What you need to know about the SAG-AFTRA strike that will upend Hollywood

2023/07/14

Writers Guild of America members, with support from SAG-AFTRA, strike at Paramount Studios in Los Angeles on June 6, 2023. - Myung J. Chun/Los Angeles Times/TNS

NEW YORK — Lights, camera, pause. Hollywood is officially on hiatus as the union representing on-screen talent has joined screenwriters in striking against the studios, amid stalled contract negotiations.

SAG-AFTRA officially announced its strike would commence at midnight PST Friday, after the union’s contract expired late Wednesday and negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) fell apart. Union leadership noted that while the strike was “an instrument of last resort,” settling for an unfair deal wouldn’t just “destroy each of us, but the industry at large.”

Here’s a breakdown of what the strike means for screens big, small and beyond.
Why is SAG-AFTRA striking?

The union, representing roughly 160,000 actors, broadcast journalists, hosts and more, is seeking more than an increase in pay and improvement in working conditions.

SAG wants to ensure their livelihoods are protected amid the emergence of evolving technologies, such as streaming services and artificial intelligence, concerns shared by the Writers Guild of America, who began their strike in May.

Oscar winners like Meryl Streep, Jennifer Lawrence, and Ariana DeBose last month were among the hundreds of SAG members who signed a letter in which they laid out their demands to prevent a strike.

“We feel that our wages, our craft, our creative freedom, and the power of our union have all been undermined in the last decade. We need to reverse those trajectories.”
What are the ramifications of a SAG-AFTRA strike for Hollywood?

Members of the union will be ordered to stop performing, forcing sets that have yet to shut down amid the writers strike to do so — in turn likely delaying a whole host of release dates. They’ll also be prohibited from promoting upcoming work. Excited to see Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert DeNiro on the Oscars campaign trail for Martin Scorsese’s long-awaited, “Killers of the Flower Moon?” That all depends on when this strike ends. In the meantime, press junkets, interviews, or any posting of promotional content are all on hold.

”Oppenheimer” star Emily Blunt, for instance, confirmed to Deadline Thursday that, were the strike to break out during the premiere of Christopher Nolan’s much-anticipated docudrama, the star-studded cast would “be leaving together as cast in unity with everyone.”

The strike might also put a damper on this year’s San Diego Comic-Con. In addition to promotional panels being on the list of big no-no’s for represented actors, many studio staples like Marvel, Sony and HBO already reportedly pulled out of presentations or panels as a result of the writers strike.
Is all acting work prohibited under the strike?

Most on-screen theatrical work — such as TV, film, and streaming — isn’t allowed for members during the strike. However actors are expected to be permitted to appear in music videos, commercials, corporate or educational videos, and on broadcast news. It’s expected that non-SAG-AFTRA podcast and audiobook gigs will also be allowed. Voice-over work which has been negotiated by SAG is expected to be OK, but will require the union’s approval, sources tell Vanity Fair.

Morning and talk shows, as well as reality or game shows and the like are handled by the Network Television Code and should remain unaffected by the strike.
Is Broadway on strike, too?

While many SAG members also do live theater, live theatrical performance falls under a separate union: Actor’s Equity. As such, live theater such as Broadway plays and musicals, are not affected by the strike, an Actor’s Equity representative confirmed to The Daily News, adding: “Audiences can still feel good about buying tickets to Broadway and other live theatre!”
Who might you see on the picket line?

Because of the breadth of those represented by SAG-AFTRA, there’s a good chance onlookers will spot plenty of familiar faces picketing for professional protection.

That star-studded letter seen by Rolling Stone, notes that “what might be considered a good deal in any other years is simply not enough,” due to the “unprecedented inflection point in our industry,” was also signed by the likes of Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Ben Stiller, Neil Patrick Harris, Eva Longoria, Riley Keough and Ziwe.

© New York Daily News

UK

Ending private school tax breaks would raise £1.5bn for state sector, thinktank says

Labour’s pledge to remove independent schools’ tax benefits would have ‘limited effect’ on pupil numbers, according to research by IFS

Research by the IFS found that Labour’s plans to add VAT to private school fees would help provide a 2% boost in spending on England’s state schools. 

Photograph: Ben Birchall/PA

Sally Weale 

Education correspondent

THE GUARDIAN

Tue 11 Jul 2023 

Warnings of a mass exodus from private schools if Labour carries out its pledge to scrap their tax breaks have been dismissed by a leading economic thinktank. .

Research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found that Labour’s plans to add VAT to private school fees would generate up to £1.5bn in additional revenue, “a small but potentially worthwhile sum” providing a 2% boost in spending on England’s state schools.

The policy would have “a relatively limited effect” on pupil numbers, the research found.

Contrary to predictions of families quitting independent schools due to rising fees and moving their children into the already creaking state sector, the IFS said it expected higher fees would have “a weak effect” on demand, potentially reducing private school numbers by as little as 3% to 7%.

As the political parties set out their stalls for the next general election, the private schools policy has become one of Labour’s most eye-catching and hotly debated pledges. The latest IFS research answers some of the challenges to the policy, which others believe does not go far enough.

“If the main aim of removing tax exemptions from private schools is to raise revenue, then this is likely to be achievable,” the report’s author, Luke Sibieta, said. “If the aim is to encourage more pupils into the state sector and reduce inequalities by school attended, then this policy package is likely to have only minor impacts.”

Prof Francis Green of the Private Policy Education Forum, which also co-authored the study Engines of privilege: Britain’s private school problem, said: “The removal of charity status from private schools is right. But, without further measures, this will do little to lessen the unfairness in our class-segmented school system.”

The IFS analysis, published on Tuesday, confirms Labour’s calculation that ending private schools’ tax breaks would increase tax revenues by about £1.6bn and estimates that, taking into account additional costs to the state sector of around £100-£300m a year, the policy would lead to a net gain to the public finances of £1.3bn-£1.5bn.

If the numbers transferring into the state sector are low, tax revenues from private schools will be healthy and the cost of incorporating more pupils into the state sector will be limited, though the paper points out that with pupil numbers expected to fall dramatically over the next decade, state schools might welcome extra pupils.


Julie Robinson, CEO of the Independent Schools Council, said the number of pupils moving from independent schools into the state sector would be higher than the 20,000 to 40,000 estimated by the IFS.

She said: “This is the second report in less than a month to confirm what we have consistently said: Labour’s policy will not raise the money it claims it would. Even an over-optimistic estimate – which this most certainly is – leaves Labour significantly short of funding the education policies they claim a tax on parents would pay for.”

In a keynote speech last week, Keir Starmer said money raised from removing tax breaks on private schools would be used to give primary schools cash for “world-class early language innovation”. The party has also said the funds would be used to help recruit more than 6,500 new teachers into the state sector.

The shadow education secretary, Bridget Phillipson, said the IFS analysis reinforced the fact that that all of Labour’s policies are fully costed and fully funded. “The Conservatives have crashed the economy and have no plan for growth which will mean we face tough choices in government,” she said.

“Labour will fund our fully costed plans to drive high and rising standards in our state schools by ending private schools’ unjustifiable tax breaks.”

Josh Hillman, director of education at the Nuffield Foundation, which funded the research, said: “This timely analysis shows that the combination of levying VAT on fees and the tax exemptions associated with removing charitable status from private schools would raise a small but potentially worthwhile sum of money for use in state education.

“However, to make a significant contribution to reversing the widening gap in achievement between advantaged and disadvantaged pupils, a wealth of other research suggests it would need to be spent carefully on well-targeted funding streams and evidence-based programmes and practices.”

Japan asks China for 'scientific' view of Fukushima water release

Foreign Minister Hayashi says Tokyo ready to communicate about plans

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi, left, meets with his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, at an ASEAN meeting in Jakarta on July 14. 

 © Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan/Kyodo

 July 14, 2023

TOKYO (Reuters) -- Japan called on China to approach the release of radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant in a "scientific manner" at a meeting held between Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi and Chinese top diplomat Wang Yi on Friday.

In a move that has caused alarm among neighbouring countries and local fishermen, Japan is set to start releasing more than 1 million tonnes of water from the wrecked Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant this summer. China has emerged as the most vocal of those critics, saying the plan would endanger the environment and human lives.

At a meeting with Wang on the sidelines of an Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) meeting in Indonesia, Hayashi said Japan was willing to communicate with China about the water discharge from a scientific perspective, according to the Japanese foreign ministry.

"(Hayashi) called on China to respond in a scientific manner," it said in a statement.

Wang, in turn, asked Japan to "face up" to legitimate concerns of all sides, "sincerely" communicate with its neighbours and be "prudent" in handling the situation.

"This is as much an issue about attitude as it is about science," China's official Xinhua news agency cited Wang as saying.

The issue of the water release took up a substantive amount of the hour-long talk between Wang and Hayashi, but the two did not come to a clear agreement on the matter, a Japanese foreign ministry official told reporters later on Friday.

Although China has raised concerns about the water discharge, a comprehensive review of the plan by the United Nations nuclear watchdog has said that the impact would be "negligible" and that the discharge would be in accordance with international standards.

The Japanese government says the water has been filtered to remove most radioactive elements except for tritium, an isotope of hydrogen that is hard to separate from water. The treated water will be diluted to well below internationally approved levels of tritium before being released into the Pacific.

Hayashi defended the plan at an ASEAN meeting on Thursday and asserted that China was making "claims not rooted in scientific evidence", according to Japan's foreign ministry.

Relations between the two countries have also become tense as China asserts its maritime ambitions in the region, which Hayashi touched on during his meeting with Wang.

Hayashi "conveyed strong concerns over China's increasing military activity conducted within the vicinity of Japan" as well as Chinese military cooperation with Russia, according to the statement.

Wang said he hoped Japan could be "objective and rational" towards China, and not position it as a threat.

"Japan has identified China as the biggest strategic challenge and rendered China as a threat, which is seriously inconsistent with the reality of China-Japan relations," he said, adding that Beijing was open to maintaining contacts with Japan at all levels.

China woos Papua New Guinea with free trade push

Beijing leverages frustrations over economic ties with U.S., Australia

Chinese President Xi Jinping shakes hands with then-Papua New Guinean Prime Minister Peter O'Neill in Port Moresby in 2018.

 

 Reuters

RURIKA IMAHASHI and IORI KAWATE, Nikkei staff writersJuly 12, 2023 02:28 JST

SYDNEY/BEIJING -- China is bolstering economic ties with Papua New Guinea as the Pacific nation seeks to expand trade with the world's second-largest economy even while deepening military cooperation with the U.S.

The state-owned Bank of China (BOC) has opened its first representative office in Papua New Guinea. The office is a concrete step in Chinese President Xi Jinping's plans to "build a comprehensive strategic partnership with Papua New Guinea," BOC Chairman Ge Haijiao said in a speech at Port Moresby in early June.

Pacific island nations like Papua New Guinea have become a new battleground for influence between Beijing and Washington. As fears grow among the U.S. and its allies over China's growing assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific, the nations are seen as strategically important in both the economic and security spheres.

While the BOC has not yet obtained a banking license in Papua New Guinea and cannot engage in financial transactions, local media report, Papua New Guinea's central bank sees the representative office as a step toward introducing a new commercial bank into the country.

The Chinese side likely hopes the office will promote yuan-denominated trade.

Also last month, Papua New Guinean Prime Minister James Marape presented parliament with a visa waiver agreement with China to facilitate reciprocal travel by diplomats and government officials.

The moves come as China and Papua New Guinea expand economic cooperation on a wider scale. China has proposed the countries sign a free trade agreement and the sides are conducting a joint feasibility study.

In May, Papua New Guinea decided to establish a trade promotion body and open its inaugural overseas trade office in Shanghai. The new office could launch during Marape's trip to China planned for sometime this year, local media report. The FTA could be signed then as well.

A newly constructed road that was funded by the Chinese government in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea, on November 2018. © Reuters

More overseas companies operating in Papua New Guinea are based in China than anywhere else, according to the Australian think tank Lowy Institute. They span across a wide range of industries, from retail to hotels to construction.

Papua New Guinea is drawn to China partly due to frustration over its trade with the U.S. and Australia.

Australia was the country's largest export destination as of 2020. But since gold and other precious metals comprise over 98% of these shipments, Papua New Guinea essentially faces a trade deficit with Australia, according to Papua New Guinean Trade and Investment Minister Richard Maru.

China ranked third, after Australia and Japan, at around 6.4 billion kina ($1.8 billion at current rates) in 2020. The figure had grown 11-fold since 2012. Papua New Guinea hopes to further expand shipments of taro and other agricultural products to the country.

Last year, China signed a security treaty with the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea's eastern neighbor. It also proposed a regionwide deal with 10 Pacific island nations, including on security, though the framework fell through.

After the Solomon Islands deal, the U.S. and Australia sought to deepen military cooperation with Papua New Guinea. Papua New Guinea concluded a defense cooperation agreement with the U.S. in May, and is in talks for a security pact with Australia as well.

China appears to be responding by improving economic ties with Papua New Guinea.

"Deepening ties with China complicates security ties with Australia and the U.S., given PNG doesn't see these bilateral relationships as binary -- it will deepen economic ties with China, while deepening its ties with Australia and the U.S.," said Maholopa Laveil, the FDC Pacific fellow at the Lowy Institute.

"The Marape government is leveraging its trade ties to gain more from Australia and the U.S. in its defense agreements," Laveil said.

Cuban government condemns provocative US nuclear submarine visit to Guantanamo Bay


The Russian military training ship Perekop performs docking maneuvers on July 11, 2023, in Havana. (AFP)

AFP
Published: 11 July ,2023

The Cuban government on Tuesday said it “strongly rejects” the presence of a US nuclear-powered submarine last week at the American naval base in Guantanamo Bay on the island’s east coast.

In a statement issued in English, the foreign ministry said it “strongly rejects the arrival of a nuclear-powered submarine in the Guantanamo Bay on July 5, 2023, that stayed until July 8 at the US military base located there.”

The incident was a “provocative escalation of the United States, whose political or strategic motives are not known,” it added.

The ministry warned of the “danger of the presence and circulation of nuclear submarines of the United States armed forces in the nearby Caribbean region.”


In Washington, the State Department had no immediate comment on Havana’s statement.

The complaint follows a tightening of relations between Cuba and Russia, with an uptick in bilateral projects and visits by senior officials even as Moscow is engaged in a war on Ukraine.

Last month, Cuba and Russia -- both under US sanctions -- announced they would pursue closer “technical-military” cooperation.

Moscow and Havana were at the center of a global nuclear scare in 1962, when the Soviet Union stationed missiles on the island, sparking threats of an attack by the United States.

The weapons were withdrawn and a crisis averted, but Cuba has been under a US blockade ever since.

Cuba has also raised eyebrows over recent interactions with China.

The Wall Street Journal has reported that Havana was negotiating with Beijing to establish a joint military training facility on the island, and the White House said China has been operating an intelligence unit in Cuba for years -- which Havana has denied.

Cuba has repeatedly demanded the return of a 117-square-kilometer (45-square-mile) territory in US hands since 1898 and home to the Guantanamo base.

Since 2002, it has been used by the United States to house “enemy combatants” captured in the so-called war on terror following the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Last month, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Fionnuala Ni Aolain said the treatment of the remaining 30 detainees at Guantanamo was “cruel, inhuman and degrading.”

 

Russia declares Norway-headquartered Human Rights House ‘undesirable’

The Procurator General’s Office in Moscow claims the organisation’s activities are “provocative” and “shapes public opinions”.

By

Thomas Nilsen

     

July 07, 2023

The announcement Friday afternoon comes as no surprise. There is no longer any room for human rights work in Russia.

Today, more than 80 civil society organizations are united under the umbrella foundation Human Rights House. Advocating for the freedoms of assembly, association, and expression, the groups are based in many countries but headquartered in Oslo.

Human Rights House has advocated civil rights in Russia for years and supported many local individuals and groups.

The Procurator General’s Office states that the Human Rights House is engaged in discrediting Russia’s foreign policy and its armed forces. The provocative information agenda of the organization is aimed at political and economic isolation of Russia, the statement reads.

“The activities of the HRHF and the listed national human rights houses are aimed at violating the territorial integrity of the state, destabilizing the socio-political situation, discrediting the domestic and foreign policy pursued by the country’s leadership, and shaping public opinion about the need to change power in an unconstitutional way.”

To underline its accusation that Human Rights House Foundation is a foreign “provocative” organization, the Prosecutor General’s Office points to its investigation discovering that the activities are funded by the European Union, Great Britain, Norway, the Netherlands, Lithuania, Poland, the Czech Republic and Switzerland.

Human Rights House is the second Norwegian group to be declared ‘undesirable’ in Russia after the environmental foundation Bellona was listed in April.

The law on undesirable organizations has been expanded several times and can be used to hinder any foreign or international organization that allegedly undermines Russia’s constitutional order, military, or security.

When blacklisted, any “undesirable organization” must cease all activities in Russia or face criminal sanctions.

A 2021 amendment to the law makes it easier to open criminal cases for people affiliated with an undesirable organization. Offenses carry a punishment of up to six years in prison.

Photo: Human Rights House Foundation

GOP attorneys general attack Target’s LGBTQ Pride merchandise as potentially ‘obscene’ and ‘meant to sexualize’ kids

David Badash, The New Civil Rights Movement
July 7, 2023,

Todd Rokita / Office of Indiana Attorney General.

Seven Republican attorneys general have banded together to issue a threatening letter to Target, suggesting its LGBTQ Pride merchandise may violate state child-protection and parental-rights laws, and claiming at least some of the products are potentially "harmful to minors," "obscene," "meant to sexualize" children, and "anti-Christian." They also imply the corporation's officers may be in violation of their fiduciary responsibilities by allowing the "promotion and sale" of those items.

The six-page letter, dated July 5, also appears to promote a form of Christian nationalism, suggesting right-wing boycotts over the LGBTQ Pride products harmed the company's market value, and then stating: "It is likely more profitable to sell the type of Pride that enshrines the love of the United States. Target’s Pride Campaign alienates whereas Pride in our country unites."

The letter also refers to reports from right-wing media including the National Review, Fox News, the New York Post, and the Daily Caller, along with articles from Reuters and Axios.

It denounces Target's financial support of GLSEN. The 33-year old education non-profit's website says it works to "advise on, advocate for, and research comprehensive policies designed to protect LGBTQ students as well as students of marginalized identities," but the attorneys general claim the organization "furnishes resources to activists for the purpose of undermining parents’ constitutional and statutory rights."

The attorneys general point to specific state laws 12 times, but do not specifically tell Target it is actually in violation of any laws. An article published in CBS affiliate Idaho News concludes, "It is not immediately clear what response the attorneys general are seeking from Target."

Those attorneys general, all Republicans, are: Indiana's Todd Rokita, the lead sponsor of the letter, Tim Griffin (Arkansas), Raul Labrador (Idaho), Daniel Cameron (Kentucky), Lynn Fitch (Mississippi), Andrew Bailey (Missouri), and Alan Wilson (South Carolina). Several are former U.S. congressmen with anti-LGBTQ voting records.

"As Attorneys General committed to enforcing our States’ child-protection and parental-rights laws and our States’ economic interests as Target shareholders, we are concerned by recent events involving the company’s 'Pride' campaign," the letter begins. "Our concerns entail the company’s promotion and sale of potentially harmful products to minors, related potential interference with parental authority in matters of sex and gender identity, and possible violation of fiduciary duties by the company’s directors and officers."

"As the chief legal officers of our States, we are charged with enforcing state laws protecting children and safeguarding parental rights. State child-protection laws penalize the 'sale or distribution . . . of obscene matter.' A matter is considered 'obscene' if 'the dominant theme of the matter . . . appeals to the prurient interest in sex,' including 'material harmful to minors.' Indiana, as well as other states, have passed laws to protect children from harmful content meant to sexualize them and prohibit gender transitions of children."

They also claim that "Target wittingly marketed and sold LGBTQIA+ promotional products to families and young children as part of a comprehensive effort to promote gender and sexual identity among children," "Target reportedly promoted and sold products in our states that included, among other products, LGBT-themed onesies, bibs, and overalls, t-shirts labeled 'Girls Gays Theys;' 'Pride Adult Drag Queen Katya' (which depicts a male dressed in female 'drag'); and girls’ swimsuits with 'tuck-friendly construction' and 'extra crotch coverage' for male genitalia."

Reports have stated the "tuck-friendly construction" was only part of adult clothing lines.

The attorneys general also point to merchandise from what they say is a "self-declared 'Satanist-Inspired' brand," "products with anti-Christian designs, such as pentagrams," and one design that "included the phrase 'Satan Respects Pronouns.'"

Lastly, they claim these actions "not only raise concerns under our States’ child-protection and parental-rights laws but also against our States’ economic interests as Target shareholders."

"The evidence suggests that Target’s directors and officers may be negligent in undertaking the 'Pride' campaign, which negatively affected Target’s stock price. Moreover, it may have improperly directed company resources for collateral political or social goals unrelated to the company’s and its shareholders’ best interests," they claim. 

Corporations have First Amendment free speech rights.

California state leaders vow to provide textbooks for students after a school board rejected a social studies curriculum

Story by Cheri Mossburg • Yesterday 2:49 a.m.

After a Southern California school district rejected a state-endorsed social studies curriculum that includes material on gay rights, top state officials are vowing to buy a textbook in question and distribute it to students before the new school year.

“That social studies book is being censored by the local school board,” California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a video message directed at parents in the city of Temecula.

A statement from the governor’s office Thursday said the state will “secure textbooks for students” in the district if the school board “fails to take action at its next board meeting” next week.

The announcement is the latest dispute between state and local officials after the Temecula Valley Unified School District’s board voted 3-2 on May 16 to reject the curriculum, with some board members claiming there was not enough parental involvement in the curriculum creation process as well as making comments attacking gay rights activist and politician Harvey Milk.

The curriculum – for grades one through five – contains supplemental resource material for teachers that includes a short biography of Milk, who is believed to be the first openly gay politician elected to public office in California in 1977. The materials describe his lifestyle and his work for gay rights in California until his assassination in 1978.

Many parents at a June public hearing decried the school board’s rejection of the curriculum, and the board is due to review at its next meeting on July 18 a new proposed curriculum that should meet state standards, according to the board’s president.

The Temecula board has previously drawn attention for firing its superintendent without cause, according to the Los Angeles Times, and banned critical race theory from school curricula in December.

State can deliver materials, Newsom says

Newsom’s announcement Thursday also contained statements from state legislative leaders, including Senate President pro Tempore Toni G. Atkins, Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, who collectively rejected what they described as a book ban.

“California will secure textbooks for students in Temecula if the local school board fails to take action at its next board meeting and the state will enact legislation to impose fines on any school district that fails to provide adequate instructional materials,” the governor’s office said in a news release.


In response to the governor’s announcement, Joseph Komrosky, who serves as the president of the district’s board and voted against the curriculum, said the district “did not ‘ban’ a book at its May 16, 2023 regular meeting. Instead the Board of Education determined not to adopt as curriculum a history-social science program for District-wide use that had been part of a pilot study conducted by the District.”

Komrosky added that board members shared concerns about supplemental material he described as “not a textbook” that was part of that curriculum related to a lesson for fourth graders about Milk.

Board members who opposed the curriculum called Milk a “pedophile” in the May meeting before voting it down. The 34-year-old Milk had a relationship with a 16-year-old while living in Greenwich Village in New York that has long been a source of controversy, according to the late San Francisco journalist Randy Shilts’ biography of Milk, “The Mayor of Castro Street.” The age of consent in New York was raised from 14 to 18 in 2017.

Komrosky said in June that his statements about Milk “were not based upon him being a homosexual, but rather based upon him being an adult having a sexual relationship with a minor.”

In Thursday’s response, Komrosky continued, “But what the Governor has conveniently ignored is that members of the Board of Education expressed other significant concerns about the District’s process, including whether it had adequately engaged the community regarding the adoption of curriculum.”

The proposed social studies curriculum was part of a pilot process started last year and included 47 classrooms with 1,300 students, Kimberly Velez, assistant superintendent of Student Support Services, said during the May meeting.

The curriculum rejected by the Temecula school board is one of four standard, state-approved textbooks being used across hundreds of school districts in California, the governor’s office said Thursday.

“Cancel culture has gone too far in Temecula: radicalized zealots on the school board rejected a textbook used by hundreds of thousands of students and now children will begin the school year without the tools they need to learn,” Newsom said in the statement.

“If the school board won’t do its job by its next board meeting to ensure kids start the school year with basic materials, the state will deliver the book into the hands of children and their parents — and we’ll send the district the bill and fine them for violating state law.”

CNN reached out to each member of the Temecula Valley Unified School District for further comment.

Board member Steven Schwartz said, “I believe the Governor is acting in the best interest of our students. I have supported the (social studies) textbooks based on the expertise of our teachers who piloted the program.”

Board member Alison Barclay said, “I am pleased to hear that the State of California is willing to support our students and ensure that they have access to the most up to date and accurate information. … Our students deserve the best and having to continue to learn from a completely outdated curriculum that doesn’t meet state standards is not what’s best for our students.”

Thurmond has sponsored legislation that, if passed, would impose fines on districts that fail to provide adequate instructional materials, according to a news release.

CNN’s Aya Elamroussi, Taylor Romine, Elizabeth Joseph and Alexandra Coenjaerts contributed to this report.

For more CNN news and newsletters create an account at CNN.com

Online Incitement Against LGBT People in Cameroon

Planned Visit by French Expert Met with Online Hate

Larissa Kojoue
Researcher, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Rights Program

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) people in Cameroon are all too aware of homophobic rhetoric and violent attacks against them. This has been highlighted once again in the outpouring of vitriol before a scheduled visit by Jean-Marc Berthon, the French ambassador for the Rights of LGBT+ Persons.


IDAHOT 2021 Campaign by Elles Cameroun, “Resister. Soutenir. Guérir”, May 17, 2021, Bepanda Douala. © 2021 Elles Cameroun

Berthon was due to visit Cameroon later this month for an event on gender and sexuality hosted by the French Institute in Yaoundé, the capital. Cameroon’s government officially registered its objection to the visit, and Foreign Minister Lejeune Mbella Mbella said in the media that the visit would contravene Cameroonian law, which forbids consensual same-sex relations.

The visit was then cancelled.

Since the visit was announced, many people have called for mob justice and violence against LGBT persons on social media. Some government and political officials, as well as public figures, referred to LGBT people as “against nature,” “an anomaly,” “vampire citizens,” “destructive of the family,” “destructive of the state,” or as using “satanic and demonic practices.” In addition to this online hatred, people perceived as LGBT live with constant threats of harassment and physical violence every day.

Tamu (not their real name), an LGBT activist living in Yaoundé, told me, “The situation is very tense. People are scared. Everywhere you go you hear: 'We have to burn them all.' … There are young [LGBT] people calling me from everywhere. They don't know what to do.”

The foreign minister claimed that there are no LGBT people in Cameroon, which is patently false. LGBT groups exist in Cameroon and several even manage to work with the government on initiatives to combat HIV/AIDS. But Cameroon has a dismal track record on upholding the rights of LGBT people. Security forces have failed to protect LGBT people from violence and in some instances have been responsible for acts of violence, or complicit in them. The Cameroonian government should unequivocally condemn violence and incitement to violence against LGBT people, investigate such crimes against LGBT persons, and bring those responsible to justice.

Overlooked No More: Hannie Schaft, Resistance Fighter During World War II

She killed Nazis in the Netherlands and was known as “the girl with the red hair” on their most-wanted list. Then she was executed.

Hannie Schaft was one of few women to take up arms during the resistance. She was a student when the Nazis occupied the Netherlands.

Credit...Wikimedia Commons


By Claire Moses
Claire Moses reported this story from Amsterdam and The Hague, using documents from the 1940s at the Dutch National Archives.

July 7, 2023

This article is part of Overlooked, a series of obituaries about remarkable people whose deaths, beginning in 1851, went unreported in The Times.

It’s April 17, 1945. Two Nazi officers are making a 24-year-old woman walk ahead of them toward the sandy dunes along the Dutch coast. She’s wearing a blue skirt and a red and blue sweater.

She is the Dutch resistance fighter Hannie Schaft, but one might not have recognized her immediately: Her signature red hair has been dyed black.

As she walks, one of the officers fires his gun at the back of her head. The bullet ricochets off her skull and doesn’t kill her. The other officer then shoots her, also in the back of the head, this time at closer range.

That is how Hannie Schaft died, just a few weeks before the end of World War II in Europe. She had been arrested and sent to a prison in Amsterdam about a month earlier, during a random check in Haarlem, her hometown in the Netherlands, when she was found carrying a gun, as well as illegal newspapers and pamphlets from the resistance movement, in her bicycle bag. Initially it wasn’t obvious to the Nazis whom they had arrested, but it soon became evident that it was the woman they had been looking for, the woman known as the “girl with the red hair,” who had shot and killed multiple Nazis and collaborators.

More in ‘Overlooked’

Overlooked No More: Dolores Alexander, Feminist Journalist and Activist
June 25, 2023

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She was born Jannetje Johanna Schaft on Sept. 16, 1920, in a left-wing, middle-class household, to Aafje Talea (Vrijer) Schaft, a homemaker with a progressive streak, and Pieter Schaft, a teacher. Hannie, a name she adopted when she became a resistance fighter, had an older sister, Annie, who had died of diphtheria. As a result, she had a protective childhood, said Liesbeth van der Horst, the director of the Resistance Museum in Amsterdam, which has a display about Schaft that includes her glasses, a version of the gun she carried, and a photo of her and a fellow resistance fighter.

“She was a serious, principled girl,” van der Horst said in an interview. “She was a bookworm.”

She added that despite being shy, Schaft “was proud of her red hair” and how it helped her stand out.

After high school in Haarlem, Schaft studied law at the University of Amsterdam, in the hopes of becoming a human rights lawyer. She was a student when the Nazis occupied the Netherlands in May 1940, plunging the country into war and targeting Jewish citizens. Though Schaft was not Jewish, the occupation set her on a path to political activism.

“As the Nazi regime’s policies got harsher against Jews, her own sense of moral outrage grew stronger,” said Buzzy Jackson, the author of “To Die Beautiful” (2023), a novel about Schaft’s life. “She started to want to do more.”

She began volunteering for the Red Cross, rolling bandages and making first aid kits for soldiers and helping German refugees. When the Nazi regime required all students in the Netherlands to pledge their loyalty to the occupiers, Schaft, like many others, refused to do so and was forced to drop out.

After the Nazis arrested Schaft, she admitted her resistance activities. She was 24 when they executed her.

Credit...Wikimedia Commons


She maintained the friendships she had formed with two Jewish girls at the university, helping them obtain fake IDs to evade Nazi checkpoints and hiding them as the Nazis continued stripping Jewish citizens of their basic rights.

By the end of the war, more than 100,000 people — nearly 75 percent of all Dutch Jews, the highest percentage of any Western European country — would be deported to concentration camps and murdered.

The resistance, van der Horst said, was not one organized movement but rather a tangle of overlapping networks.

Schaft joined the Resistance Council, a communist group, where she met two sisters, Truus and Freddie Oversteegen, who became her close friends and would survive the war. (In March, the Netherlands Institute for War Documentation announced that it had found two letters written by Truus Oversteegen to a friend, in which she mentioned Schaft.)

The armed resistance was an extremely dangerous undertaking, with many fighters arrested and executed. It’s unclear how many attacks can be attributed to Schaft, but researchers say there were at least six.

In June 1944, Schaft and a fellow resistance fighter, Jan Bonekamp (with whom she was rumored to have had a romantic relationship), targeted a high-ranking police officer for assassination. As the officer was getting on his bicycle to go to work, Schaft shot him in the back, causing him to fall off the bike. Bonekamp finished the killing but was injured doing so. He died shortly after. Schaft managed to escape on her own bike, which was how she got around doing her resistance work.

Schaft was also involved in killing or wounding a baker who was known for betraying people, a hairdresser who worked for the Nazis’ intelligence agency, and another Nazi police officer.

Before confronting her targets, Schaft put on makeup — including lipstick and mascara — and styled her hair, Jackson said. In one of the few direct quotations that have been attributed to Schaft, she explained her reasoning to Truus Oversteegen: “I’ll die clean and beautiful.”

Dawn Skorczewski, a lecturer at Amsterdam University College, said Schaft’s involvement in the resistance was particularly extraordinary because few women in the movement took up arms.

“It’s unusual that a woman of her age would start killing Nazis in alleyways,” she said in a video call.

Once the Nazis started looking for “the girl with the red hair,” as she was described on their most-wanted list, Schaft disguised herself by dying her hair black and wearing wire-frame glasses.

The Nazis raided Schaft’s parents’ house and arrested them, hoping that she would turn herself in, but they were released nine months later, according to the Resistance Museum.

After Schaft was caught, she admitted her resistance activities. But there is no evidence that she gave the Nazis information about any of her fellow resistance fighters.

After the liberation of the Netherlands on May 5, 1945, Schaft’s body was dug up from a mass grave with hundreds of other people the Nazis had executed. She was the only woman among them.

Later that year, she was buried at the Honorary Cemetery in the seaside town of Bloemendaal, alongside hundreds of other resistance fighters. Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands attended the service, according to documents in the Dutch National Archives.

Schaft’s name is well known in the Netherlands. There are streets and schools named after her, and in 1981 she was the subject of a scripted movie called “The Girl With the Red Hair.” (Janet Maslin panned the film in The New York Times, writing that Schaft’s story “was undoubtedly more exciting in reality than it is on the screen.”) An Amsterdam-based postproduction company is planning to polish the original film and rerelease it for the Netherlands Film Festival in September.

Her story is still being uncovered by researchers — a challenging task because resistance fighters worked undercover and often left little evidence behind.


As Jackson, the author of “To Die Beautiful,” noted, “The reason we know about Anne Frank is because she left a diary.”

Schaft, on the other hand, made it a point not to put anything in writing. “That’s true for most people in the resistance,” Jackson said. “There are not a lot of records to look at.”

Claire Moses is a reporter for the Express desk in London. More about Claire Moses