Australians start applying for mail-in ballots ahead of Indigenous Voice referendum


A skater boarder passes a vote Yes poster for the Voice referendum in Sydney, Australia, Monday, Sept. 11, 2023. Voters can apply from Monday for postal ballots in the Oct. 14 referendum that would create a so-called Indigenous Voice to Parliament, a proposal for constitutional change that opinion polls suggest is becoming increasingly likely to be rejected.

A pedestrian walks past a vote Yes poster for the Voice referendum in Sydney, Australia, Monday, Sept. 11, 2023. Voters can apply from Monday for postal ballots in the Oct. 14 referendum that would create a so-called Indigenous Voice to Parliament, a proposal for constitutional change that opinion polls suggest is becoming increasingly likely to be rejected. 

(AP Photo/Mark Baker)

BY ROD MCGUIRK
 September 11, 2023

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Voters began applying Monday for mail-in ballots ahead of the Oct. 14 referendum that would create an Indigenous Voice to Parliament, a proposal for constitutional change that opinion polls suggest is becoming increasingly likely to be rejected.

Australians will vote at the first referendum in a generation whether to enshrine in the constitution a collection of appointed Indigenous advocates aimed at giving the nation’s most disadvantaged ethnic minority more say on government policy.

People who are unable to attend a polling booth on Oct. 14 for reasons including distance, disability and prison sentences can apply from 6 p.m. Monday for authorities to provide them with postal ballots, which will be cast in Australia’s first referendum since 1999.

A majority of voters across the nation and in a majority of Australia’s six states need to support the referendum for it to pass. Only eight out of 44 referendums have achieved that double majority.

But a Resolve Political Monitor opinion poll published in newspapers on Monday suggested the smallest state, Tasmania, was the only one with majority support for the Voice.

National support for the Voice was at 65% when polls on the question were first held in August 2022, but support has been declining for months.

Proponents hope support will rally when voters become more engaged with the question closer to the voting day.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese took the final step in ensuring the referendum goes ahead by directing the governor-general late Monday to issue electoral authorities with a required legal order to conduct the vote.

Opposition leader Peter Dutton had earlier urged Albanese in Parliament to call the referendum off because of the declining support in polls.

“Will the prime minister withdraw his Voice referendum so that we can avoid an outcome which sets back reconciliation and divides the nation?” Dutton asked Albanese.

Albanese criticized Dutton over his opposition to the Voice, saying the conservative party leader had “chosen politics over substance.”

The Voice referendum would be the first in Australia’s history to pass without bipartisan support.

Melbourne University election analyst Adrian Beaumont said referendums proposed by Albanese’s center-left Labor Party have always been opposed by their conservative opponents since 1946.

“It’s very clear that Voice support is slumping in all polls,” Beaumont said. “Conservative oppositions always oppose Labor referendums, and they are able to scare the electorate into opposing changes.”

Proponents say embedding the Voice in the constitution would recognize the special place that Indigenous people have in Australian history while giving them input in government policies.

Opponents argue it would be the biggest change to Australia’s democracy in the nation’s history and divide Australians along racial lines without reducing Indigenous disadvantage.

Indigenous Australians account for 3.8% of the population and they die around eight years younger than Australia’s wider population on average.

As US East Coast ramps up offshore wind power projects, much remains unknown





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The five turbines of America’s first offshore wind farm, owned by the Danish company, Orsted, stand off the coast of Block Island, R.I., on Oct. 17, 2022. As the U.S. races to build offshore wind power projects that will transform coastlines from Maine to South Carolina, much remains unknown about how the facilities could affect the environment. And that has some people concerned, particularly those who depend on the sea for their livelihoods. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

Crew members of a fishing boat unload their catch in Point Pleasant Beach, N.J., on June 20, 2023. The commercial and recreational fishing industry has numerous concerns over offshore wind projects. The wind industry says it has tried to address those concerns, and will pay compensation for those that can’t be avoided. (AP Photo/Wayne Parry)

 Guests tour the five turbines of America’s first offshore wind farm, owned by the Danish company, Orsted, off the coast of Block Island, R.I., as part of a wind power conference, Monday, Oct. 17, 2022. As the U.S. races to build offshore wind power projects that will transform coastlines from Maine to South Carolina, much remains unknown about how the facilities could affect the environment. And that has some people concerned, particularly those who depend on the sea for their livelihoods. (AP Photo/David Goldman, File)

Workers at the J.T. White Clam Depuration Plant in Highlands, N.J., prepare to move wagons of clams on Aug. 1, 2023. The commercial and recreational fishing industry has numerous concerns over offshore wind projects. The wind industry says it has tried to address those concerns, and will pay compensation for those that can’t be avoided. 

(AP Photo/Wayne Parry)

BY WAYNE PARRY
 September 11, 2023

POINT PLEASANT BEACH, N.J. (AP) — As the U.S. races to build offshore wind power projects, transforming coastlines from Maine to South Carolina, much remains unknown about how the facilities could affect the environment.

And that worries some people, particularly those who depend on the sea for their livelihoods.

“We don’t have the science to know what the impact will be,” said Jim Hutchinson, managing editor of The Fisherman magazine in New Jersey. “The attitude has been, ‘Build it and we’ll figure it out.’”

The wind power industry disputes such claims, citing years of studies.

So far, four offshore wind projects have been approved by the federal government for the U.S. East Coast, according to the American Clean Power Association. Vineyard Wind will place 62 turbines about 15 miles (24 kilometers) off Martha’s Vineyard, generating enough electricity to power 400,000 homes.

South Fork Wind will place 12 turbines in the waters off Long Island, New York, about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Montauk Point, to power 70,000 homes. And Ocean Wind I, the first of two Orsted projects in New Jersey, will place 98 turbines about 15 miles off Atlantic City and Ocean City, generating power for 500,000 homes. The company is a Danish wind power business that will build two of the three offshore projects approved for New Jersey.

Those projects are in addition to the planned Revolution Wind development, about 15 miles southeast of Point Judith, Rhode Island, with 65 turbines powering nearly 250,000 homes. Numerous others have been proposed, and the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management plans to review at least 16 offshore wind projects by 2025.

“All this is happening so fast,” said Greg Cudnik, a recreational fisherman, bait and tackle shop owner and party boat captain from Ship Bottom, New Jersey. “Science takes time.”

A joint study in March by two federal scientific agencies and the commercial fishing industry documents numerous impacts that offshore wind power projects could have on fish and marine mammals, including noise, vibration, electromagnetic fields and heat transfer that could alter the environment.

Like numerous existing studies, the report pointed out the complexities of how the structures and cables might interact with marine life. For instance, turbines can attract some fish and repel others.

The March study said large underwater platforms are rapidly colonized by smaller, bottom-dwelling marine life, including shellfish and crabs, which in turn attract larger predators like black sea bass. At the same time, cloudy water from turbine operations, noise, vibrations and electromagnetic fields could also make species leave an area.

In most instances, report authors agreed that more studies are needed. Andy Lipsky, who oversees the wind energy team at NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, is a co-author. He said the work helps agencies define monitoring required for long-term studies and that more work is required to determine how offshore wind energy changes marine habitats.

Research in other countries also is also nuanced. Some European studies have shown that crabs and lobster are attracted to harder sea bottoms that support wind turbines. Others, including flatfish and whiting, were shown to leave those areas.

And in May, the Biden Administration offered an $850,000 grant to collect more information on the hearing abilities of critically endangered North American right whales, citing “knowledge gaps” in how the animals behave. The request was made “in support of the rapid development of offshore wind,” according to a notice on the Grants.gov website.

Substantial research already exists. The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has posted a half-dozen or more studies on its web site every year since 2016; in several instances the studies called for further investigation and analysis.

Phil Sgro, a spokesman for the American Clean Power Association, said the industry believes sufficient scientific studies exist to establish that offshore wind development can be done “in a manner that is both economical and environmentally responsible.”

Opponents blame ocean floor preparation for causing or contributing to the deaths of 70 whales on the U.S. East Coast since December. But three federal agencies say there is no evidence the two are related.

The U.S. fishing industry — both commercial and recreational — has numerous concerns about offshore wind impacting operations in places long available for fishing with minimal interference.

Interviews with commercial and recreational fishermen and women show they share common anxieties about the offshore wind turbines chasing away species they have long relied on.

They fear electromagnetic fields emitted from underwater power cables could deter or harm some marine life. They worry about being able to safely navigate around the turbines, and about being prohibited from productive fishing grounds on which they have relied for generations.

They also worry that unforeseen consequences could reduce catches and trigger government limits on how much can be caught if fish stocks diminish.

And while some companies have voluntarily agreed to compensate fishermen for any economic damage, there is no mandate requiring it.

“Offshore wind is the single greatest existential threat to commercial fishing in the United States of America right now,” Meghan Lapp, fisheries liaison for Seafreeze, a seafood company based in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, told New Jersey lawmakers at a recent hearing.

Cudnik, the New Jersey boat captain, worries about prime species being driven away by changes to the ocean floor.

“Clams, scallops, flounder, and sand eels are associated with soft sand bottoms,” he said. “Striped bass, sea bass, mahis — everything eats these eels. When they are in abundance, it’s awesome fishing. All these offshore wind areas are in that prime habitat.”

And Keith Craffey, president of the Baymen’s Protective Association on New Jersey’s Raritan Bay, worries that power cables from a New York project coming ashore in New Jersey will be placed across productive clam beds his members use, potentially rendering the areas off-limits.

“If we have to lay off 50 guys because of it, are the offshore wind companies going to pick those 50 guys up?” he asked.

On Monday, the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management released an environmental impact statement for the proposed Empire Wind project in New York, designed to power 700,000 homes. It determined that the project could have “moderate to major” impacts on commercial fisheries, and “minor to moderate” impacts for recreational fishing, although minor beneficial effects could also occur from the creation of an artificial reef that will attract some fish.

New Jersey’s commercial fishing industry had nearly $690 million in sales in 2020, not including imports, according to the U.S. Commerce Department. The recreational sector generated $724 million in sales that year.

Sgro said the wind power industry has worked closely with the government and the fishing industry to address concerns, including agreeing to avoid placing turbines in the areas most heavily used by anglers. He said a study in the waters off southern New England determined that heat and electromagnetic fields from buried cables will not negatively affect important fish species in the area.

Orsted, the developer behind two of New Jersey’s approved projects, said it has worked hard to “avoid, minimize and mitigate” negative impacts on fishing.

The company said a 7-year study of its wind farm in Block Island, Rhode Island, found the catch of most species was unaffected and that there was a greater abundance of black sea bass and cod after construction.

The study was paid for by Orsted, designed in cooperation with local commercial fishermen and carried out by INSPIRE Environmental, which does ocean floor studies for companies and governments.

Orsted says it will compensate boat crews for damage to or loss of gear; pay direct compensation to recreational and commercial vessels adversely impacted, and create a navigational safety fund. It also plans to coordinate with state and federal authorities on seasonal operating restrictions to protect flounder and herring.

The federal government has endorsed — but not required — compensation to the fishing industry for negative effects from offshore wind. Eleven states are considering setting up a regional fund to administer such payments.

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., a New Jersey Democrat, supports the compensation “if the industry experiences economic losses as a result of the transition to offshore wind power.”
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Follow Wayne Parry on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, at twitter.com/WayneParryAC

INVASION OF PRIVACY

Candidate in high-stakes Virginia election performed sex acts with husband in live videos

BY SARAH RANKIN AND DENISE LAVOIE
 September 11, 2023

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — A candidate in a high-stakes legislative contest in Virginia had sex with her husband in live videos posted on a pornographic website and asked viewers to pay them money in return for carrying out specific sex acts.

Screenshots of Susanna Gibson on the website were shared with The Associated Press. The campaign for Gibson, a Democrat running for a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates in a district just outside Richmond, issued a statement Monday in which it denounced the sharing of the videos as a violation of the law and her privacy. Gibson called the exposure of the videos “the worst gutter politics.”

“It won’t intimidate me and it won’t silence me,” she said in the statement. “My political opponents and their Republican allies have proven they’re willing to commit a sex crime to attack me and my family because there’s no line they won’t cross to silence women when they speak up.”

The Washington Post first reported the videos on Monday.

The revelation marked an explosive turn in a contest that will carry significant weight in determining the balance of power in the Virginia General Assembly. The race has attracted large amounts of spending and interest for an off-year legislative race.

Democrats control the Senate by a four-vote margin, and Republicans control the House of Delegates by the same margin, with four seats currently vacant. The parties are waging intense legislative battles as GOP rising national political star Gov. Glenn Youngkin looks to bolster his conservative agenda with full control of state government.

Gibson said that exposing the videos is “an illegal invasion of my privacy designed to humiliate me and my family.” Gibson’s attorney, Daniel P. Watkins, said that disseminating the videos is a violation of Virginia’s revenge porn law, which makes it a crime to “maliciously” disseminate or sell nude or sexual images of another person with the intent to “coerce, harass, or intimidate.

“A criminal act has occurred here, and that’s the dissemination of revenge porn by a Republican operative,” Watkins told the AP.

Watkins cited a 2021 Virginia Court of Appeals ruling that found it was unlawful for a man to secretly record his girlfriend during a consensual sexual encounter even if he did not show the video to other people. The court found that consent to being seen is not the same as consent to being recorded.

Gibson, 40, a nurse practitioner and married mother of two young children, won a Democratic primary in June and is running against Republican businessman David Owen in one of the most competitve districts in the state.

“I’m sure this is a difficult time for Susanna and her family, and I’m remaining focused on my campaign,” Owen said in a statement.

A top-ranking Virginia Democrat immediately came to Gibson’s defense after the videos were reported by the Post. “Now we are going to make this the biggest fundraising day of her campaign,” Sen. L. Louise Lucas said on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.

Garren Shipley, a spokesman for Republican House Speaker Todd Gilbert, did not immediately respond to a request seeking comment.

Gibson and Owen are competing in the 57th District, an area that includes suburbs of Richmond in both Henrico and Goochland counties. The district chose Youngkin by a 51.2%-to-48.3% margin in 2021, but in the 2022 congressional midterm elections, the split in the district was 50% Democratic to 49.1% Republican.

Gibson has said the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2022 decision overturning Roe v. Wade propelled her into the race.

Gibson had an account on Chaturbate, a legal website where viewers can watch live webcam performances that feature nudity and sexual activity, according to the screenshots reviewed by the AP. The videos show GIbson and her husband, John David Gibson, having sex and at times looking into the camera and asking viewers for donations in the form of “tokens” or “tips” to watch a private show.

Chaturbate videos are streamed live on that site and are often archived on other publicly available sites, the Post reported. More than a dozen videos posted under Gibson’s Chaturbate username were archived on one of those sites — Recurbate — in September 2022, the month after she announced her candidacy. The most recent were two videos archived on Sept. 30, 2022. It is unclear when the livestream occurred.

NEW LEADER OF GOP FREEDOM CAUCUS
Putin says prosecution of Trump shows US political system is ‘rotten’



In this photo released by Roscongress Foundation, Russian President Vladimir Putin gestures while speaking at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia, Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2023. (Sergey Shinov, Roscongress Foundation via AP)

In this photo released by Roscongress Foundation, Russian President Vladimir Putin addresses a plenary session of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia, Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2023. (Vyacheslav Viktorov, Roscongress Foundation via AP)

Russian President Vladimir Putin applauds as he attends a plenary session of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia, Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2023. (Mikhail Metzel, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)

Russian President Vladimir Putin addresses a plenary session of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Russia, Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2023. (Mikhail Metzel, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)

 September 12, 2023

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin asserted Tuesday that the criminal cases against former U.S. President Donald Trump are political revenge that show the fundamental corruption of the United States.

“As for the prosecution of Trump, for us what is happening in today’s conditions, in my opinion, is good because it shows the rottenness of the American political system, which cannot pretend to teach others democracy,” Putin said at an Eastern Economic Forum gathering in Russia’s Pacific Coast city of Vladivostok.

“Everything that is happening with Trump is the persecution of a political rival for political reasons. That’s what it is. And this is being done in front of the public of the United States and the whole world,” he said.

Opinion polls indicate that Trump is by far the strongest contender to become the Republican Party’s candidate in the 2024 presidential election. During his four years in the White House, Trump repeatedly touted having good relations with Putin, while critics alleged he was submissive to the Russian leader.

Trump has claimed he could resolve the conflict in Ukraine in a matter of days, if he regains the presidency. He has not provided details of his potential approach.

“We hear that Mr. Trump says that he will solve pressing problems in a few days, including the Ukrainian crisis. Well, this cannot but bring happiness. This is good,” Putin said.

However, the Russian leader said his country’s poor relations with the United States were unlikely to change significantly regardless of who becomes president.

“What to expect from the future, no matter who the president is, it’s hard for us to say, but it’s unlikely that anything will change radically,” Putin said. He claimed the Biden administration has instilled a strong bias against Russia and ”it will be very difficult for them to somehow turn this whole ship” in the other direction.

Russia also is due to have a presidential election in 2024. Putin hedged Tuesday when asked if he would seek another term after being in power, as president or prime minister, since 2000.

“We will talk about it” after the Russian parliament sets an election date, he said.
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Jim Heintz in Tallinn, Estonia, contributed to this report.

Fukushima nuclear plant’s operator says the first round of wastewater release is complete


A group of plaintiffs and supporters, demanding revokation of TEPCO’s treated water discharge plan, head to the Fukushima District Court to file a lawsuit, in Fukushima, northeastern Japan, Friday, Sept. 8, 2023. Fishermen and residents of Fukushima and five other prefectures along Japan’s northeastern coast filed a lawsuit Friday demanding a halt to the ongoing release of treated radioactive wastewater from the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea. The banner reads “Lawsuit to halt the release of ALPS treated radioactive wastewater."

BY MARI YAMAGUCHI
September 11, 2023

TOKYO (AP) — The operator of the wrecked Fukushima nuclear power plant said Monday that it has safely completed the first release of treated radioactive water from the plant into the sea and will inspect and clean the facility before starting the second round in a few weeks.

The Fukushima Daiichi plant began discharging the treated and diluted wastewater into the Pacific Ocean on Aug. 24. The water has accumulated since the plant was damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami in 2011, and the start of its release is a milestone in the plant’s decommissioning.

The discharge, which is expected to continue for decades until the decommissioning is finished, has been strongly opposed by fishing groups and by neighboring countries. China has banned all imports of Japanese seafood in response, hurting producers and exporters and prompting the Japanese government to compile an emergency relief fund. Groups in South Korea have also fiercely protested, demanding Japan stop the release.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, at summits last week of Southeast Asian countries and the Group of 20 nations, stressed the safety and transparency of the release to win international support and sought the immediate lifting of China’s ban.


Fukushima official says release of treated water is a milestone in nuclear plant’s decommissioning

During the 17-day first release, the plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, said it discharged 7,800 tons of treated water from 10 tanks. About 1.34 million tons of radioactive wastewater is stored in about 1,000 tanks at the plant.

Plant workers will rinse the pipeline and other equipment and inspect the system over the next few weeks before starting the release of the second round of 7,800 tons stored in 10 other tanks, TEPCO spokesperson Teruaki Kobashi told reporters Monday.

All sampling data from seawater and fish since the start of the release have been way below set safety limits, officials said.

The International Atomic Energy Agency has been cooperating with Japan and reviewed the safety of the project. It concluded that the release, if carried out precisely as planned, would have a negligible impact on the environment, marine life and human health. On Monday, a team of South Korean experts from the Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety, under an agreement between South Korea and the U.N. nuclear agency, visited an IAEA office set up at the Fukushima plant to monitor the release and share information, the IAEA said in a statement. The South Korean team has been in Japan for the last two weeks and met with IAEA officials offsite.

TEPCO and the government say the wastewater is treated to reduce radioactive materials to safe levels, and then is diluted with seawater to make it much safer than international standards.

The radioactive wastewater has accumulated since three of the plant’s reactors were damaged by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. It continues to grow because cooling water used on the damaged reactors leaks into the reactor basements, where it mixes with groundwater.

TEPCO plans to release 31,200 tons of treated water through March 2024, and officials say the pace will pick up later.

The government and TEPCO say the discharge is unavoidable because the tanks will reach their capacity of 1.37 million tons next year and space at the plant is needed for its decommissioning.

UAW union makes progress with 1 of 3 automakers as strike deadline looms


A worker assembles a Ford vehicle at the company's Chicago Assembly Plant (2010). Ford, General Motors and Stellantis are locked in negotiations with the UAW this week as a strike deadline looms at midnight Thursday

. File Photo by Brian Kersey/UPI | License Photo

Sept. 11 (UPI) -- Stellantis NV, the owner of Jeep and Chrysler, reached a partial agreement with the United Auto Workers union on Monday as a strike deadline looms that could cost the auto industry more than $1 billion.

The union and automaker reached a tentative agreement on health and safety issues, a positive step forward to handling other issues for their contract before the current one expires at midnight Thursday.


"There is still more work to do, but we know that Stellantis and the UAW have a shared interest in these discussions: reaching an agreement that secures the future for our employees and their families," said Tobin Williams, senior vice president of human resources of Stellantis North America in a note to workers.

"We are on a good path and remain committed to reaching a tentative agreement without a work stoppage that would negatively impact our employees and our customers."

Stellantis also sent a second proposal to the union on Monday. The first proposal to the union, which included a 14.5% pay raise to most employees was swiftly rejected. UAW President Shawn Fain rejected similar raise proposals from Ford and General Motors as inadequate with members facing inflation pressures.

The UAW proposal wants the automakers to make temporary workers into full-time after 90 days, give the union the right to strike over plant closures, and more paid time off, including recognizing Juneteenth as a holiday.

Ford wants the right to outsource any work at any time and GM and Stellantis have agreed to give workers paid time off during Juneteenth. All three so far have rejected all UAW changes to pension and retiree healthcare plans.

Stellantis reports progress in talks with auto workers and plans to make another offer Monday


 United Auto Workers members walk in the Labor Day parade in Detroit, Sept. 2, 2019. Automaker Stellantis has made a counteroffer to the United Auto Workers that includes wage increases in each year of a new four-year contract totaling 14.5%. The raises, which would be for most workers, doesn’t include any lump sum payments.

 (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)

 September 11, 2023

DETROIT (AP) — Stellantis is reporting progress in talks with the United Auto Workers union with just three days left before contracts expire with Detroit’s three automakers.

Tobin Williams, head of human resources for North America, told employees in an email that the union made counteroffer to its economic proposal on Sunday.

Stellantis released no details of its offer Monday.

He also says both sides have reached agreement in a number of areas including health and safety.

“There was good energy among both teams and great momentum to reach an agreement as we head into the final days before the contract expires Thursday night,” Williams wrote. “We are on a good path and remain committed to reaching a tentative agreement.”

UAW President Shawn Fain on Friday called counter offers from Stellantis, General Motors and Ford inadequate. He warned of strikes against any company without a tentative contract agreement when the contracts expire at 11:59 p.m. Thursday.

On Monday, Fain said in a statement that all three companies waited until the last minute to make economic offers. “When the CEOs are ready to make a serious offer, we’ll be there, day or night,” he said.

On Friday, Stellantis, which was formed in a 2021 merger of Fiat Chrysler and France’s PSA Peugeot, made its first counteroffer to the union’s demands with a bigger pay raise than offers from Ford and General Motors. Stellantis offered wage increases in each year of a new four-year contract totaling 14.5%.

Last week Ford increased its offer from 9%, to 10% raises over four years, but it also included lump sum payments, while GM’s offered 10% plus lump sums. All three companies offered additional lump sum payments to cover inflation.

The proposal from Stellantis, which was formed in a 2021 merger of Fiat Chrysler and France’s PSA Peugeot, is closer to the union’s demands of 46% across-the-board increases over four years, but both sides still are far apart.

Fain said Friday that he threw the offers into the trash. “Things are moving but they’re moving very slow and we’ve got a long way to go in four days,” Fain said on a Sunday night video event.

The union has asked for 46% raises in general pay over four years — an increase that would elevate a top-scale assembly plant worker from $32 an hour now to about $47. In addition, the UAW has demanded an end to varying tiers of wages for factory jobs; a 32-hour week with 40 hours of pay; the restoration of traditional defined-benefit pensions for new hires who now receive only 401(k)-style retirement plans; and a return of cost-of-living pay raises, among other benefits.

Perhaps most important to the union is that it be allowed to represent workers at 10 electric vehicle battery factories, most of which are being built by joint ventures between automakers and South Korean battery makers. The union wants those plants to receive top UAW wages. In part, that is because workers who now make components for internal combustion engines will need a place to work as the auto industry increasingly transitions to EVs.

Hostess is being acquired by JM Smucker in a deal valued at $5.6B after coming back from the brink

Hostess reemerged in 2013 with a far less costly operating structure than its predecessor company and was no longer unionized.

- A Hostess sign is shown on a closed retail outlet store in Garland, Texas

 Hostess, the maker of snack classics like Twinkies and HoHos, is being sold to J.M. Smucker in a cash-and-stock deal worth about $5.6 billion. Smucker, which makes everything from coffee to peanut butter and jelly, will pay $34.25 per share in cash and stock, and it will also pick up approximately $900 million in net debt.

 (AP Photo/LM Otero, file)
1
BY MICHELLE CHAPMAN
September 11, 2023

Hostess, the maker of snack classics like Twinkies and HoHos, is being sold to J.M. Smucker in a cash-and-stock deal worth about $5.6 billion.

Smucker, which makes everything from coffee to peanut butter and jelly, will pay $34.25 per share in cash and stock, and it will also pick up approximately $900 million in net debt.

Hostess Brands Inc. shareholders will receive $30 in cash and 0.03002 shares of The J.M. Smucker Co. stock for each share of stock that they own.

“We believe this is the right partnership to accelerate growth and create meaningful value for consumers, customers and shareholders. Our companies share highly complementary go-to market strategies, and we are very similar in our core business principles and operations,” Hostess President and CEO Andy Callahan said in a prepared statement Monday.

Twinkies went big when Hostess put them on shelves in 1930, and it followed up with a string of sweet concoctions like DingDongs, Zingers and Sno Balls.

In an interview with The Associated Press this year, Callahan talked about how Hostess Brands managed some of the most well-known brands in America, and also how balance was needed as Americans’ tastes changed.

The company motored along for decades, but its struggles began to grow in this century, with workers blaming mismanagement and a failure to invest in brands to keep up with changing tastes. The Lenexa, Kansas, company said that it was weighed down by higher pension and medical costs than its competitors, whose employees weren’t unionized.

By 2012, the company with roots dating back to 1925, began selling off its brands in chunks to different buyers. Wonder was sold to Flowers Foods. McKee Foods, which makes Little Debbie snack cakes, snapped up Drake’s Cake, which includes Devil Dogs and Yodels.

The rest, including Twinkies and other Hostess cakes, was acquired by Metropoulos & Co. and Apollo, for $410 million.

Apollo Global Management, founded by Leon Black, buys troubled brands and tries to turn them around before selling them. It’s done so with fast-food chains Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s. Metropoulos & Co., which has revamped then sold off brands including Chef Boyardee and Bumble Bee, also owns Pabst Brewing Co.

Hostess reemerged in 2013 with a far less costly operating structure than its predecessor company and was no longer unionized.

Morgan Stanley’s Pam Kaufman said that Hostess offered attractive revenue growth through its U.S. sweet snacks business and opportunities for international expansion. She anticipates merger and acquisition activity ramping up in the packaged food sector due to slowing revenue growth and strong balance sheets.

The boards of The J.M. Smucker Co. and Hostess have both approved the deal, which is expected to close in Smucker’s fiscal third quarter.

Smucker’s stock dropped 7%, while shares of Hostess surged 19%.

HAUNTED HIGHWAY

New highways carve into Cairo’s City of the Dead cemetery as Egypt’s government reshapes the city



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A bulldozer demolishes structures in Cairo’s historic City of the Dead, Egypt, Saturday, Aug. 26, 2023. Authorities have already razed hundreds of tombs and mausoleums as they carry out plans to build a network of multilane highways through the City of the Dead, a vast cemetery in the Egyptian capital that has been in use for more than a millennium. 

A man films his relatives recently demolished graves in Cairo’s historic City of the Dead, Egypt, Sept. 1, 2023. Authorities have already razed hundreds of tombs and mausoleums as they carry out plans to build a network of multilane highways through the City of the Dead, a vast cemetery in the Egyptian capital that has been in use for more than a millennium. (AP Photo/Amr Nabil)

Workers disassemble the 700-year-old minaret of al-Turba al-Soltaniya, which will be moved to a new location to make way for a new highway roundabout,” at Cairo’s historic City of the Dead, Egypt, Sept. 4, 2023. Authorities have already razed hundreds of tombs and mausoleums as they carry out plans to build a network of multilane highways through the City of the Dead, a vast cemetery in the Egyptian capital that has been in use for more than a millennium. 

Residents prepare to fly their kite at Cairo’s historic City of the Dead, Egypt, Sept. 1, 2023. Authorities have already razed hundreds of tombs and mausoleums as they carry out plans to build a network of multilane highways through the City of the Dead, a vast cemetery in the Egyptian capital that has been in use for more than a millennium.

AP Photos/Amr Nabil

BY LEE KEATH AND SAMY MAGDY
September 11, 2023


CAIRO (AP) — The cane chairs and umbrella still stand in the courtyard of Hussein Omar’s family mausoleum, where his grandmother came every morning for 19 years after her daughter — his mother — died. Near her grave, she would sit and pray under the date palm and among the flowering plants, a few hours of peace in Cairo ’s historic City of the Dead.

Now the mausoleum, built in 1924 in a neo-Islamic style and housing the graves of a number of prominent Egyptians from a century ago, is threatened with demolition.

Authorities have already razed hundreds of tombs and mausoleums as they carry out plans to build a network of multilane highways through the City of the Dead, a vast cemetery that has been in use for more than a millennium. Stunned preservationists say the construction is destroying a unique part of Egypt’s heritage where major Islamic figures, prominent Egyptian politicians, artists and scholars and the loved ones of many Egyptians are buried.

“It’s always felt like a very sacred space. We always thought that whatever happens in the rest of Cairo, the City of the Dead would be safe,” said Omar, a historian who is writing a 500-year history of Cairo as told through the necropolis. “As we see now, that’s not the case.”

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The work is part of a mega-building campaign by President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi that is reshaping the city of some 20 million people. His government has put up massive freeways and flyovers at a furious rate, torn down several older neighborhoods it considers slums and built housing projects. It has encouraged the growth of gated suburban compounds outside the city while building a giant new capital in the desert.

Though many support the roadwork to unclog congestion in the overcrowded city, the construction has also brought complaints of uprooting green spaces and trees.

But the cemetery destruction sparked an outcry that is unusual in an Egypt, where dissent has been squelched for years under el-Sissi.

Dozens of parties, activists, public figures and non-governmental organizations signed a petition in August condemning the destruction. Five members of a committee of experts formed by the government to study the cemeteries resigned in protest, saying authorities ignored its recommendations that demolitions be halted and alternatives to the routes be found.

The government’s project is destroying a “unique, architectural, historic fabric,” Ayman Wanas, an official with the government department that lists distinctive buildings, wrote in his resignation letter posted online. “It’s a waste of Egypt’s historic, valuable heritage which is irreplaceable.”

Apparently in response, authorities last week temporarily halted the demolition of tombs in the main part of the cemetery, a municipal official who oversees the eastern Cairo area where the cemeteries are located, told The Associated Press.

He said no explanation was given to the municipality, but he believes the government either wants to examine alternatives or wants to quiet criticism ahead of a meeting of the United Nations cultural agency, UNESCO, that started Sunday in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t allowed to brief media.

Security agents told grave caretakers not to let anyone enter or photograph sites, several caretakers said.

The area is designated by UNESCO as a world heritage zone. But many preservationists sharply criticize the agency for remaining silent over the destruction. In a statement to the AP, UNESCO said it has expressed concerns to the Egyptian government and asked for more information on the work.

There was no official announcement of the temporary halt and no word that the highway plans had been changed.

The City of the Dead, covering nearly 2 square miles (5 square kilometers), has been a unique space in Cairo for centuries. Originally a desert plain outside the city, it first came into use soon after the Muslim conquest of Egypt in the 700s. Imam Shafii, one of the top scholars of early Islam, was buried there after his death in 819, and now the grey dome of his mausoleum-shrine towers over the district.

Over the centuries, it was filled with the tombs of Mamluk and Ottoman nobles and ordinary Egyptians. A rare large open space in Cairo, it has a stark beauty — quiet dirt paths run through a landscape of grave-markers, ancient domes and unexpected areas of greenery. Stately mausoleum compounds hold elaborately carved and decorated cenotaphs inside.

The area also abounds with life. Families come weekly to visit loved ones’ graves, spending the day with picnics and food. Generations of caretaker families live in the mausoleums. Kids fly kites on its empty roads in the evening. Tens of thousand of people live in residential neighborhoods within the cemetery, and on Fridays its main avenue is packed with an outdoor market.

The main demolitions so far have been in an area dotted with mausoleums of some of Egypt’s most notable families of the late 1800s and early 1900s. The government said it has given families who had to exhume and move their loved ones new burial plots, usually in the suburbs outside Cairo.

Omar’s extended family has five mausoleums in the cemetery, two of which are slated for destruction. His mother, who died in 2001, is buried in the Barakat family mausoleum. Among his forebearers there are Fathallah and Atef Barakat, two nationalist figures who participated in the 1919 Revolution against British colonial rule.

For Omar and others, the necropolis isn’t just a historic site, but a center of personal memories and a place that joins life, death and peace.

Omar recalls visiting the mausoleum as a 6-year-old and asking his grandmother what the sound was that he was hearing. Raised in densely urbanized Cairo, he didn’t recognize the sound of birds singing.

“It is about the cohesiveness of the space, the peacefulness of the space. It has historically been a place of serenity,” he said. “What does it mean to have some lone surviving mausolea in the middle of a massive jumble of roads and traffic?”

In 2020, a large highway flyover was built across the southern end of the cemetery, razing hundreds of graves. The more extensive plans now reportedly include making way for two new highways, two large roundabouts, a giant cloverleaf and the widening of other roads.

Preservationists fear that will mean the City of the Dead’s end: Carved up between highways, its remaining pieces would be vulnerable to further destruction.

The government has long argued the graves are not on a list of protected official historic Islamic and Christian monuments, a list that has hardly been updated in decades.

Two 700-year-old minarets on the list that are in the path of the roadwork are being dismantled and moved to another location. The planned highways weave within yards (meters) of several other registered monuments.

Prime Minister Moustafa Madbouly said in June that alternative burial sites are being provided for families moving their dead ahead of the construction. He said tomb markers of historic figures would be collected in a “Cemetery of the Immortals.”

Mostafa el-Sadek, a university professor who leads a volunteer initiative to document ancient graves and mausoleums, was frustrated by the government’s insistence on razing the tombs.

“The demolition must stop,” he said. “This area has layers and layers of history. Any problems, including the groundwater, could be resolved. It’s a matter of willingness.”

 

US sets record for billion-dollar weather disasters in a year — and there’s still 4 months to go


Ryan Orosco, of Brentwood, carries his son Johnny, 7, on his back while his wife Amanda Orosco waits at the front porch to be rescued from their flooded home on Bixler Road in Brentwood, Calif., Jan. 16, 2023

 (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group via AP, File)

BY SETH BORENSTEIN
September 11, 2023

The deadly firestorm in Hawaii and Hurricane Idalia’s watery storm surge helped push the United States to a record for the number of weather disasters that cost $1 billion or more. And there’s still four months to go on what’s looking more like a calendar of calamities.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced Monday that there have been 23 weather extreme events in America that cost at least $1 billion this year through August, eclipsing the year-long record total of 22 set in 2020. So far this year’s disasters have cost more than $57.6 billion and claimed at least 253 lives.

And NOAA’s count doesn’t yet include Tropical Storm Hilary’s damages in hitting California and a deep drought that has struck the South and Midwest because those costs are still to be totaled, said Adam Smith, the NOAA applied climatologist and economist who tracks the billion-dollar disasters.

“We’re seeing the fingerprints of climate change all over our nation,” Smith said in an interview Monday. “I would not expect things to slow down anytime soon.”


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NOAA has been tracking billion-dollar weather disasters in the United States since 1980 and adjusts damage costs for inflation. What’s happening reflects a rise in the number of disasters and more areas being built in risk-prone locations, Smith said.

“Exposure plus vulnerability plus climate change is supercharging more of these into billion-dollar disasters,” Smith said.

In this photo made in a flight provided by mediccorps.org, the remains of a destroyed home are visible in Keaton Beach, Fla., following the passage of Hurricane Idalia, Aug. 30, 2023. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

NOAA added eight new billion-dollar disasters to the list since its last update a month ago. In addition to Idalia and the Hawaiian firestorm that killed at least 115 people, NOAA newly listed an Aug. 11 Minnesota hailstorm; severe storms in the Northeast in early August; severe storms in Nebraska, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin in late July; mid-July hail and severe storms in Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Tennessee and Georgia; deadly flooding in the Northeast and Pennsylvania in the second week of July; and a late June outbreak of severe storms in Missouri, Illinois and Indiana.

“This year a lot of the action has been across the center states, north central, south and southeastern states,” Smith said.

Experts say the United States has to do more to adapt to increased disasters because they will only get worse.

“The climate has already changed and neither the built environment nor the response systems are keeping up with the change,” said former Federal Emergency Management Agency director Craig Fugate, who wasn’t part of the NOAA report.

The increase in weather disasters is consistent with what climate scientists have long been saying, along with a possible boost from a natural El Nino, University of Arizona climate scientist Katharine Jacobs said.

“Adding more energy to the atmosphere and the oceans will increase intensity and frequency of extreme events,” said Jacobs, who was not part of the NOAA report. “Many of this year’s events are very unusual and in some cases unprecedented.”

Destroyed homes are visible in the aftermath of a devastating wildfire in Lahaina, Hawaii, Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2023. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

Smith said he thought the 2020 record would last for a long time because the 20 billion-dollar disasters that year smashed the old record of 16.

It didn’t, and now he no longer believes new records will last long.

Stanford University climate scientist Chris Field called the trend in billion-dollar disasters “very troubling.”

“But there are things we can do to reverse the trend,” Field said. “If we want to reduce the damages from severe weather, we need to accelerate progress on both stopping climate change and building resilience.”
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Follow AP’s climate and environment coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment
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Follow Seth Borenstein on Twitter at @borenbears
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Cash bail disproportionately impacts communities of color. Illinois is the first state to abolish it


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Shannon Ross poses for a portrait Saturday, Aug. 19, 2023, in Chicago. Ross, who describes himself as Indigenous and a person of color, was arrested in Chicago in October 2019 on weapons charges, and ultimately found not guilty. But that came only after he spent months in jail awaiting trial, lost his home, car, job and countless moments with his children. Illinois will become the first state to completely abolish cash bail on Sept. 18, making the state a testing ground for whether and how eliminating it works on a large scale. 

Shannon Ross poses for a portrait Saturday, Aug. 19, 2023, in Chicago. Ross, who describes himself as Indigenous and a person of color, was arrested in Chicago in October 2019 on weapons charges, and ultimately found not guilty. But that came only after he spent months in jail awaiting trial, lost his home, car, job and countless moments with his children. Illinois will become the first state to completely abolish cash bail on Sept. 18, making the state a testing ground for whether and how eliminating it works on a large scale. 

Nikuya Brooks stands in her dining room at home Friday, Aug. 11, 2023, in Chicago. Brooks’ bond was set at $150,000 after her first-time arrest on drug charges in 2017, according to the mother of three. No one in her family could pull together 10% of the bond for her to walk free. Illinois will become the first state to completely abolish cash bail on Sept. 18, making the state a testing ground for whether and how eliminating it works on a large scale. 

Nikuya Brooks stands on the porch at home with her 16-year-old daughter Gabrielle Jones, left, and their dog Snowball Friday, Aug. 11, 2023, in Chicago. Brooks’ bond was set at $150,000 after her first-time arrest on drug charges in 2017, according to the mother of three. No one in her family could pull together 10% of the bond for her to walk free. Illinois will become the first state to completely abolish cash bail on Sept. 18, making the state a testing ground for whether and how eliminating it works on a large scale. 

AP Photos Erin Hooley


BY CLAIRE SAVAGE AND COREY WILLIAMS
September 11, 2023


CHICAGO (AP) — It took four and a half months for Shannon Ross’ life to unravel.

Ross, who describes himself as Indigenous and a person of color, was arrested in Chicago in October 2019 on weapons charges and ultimately found not guilty. But that came only after he spent months in jail awaiting trial, lost his home, car, job and countless moments with his children.

Ross couldn’t afford the $75,000 bond set during a hearing that he recalls lasted only a few minutes.

“I had to lose everything to prove that I wasn’t guilty,” he told The Associated Press. “It messes with you mentally, psychologically. It messes up relationships; it messes up the time you put in to build your life up.”

But Illinois is about to overhaul the system that upended Ross’ life. Illinois’ Pretrial Fairness Act, which abolishes cash bail as a condition of pretrial release, will take effect Sept. 18, making Illinois the first state to end cash bail and a testing ground for whether — and how — it works on a large scale.

Judges can still keep people accused of serious crimes behind bars pretrial, but first would have to go through a more rigorous review of each case.

Critics say cash bail policies are especially unfair to Black people and other people of color. A 2022 federal civil rights report on cash bail systems found that courts tend to impose higher pretrial detention penalties on Black and Latino people, citing a study that showed Black men received bail amounts 35% higher than white men, and Latino men received bail amounts 19% higher than white men.

Cook County Public Defender Sharone Mitchell Jr. described Illinois’ previous cash bail system as “a cousin to slavery.”

“The vast majority of people in the system are poor, and they’re Black and brown, and they have no power. It is an incredibly unfair system,” he said. “You go to a bond hearing, it sounds like a slave auction. People are talking very fast. They’re putting price tags on people’s freedom.”

Between 1970 and 2015, there was a fivefold increase in the number of people jailed before trials, according to the 2022 U.S. Commission on Civil Rights report. Data shows more than 60% of defendants were detained prior to trial because they couldn’t afford to post bail, and that nearly 74% of the 631,000 people jailed daily in the United States are awaiting trial.

Typically in state courts, a judge decides if a defendant poses too much of a threat to the community to be released, or if they can be freed with conditions, according to the nonprofit Bail Project.

Some states have tried to ease cash bail rules.

In 2017, New Jersey essentially replaced its cash bail system with a risk assessment process that gauged the potential danger a released defendant could pose to the community. But cash bail is still allowed in some instances in that state and others that have curtailed the practice, such as New York and Alaska.

California has made several efforts to reform its cash bail system, but lawmakers balked at sweeping reform.

Proponents of cash bail argue that it ensures released defendants show up for court proceedings, and say that without it, violent criminals who are released pending trial could have the opportunity to commit more crimes. But New Jersey data showed that after the state moved away from cash bail, the number of defendants who were charged with a new crime or who failed to appear in court remained steady.

Illinois state Senate minority leader John Curran, a Republican representing suburbs southwest of Chicago, said he’s not opposed to changing the system but wants judges to retain more power than Illinois’ new law grants.

“I’ve always said that New Jersey has done this mostly right,” Curran said. “All felonies are put before a judge and a judge can consider if a person is a danger to the community or a willful flight risk or whether there is a history of intimidating witnesses, and they can detain on those standards and it gives judges full discretion.”

The loudest opposition to the change in Illinois has come from law enforcement. Jim Kaitschuk, executive director of the Illinois Sheriffs’ Association, said members’ focus is now on trying to “work through it the best we can.”

“I think we’ll be searching for a lot of people” because defendants who don’t post bond have no incentive to return to court, Kaitschuk said.

Although setting people free before trial will become the default in Illinois, there will still be cases that warrant detention, including for those accused of violent or sexual offenses or facing charges involving a gun, according to the public defender Mitchell.

In such cases, the judge must weigh several factors in deciding whether to keep someone jailed, including evidence, previous convictions, and whether that person is a flight risk.

“It won’t make the system perfect for everybody. But what it will do, we think, is puts us in a better position to make a more thoughtful decision,” Mitchell said.

Race certainly seemed to play a role when Nikuya Brooks’ bond was set at $150,000 after her first-time arrest on drug charges in 2017, according to the Chicago mother of three. No one in her family could pull together 10% of the bond for her to walk free. Brooks, who is Black, said a white woman she was jailed with had prior convictions and the same charges as Brooks, but received a lower bond.

According to Brooks, she didn’t know her ex was transporting ecstasy while she was in the car. Police stopped the vehicle and arrested both. She said she spent a year in DuPage County Jail before her trial, unable even to hug her children.

“I really wanted to fight my case because I’m not a criminal,” she said. “I’m not a drug dealer. I’m a mom. You know, I bake cookies for the PTA. I ran a Girl Scout troop.”

Brooks said other women in jail told her if she pleaded guilty, prison visits offered more freedom and that she might be able to hug or kiss her children. She told her public defender she wanted to make a deal, and ended up serving about two more years in prison.

Years later, she still struggles to find employment because of her criminal record.

“You’re already being punished because you’re being detained,” she said. “But you’re also being punished twice because you’re poor.”

Ross, who was cleared of the weapons charges that put him in jail, said he also struggles to find secure housing and income four years later. He lost his job as a forklift operator while jailed. Once he made bail with the help of the Chicago Community Bond Fund, Ross started a business online during pretrial house arrest. But he said his credit score tanked after he couldn’t make payments from jail.

“I feel like it was a Catch-22,” Ross said. “And the worst part about it is I knew I was not guilty.”

Reflecting on their experiences, Brooks and Ross said being locked up pretrial harmed their chances in court. “You’re automatically stigmatized if you’re incarcerated and you’re fighting your case, especially Black women,” Brooks said. They hope the new law will change that for others in Illinois.

“It’s more equal for everyone,” said Ross. “I feel like it’s more justice in the criminal justice system.”
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Savage is a corps member for the Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.