mourned the tens of thousands of Jeju islanders killed by government forces some seven decades ago during a memorial ceremony that was marked by the absence of President Yoon Suk-yeol and extreme right-wing protesters challenging the widely accepted history of the Jeju Massacre.

Thousands of island residents congregated at the Jeju 4.3 Peace Park for the 75th anniversary ceremony that honors the 30,000 Jeju islanders who were killed during the South Korean government's suppression campaign targeting so-called communists between March 1, 1947, and Sept. 21, 1954

The tragedy is widely known as the Jeju April 3 Incident, or Jeju 4.3 in Korean, for the communist-led uprising that occurred on that day in 1948, which sparked the government crackdown in which Jeju residents were slaughtered.

At the park, located outside Jeju City, created in the 2000s to commemorate Jeju's 4.3 dead, bereaved family members held jesa memorial ceremonies and wiped clean tombstones of their loved ones in the cemetery for the 4,007 islanders who disappeared but are believed to have been killed during the massacre.

Prime Minister Han Duck-soo, who attended the ceremony in Yoon's place, read prepared remarks by the president, who vowed to "warmly care for the souls of the innocent 4.3 victims" and to "sublimate the value of freedom and human rights that you have cherished."

"The government is committed to restoring the honor of the 4.3 victims and their families," Han, reading Yoon's remarks, said before the memorial tables entrainment room, where the names of the more than 14,000 identified massacre victims are etched.

"The way to truly honor the victims and their bereaved families is to create a Republic of Korea where freedom and human rights bloom and to achieve greater prosperity here in Jeju based on universal values and the spirit of liberal democracy. The responsibility lies with me, the government and our people," he said.

RELATED45 years on, story helped generations face trauma of Korean massacre

Yoon attended the ceremony last year as president-elect, making him the first conservative leader to participate in the memorial but only liberal Presidents Moon Jae-in and Roh Moo-hyun have done so while in office.

A day prior to the ceremony, the presidential office said Yoon was not going to attend out of concern over whether it was "appropriate to go to the same event every year."

For decades following the official end of the massacre, the government blamed Jeju 4.3 on so-called communists. Islanders related to those killed were subsequently branded with the same label and have been denied government jobs, as well as facing harassment

The South Korean government eventually accepted responsibility for the massacre and officially apologized to the people of Jeju following the passage of the Jeju 4.3 Special Act in 2000. However, conservative governments have seemingly kept the issue at arm's length.

Surrounding this year's memorial service are controversial comments made by North Korean defector and member of Yoon's People's Power Party Tae Yong-ho, who said while on the island in February that the uprising of April 3, 1948, was initiated by North Korean founder Kim Il Sung and his communist party.

The uprising was a predawn assault by a few hundred people that was the culmination of several factors, one of which was the division of the Korean Peninsula. The official government investigation report said there is "no concrete evidence that the events were direct by the instructions of the headquarters of the South Korean Labor Party."

Tae's comments were swiftly confronted by the local government and Jeju 4.3 bereaved family associations as attempts to distort the truth. However, following Tae's remarks, right-wing political organizations erected 80 banners around the island that parroted Tae's remarks.

A political banner that reads, "The Jeju April 3 Incident was a communist riot caused by Kim Il Sung and Namrodang against the founder of the Republic of Korea" is in tatters on March 23, shortly after it was erected in Seogwipo City, Jeju Island. Photo by Darryl Coote/UPI

Jeju City Mayor Kang Byung-sam told UPI in an interview that he was "scared" when he first saw one of the banners near city hall.

After they were erected, 59 of them were slashed to pieces, he said.

Two people have been apprehended over vandalizing the banners, which were taken down on Friday under the Jeju 4.3 Special Act that prohibits the dishonoring of victims, he said, adding that he expects lawsuits to be filed by the extreme right-wing groups against the local government for doing so.

Asked if city hall received any comments about the banners, he said that on one day alone a call came in every 3 minutes to complain about them.

Prior to the memorial ceremony on Monday, an extreme right-wing group associated with the Northwest Youth League, an organization of North Korean refugees who were deployed on the island during the massacre and blamed for some of the worst atrocities, had planned to hold a rally out front of the Jeju 4.3 Peace Park during the memorial ceremony.

"Every time a conservative government takes power, there are groups that criticize the 4.3 uprising," local reporter and author Heo ho-joon said. "This year, it has become more severe.

A van transporting three or four of the Seobuk members was confronted Monday morning outside the park by counter-protesters and bereaved family members who had to be separated from the vehicle by police.

Shouts of "shame" and accusations of truth distortion were hurled at those in the van, which eventually left the area, while police were bombarded with questions as to why they were protecting them.

"The Northwest Youth League needs to apologize to the victims of April 3. This is an absurd situation. We can't accept those kinds of actions," Yang Seong-ju, external vice president of the Association of Bereaved Families 4.3 Victims, told UPI as an explanation for why he was yelling at the vehicle.

Park Song-tae was paying her respects before her father's name etched into a stone monument within the park on Monday.

She told UPI she was born in 1947 and was 2 years old when her father died during the massacre. She has no recollection of what he looked like, she said.

Asked how she felt about the banners and the protests, Park said she was angry but was glad she had the park.

"It's really good to be able to find his name here, to remember my father," she said.

About 5K GM salaried workers take buyouts, avoiding layoffs


The General Motors logo is displayed outside the General Motors Detroit-Hamtramck Assembly plant, Jan. 27, 2020, in Hamtramck, Mich. General Motors is offering buyouts to most of its U.S. salaried workforce and some global executives in an effort to trim costs as it makes the transition to electric vehicles. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)

DETROIT (AP) — About 5,000 white-collar workers at General Motors took the company’s buyout offers, which the automaker says is enough to avoid layoffs at this time.

GM said Tuesday that the offers will save about $1 billion per year in costs, about half of the $2 billion it wants to cut annually by the end of 2024. The company now has about 58,000 salaried workers in the U.S.

The buyouts come at an uncertain time for the auto industry, which is in the midst of a transition from internal combustion to electric vehicles. GM has a goal of selling only electric passenger vehicles by 2035.

The Detroit automaker and its competitors are making huge capital outlays to develop and build new electric vehicles, all while continuing to make cars, trucks and SUVs with gasoline engines. They’re also spending big to get scarce minerals and parts needed for EV batteries.

“The steps we are taking will allow us to maintain momentum, remain agile, and create a more competitive GM,” the company said in a prepared statement.

GM hopes to get the remaining $1 billion in savings by reducing vehicle complexity and expanding use of shared parts on internal combustion and electric vehicles. It also plans to cut spending across the company, including for travel and marketing, the statement said.

At a Bank of America conference Tuesday, GM Chief Financial Officer Paul Jacobson said the company will take a $1 billion charge because of the buyouts, but said it will save $1 billion per year as the workers leave later in in 2023.

The company, he said, had a goal of making attrition go faster. “You’ve got a pretty quick payback,” Jacobson said.

Last month GM offered buyouts to white-collar workers with at least five years of service, and global executives who have been with the company at least two years.

Although the 5,000 workers who will leave is enough to hold off layoffs, GM isn’t ruling it out in the future. “Given the results of the program, companywide involuntary separations are not a consideration at this point,” the statement said.

Employees taking the buyouts had to sign up by March 24, and those who are approved for the packages have to leave by June 30.

U.S. salaried workers are being offered one month of pay for every year of service, up to 12 months. They’ll also get COBRA health care and part of the bonuses they would receive this year.

Last August, crosstown rival Ford Motor Co. let go of 3,000 white collar workers to cut costs and help make the costly transition from internal combustion vehicles to those powered by batteries.

2 construction workers die at JFK International Airport

April 3 (UPI) -- Two workers at JFK International Airport died Monday after being buried under construction rubble, officials said.

The incident happened late Monday morning with the Port Authority Police Department, the New York City Fire Department and emergency services responding to the scene following calls that came in at 11:08 a.m., the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said in a statement.

The two workers were identified by the Port Authority as Francisco Reyes, 41, and Fernando Lagunas, Pereira, 28, The New York Times reported.

The workers were "relocating utility lines in the vicinity of cogeneration plant to support the increased energy needs of the JFK redevelopment project," it said in a statement to ABC News.

According to the state, the $18 billion redevelopment project seeks to modernize the transportation facility.

Following the incident, a stop order for all construction at JFK airport was issued.

The Port Authority said it is "conducting a thorough investigation and will be cooperating with all other investigative agencies."

ADVERTISEMENT

NHL’s Pride nights collide with LGBTQ+ political climate

By ERICA HUNZINGER

1 of 6
Screens display "Blackhawks Pride Night" outside United Center before an NHL hockey game between the Vancouver Canucks and the Chicago Blackhawks in Chicago, Sunday, March 26, 2023. (AP Photo/Nam Y. Huh)

Sports leagues and teams often use Pride nights to raise the visibility and acceptance of LGBTQ+ people — as well as sell them tickets — and the NHL has been a leader. They can include special jerseys designed by LGBTQ+ artists, performances, information tables, even drag performances. And they’re largely a hit.

But six NHL players recently opted out of wearing rainbow-colored jerseys on their teams’ Pride nights for the first time, leading the league’s commissioner to say it is weighing the future of the events.

That worries some fans and LGBTQ+ supporters, who say it’s a sign that a political climate that has led to restrictions on expression, health care and transgender sports participation both in the U.S. and internationally is now threatening events that are meant to be fun and affirming.

“It’s definitely fair to say that this political landscape is helping to sort of normalize people for opting out of the optional ways that they have been asked to show support for marginalized members of society,” said Hudson Taylor, executive director and founder of Athlete Ally, an organization that works with teams and leagues to push for LGBTQ+ inclusivity.

Pro sports has been here before. In June, five pitchers with the Tampa Bay Rays cited their Christian faith in refusing to wear Pride jerseys, and a U.S. women’s national soccer player skipped an overseas trip in 2017 when the team wore Pride jerseys and also didn’t play in an NWSL game last year for the same reason.

This season, three NHL teams — the Chicago Blackhawks, the New York Rangers and the Minnesota Wild — that previously wore rainbow warmups decided not to. The Rangers and Wild changed course after initially planning for players to wear rainbow-themed warmup jerseys but did not specifically say why.

Between the players opting out and the team decisions, NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman said the league will “evaluate” in the offseason how it handles Pride nights moving forward, calling the refusals a distraction from “the substance of our what our teams and we have been doing and stand for.” Yet he also noted that the NHL, teams and players “overwhelmingly” support Pride nights.

The NHL has partnered for a decade with You Can Play Project, which advocates for LGBTQ+ participation in sports. No NHL players had previously opted out of Pride nights.

The changes come as Republican lawmakers across the U.S. pursue several hundred proposals this year to push back on LGBTQ+, and particularly transgender, rights. At the same time, international sports-governing bodies are instituting policies that ban all trans athletes from competing in track and field and effectively ban trans women from swimming events.

Internationally, a Russian law that restricts “propaganda” about LGBTQ+ people, including in advertising, media and the arts, has led at least one Russian NHL player to decline participation in Pride night. And Ugandan lawmakers recently passed a bill prescribing jail terms for offenses related to same-sex relations.

It’s all connected, said Evan Brody, an assistant professor at the University of Kentucky whose media studies research often focuses on LGBTQ+ spaces in sports.

“The laws that are being passed, the players not participating, all exist within the same kind of ecosphere,” Brody said. “They all exist within this larger anti-LGBTQ discourse, which I think we are often very quick to point out about other countries and maybe less so to think about how that’s affecting things in the United States.”

In the NHL, many Pride nights are more about selling tickets, Taylor said. But because the league has been such a leader among men’s sports in how to do Pride nights well, he said, it’s “conspicuous” to see players and teams “roll back the ways in which they have historically shown support for and given visibility to the LGBTQ community.”

Russian Ivan Provorov and Canadians James Reimer and brothers Eric and Marc Staal all cited religious beliefs for refusing to take part in warmups in rainbow-colored jerseys. Ilya Lyubushkin said he would not participate because of the law in Russia, where he was born. And Andrei Kuzmenko, another Russian player, decided not to wear the special uniform after discussions with his family.

“Some players choose to make choices that they are free to make,” Bettman said Thursday night at a news conference in Seattle. “That doesn’t mean they don’t respect other people and their beliefs and their lifestyles and who they are. It just means they don’t want to endorse it by wearing uniforms that they are not comfortable wearing.”

Taylor noted that the fear of Russian retribution could be “very real” for a player like Lyubushkin, who has family in Moscow and visits often.

“I don’t think the LGBTQ community should feel that NHL hockey players are turning their back on that community,” new NHL Players’ Association executive director Marty Walsh said. “A supermajority of players have worn the jersey.”

The Twin Cities Queer Hockey Association took part in the Minnesota Wild’s Pride night this season, with two teenage LGBTQ+ members of the association sitting on the bench during warmups, among other things.

Bennett-Danek, who cofounded the association with her wife in early 2022, said the Wild have “been nothing but supportive” of their organization and the community at large.

“Yes, canceling wearing the jerseys was wrong, but they did not cancel any other part of Pride night and they continue to support our group, even today,” Bennett-Danek said. “They are also handing over the Pride jerseys with signatures for auction to further help support our LGBTQIA community here in the Twin Cities. … So, in our mind they have righted the wrong. They have promised us that Pride next year will not be canceled.”

The NHL hasn’t given out a penalty or fine for anti-LGBTQ+ language since 2017, though the American Hockey League suspended a player in April 2022 for eight games for using homophobic language. And the vast majority of NHL players are participating in pregame Pride skates, which Edmonton’s Zach Hyman said is “an obvious no-brainer.”

“It doesn’t go against any of my beliefs,” Hyman said. “On the contrary, I think it’s extremely important to be open and welcoming to that greater community just because they’re a minority and they’ve faced a lot of persecution over the years. And to show that we care and that we’re willing and ready to include them in our game and our sport is extremely important to me.”

___

Contributing to this report were AP Sports Writers Stephen Whyno in Washington and John Wawrow in Buffalo, New York, and AP freelance writer Mark Moschetti in Seattle.

Iowa-LSU finale is most-viewed women's basketball game on record

By Alex Butler


1/5

LSU Tigers guard Angel Reese (R) waves bye to fans during the second half of the 2023 NCAA Division I women's basketball tournament title game Sunday at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. Photo by Ian Halperin/UPI | License Photo

April 4 (UPI) -- The LSU-Iowa finale was the most-viewed women's basketball game on record, according to ESPN and Nielsen.

ESPN announced Monday night that 9.9 million viewers watched the game Sunday night on the network. Viewership was up 103% compared to last year's championship game.

The broadcast also was the most-viewed college event -- men's or women's -- ever on ESPN+. ESPN said viewership peaked at 12.6 million.

Senior guard Jasmine Carson scored 22 points off the bench to lead LSU to the 102-85 victory Sunday at the American Airlines Center in Dallas. Seniors Alexis Morris and LaDazhia Williams scored 21 and 20 points, respectively. Tigers forward Angel Reese totaled 15 points, 10 rebounds and five assists.

Iowa Hawkeyes star Caitlin Clark -- the National Player of the Year -- scored a game-high 30 points. About 20,000 fans attended the title game.

ESPN announced last week that the Iowa-South Carolina tournament game drew 5.5 million viewers, setting a record for the most-viewed semifinal on ESPN platforms. Clark scored 41 points in the Hawkeyes' win over the previously undefeated -- and defending champion -- Gamecocks.

ESPN reported March 28 that the Iowa-Louisville tournament game was the network's most-viewed Elite Eight game on record, with 2.5 million viewers.

Clark recorded a 41-point, 12-assist, 10-rebound triple-double in that Hawkeyes win. Clark became the only player in men's or women's tournament history to record a 40-point triple-double.

NCAA : LSU Tigers defeat Iowa Hawkeyes for first women's title

The LSU Tigers celebrate their 2023 NCAA Division I Women's Basketball National Championship after beating the Iowa Hawkeyes 102-85 at the American Airlines Center in Dallas on April 2, 2023. Photo by Ian Halperin/UPI | License Photo

Snailfish sets Guinness World Record for deepest observed and caught fish


Snailfish, like the ones shown here at a depth of over 24,000 feet, is the deepest observed and caught fish, according to Guinness World Records. Photo by University of Western Australia/Press Release


April 4 (UPI) -- Researchers in Japan set a new record for the deepest-caught and observed fish in the world, Guinness World Records confirmed Tuesday.

Researchers, from the University of Western Australia and Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology, observed a Pseudoliparis, or snailfish, at a depth of 27,349 feet in the Izu-Ogasawara Trench off the coast of Japan.

In August, the snailfish was filmed approaching a camera that had been set up with bait to lure deep-sea fish.

The same researchers were able to physically catch two P. belyaevi snailfish at a depth of 26,247 feet, the deepest any fish has ever been caught.

The lead researcher on the project, Alan Jamieson, of the University of Western Australia, is considered a leading voice on deep sea or "hadal" organisms and holds world records for observing the world's deepest octopus at 22,825 feet, and the world's deepest squid, at 20,381 feet.

"We have spent over 15 years researching these deep snailfish; there is so much more to them than simply the depth, but the maximum depth they can survive is truly astonishing," Jamieson said.

Jamieson told Guinness that he reasoned fish could survive at deeper depths in warmer waters and postulated that the sea trenches off Japan would likely host some of the world's deepest sea creatures.
RELATEDScientists capture video of a giant squid in Gulf of Mexico

"Two years ago, we published a paper on all ultra-deep-sea fish and concluded that the deepest is likely off Japan as the trenches there're both deep enough and slightly warmer than the previous record in the Mariana Trench, and hey presto, there it was," Jamieson told the Guinness Book of World Records.