Ukraine marks 82nd anniversary of Babyn Yar killings by Nazi forces

Reuters
Updated Fri, September 29, 2023 






Ukraine's President Zelenskiy commemorates victims of Nazi massacre in Kyiv

KYIV (Reuters) -Ukraine marked Friday's 82nd anniversary of a mass killing, mainly of Jews, in Nazi-occupied Kyiv with an appeal not to forget an event that it said provided the moral basis for opposition to "Russian aggression".

Nazi forces shot dead nearly 34,000 Jewish men, women and children on Sept. 29-30, 1941 at Babyn Yar, a ravine on the outskirts of Kyiv, after occupying the Ukrainian capital - which was then part of the Soviet Union - during World War Two.

Over the next two years, many more people were killed at Babyn Yar. Most were Jews but the victims also included Roma and non-Jewish Ukrainians, Poles and Russians.

"It is very important to always remember history, not to forget. Because 'Never again!' are not empty words," President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said after leaving a candle at a monument of a Jewish menorah erected at the site to honour the victims.

He spoke with a small group of people gathered at the monument including relatives and descendants of the victims and rabbis from Ukrainian cities.

"All our days of commemoration have been made more emotional by the war. It has sharpened our feelings, opened up our wounds. We have become more sensitive to justice, to pain, to memory, to love," said a serviceman called Yurii with the call sign "Seff" as he took part in an annual march to monument.

The Ukrainian foreign ministry urged the world to prevent such killings happening again and drew attention to Russia's invasion of Ukraine 19 months ago.

"The memory of Babyn Yar and the slogan 'Never again' are the moral basis of humanism and opposition to any forms of aggressive-chauvinistic ideologies, in particular, Russian aggression against Ukraine," it said in a statement.

Zelenskiy is Ukraine's first ethnically Jewish president, although he is not publicly religious. Most of his grandfather's family was killed during World War Two.

Russia launched a full-scale invasion on Ukraine in February 2022, saying the goal of the "special military operation" was to de-nazify and demilitarise its neighbour. Kyiv and its Western allies have accused Russia of an unprovoked land grab.

(Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka and Stefaniia Bern, Editing by Timothy Heritage and Philippa Fletcher)

EV FORDISM

Lucid (LCID) Opens Car Manufacturing Plant in Saudi Arabia

Zacks Equity Research
Thu, September 28, 2023


Lucid Group, Inc. LCID opened its first international plant in King Abdullah Economic City, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. This is Lucid’s second Advanced Manufacturing Plant (AMP-2), which will produce electric vehicles (EVs) for Saudi Arabia and other markets.

The AMP-2 is backed by the Ministry of Investment of Saudi Arabia, the Saudi Industrial Development Fund and the Economic City at King Abdullah Economic City. The facility will play a crucial role in Saudi Arabia’s vision of diversifying its economy.

Peter Rawlinson, CEO and CTO of Lucid Group said that the facility will produce Lucid’s award-winning electric vehicles and pave the way for Saudi Arabia’s electric auto industry and the expansion of its supply chain.

Per the company, the AMP-2 facility is expected to assemble 5,000 cars annually. In its initial stage, the facility will re-assemble Lucid Air vehicle kits that are pre-manufactured at Lucid’s AMP-1 plant in Casa Grande, AZ. Lucid plans to add an annual capacity of 150,000 EVs in the future.

The location of the plant will act as a catalyst for the growth and expansion of its domestic supply chain. Jeddah is located on the coast, which offers it strong supply chain access by land and sea and will help Lucid export EVs to other markets in the future.

A year ago, the government of Saudi Arabia announced to purchase 100,000 EVs from Lucid over a ten-year period. The government made an initial commitment to purchase 50,000 EVs, with the option to purchase another 50,000 vehicles over the same time-frame. The deal includes Lucid Air and future models like Gravity SUV.

In 2018, when Lucid was private, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund invested $1 billion in the company. The investment helped Lucid start producing its first EVs.

In the last reported quarter, Lucid delivered 1,404 vehicles, up from 679 vehicles in the corresponding quarter of 2022. The company is on track to produce 10,000 vehicles in 2023.

Zacks Rank & Key Picks

LCID currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

California-based EV maker Lucid opens first-ever auto plant in Saudi Arabia
Tom Foster
Wed, September 27, 2023 

Romain Maurice/Getty Images for Haute Living

Californian EV-maker Lucid has opened the first ever car manufacturing plant in Saudi Arabia, as the kingdom looks to establish itself as a global player in the EV race.

Lucid officially opened the plant in King Abdullah Economic City, near Jeddah, on Wednesday. The factory — the company’s first international plant — will initially focus on re-assembling vehicle kits sent over from the United States.

“With the support of the Saudi government, we are proud to drive local development in the technology industry,” Lucid CEO Peter Rawlinson said in a statement. “We look forward to delivering Saudi-assembled cars to customers in Saudi Arabia and beyond.” Saudi Arabia’s powerful Public Investment Fund (PIF), controlled by the Saudi government, is Lucid’s largest shareholder.

The Saudi government also has an agreement with Lucid to purchase up to 100,000 vehicles from the company over a 10-year period.

The new factory will initially deliver Lucid vehicles that have already been put together at the company’s first factory in the United States, then disassembled for shipping, then re-assembled at the plant in Saudi Arabia. While the factory initially has an annual production capacity of just 5,000 vehicles, the company says it intends to begin from-the-ground-up production at the Saudi factory “after the middle of the decade,” with an additional annual capacity of 150,000 vehicles.

Saudi Arabia wants 30% of new car sales in the kingdom to be electric by 2030. The country has looked to electric vehicles as a way to boost its manufacturing sector as it faces an inevitable decline in demand for the oil it has relied upon, and has courted other western companies in the EV industry in the hope of diversifying its economy.

In 2022, the PIF set up a state-backed EV brand, called Ceer, which last month announced a deal with Siemens on designing and building electric cars. Earlier this month, The Wall Street Journal reported that Saudi Arabia had also held talks with Tesla over an EV factory in the kingdom. Tesla CEO Elon Musk dismissed the reports, however, saying they were “utterly false.”

For Lucid, the Saudi factory milestone comes during a turbulent period for the company, whose shares have struggled since its IPO in 2021. In March, the company laid off around 18% of its workforce as part of a cost-cutting plan. Lucid shares are down more than 60% over the past 12 months.

 Here’s why a representative of Saudi Arabia is talking to Wichita investors, business people

Matthew Kelly
Wed, September 27, 2023 

The Wichita Country Club has entertained no shortage of business-minded men with a background in oil over the years. On Wednesday, its guest list will include an official envoy from Saudi Arabia.

Fahad Nazer, a spokesperson for the kingdom’s embassy in Washington, D.C., will be in town to deliver a speech called “Business Opportunities In Saudi Arabia” at a networking dinner hosted by the World Trade Council of Wichita and promoted by Wichita State University.

“Saudi Arabia has embarked on some sweeping reforms, including on the role of women, and we hope to get some insights into these as they affect international business and commerce,” said Usha Hailey, World Trade Council chair and director of WSU’s Center for International Business Advancement.

WSU said in a statement that is committed to the free exchange of ideas and declined to weigh in on the country’s human rights record.

Saudi Arabia experts called to testify earlier this month before a bipartisan Senate investigations subcommittee said such events are part of a faux grassroots campaign to help restore Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s reputation, which remains damaged five years after government agents killed and dismembered Saudi dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi in a consulate in Turkey.

“This is a tactic that we’ve seen the Saudi influence operation use post-Khashoggi,” Benjamin Freeman of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft told senators.

“They’ve hired a number of public relations firms in the heartland of this country, and what those organizations do is try to organize PR-type events for Saudi Arabia,” he said.

The kingdom’s de facto ruler, known internationally as MBS, has enacted meaningful reforms in recent years, but the country maintains a dismal human rights record and the crown prince’s rise to power has coincided with a crackdown on political opposition.

“Women being allowed to drive finally, trying to encourage more women to enter the workforce. At the same time, those social reforms — limited social reforms but still social reforms — have been accompanied by the worst period for human rights in the country’s history,” said Joey Shea, a Saudi Arabia researcher with Human Rights Watch, who also testified before Congress.

Big business

The Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, an approximately $800 billion sovereign wealth fund that represents the consolidation of Prince Mohammed’s economic power, tripled its holdings in U.S.-traded companies from 2020 to 2021. Its ambitious target is to attract $100 billion of foreign direct investment in Saudi Arabia by 2030.

Hailey, the WSU professor, dismissed the idea that the Wichita business group’s event could help rejuvenate the crown prince’s reputation by allowing him to promote his regime’s priorities and court local investors.

“The [World Trade Council] is not affiliated politically with any party and we do not allow political considerations to influence our decisions on who we may invite to speak,” Hailey wrote in an email response to Eagle questions.

“Why, you asked, are we hosting this event? We are honored to do so. Saudi Arabia is a big investor in our state and in the aerospace sector which is very important for Wichita.”

The kingdom inked a deal earlier this year for up to 121 Boeing 787 Dreamliners to anchor a new Saudi airline. Spirit AeroSystems, which manufactures 787 fuselages and engine pylons in Wichita, is on the World Trade Council’s board of directors along with other major employers and a representative from the Kansas Department of Commerce.

Records show the council is a nonprofit housed within Wichita State’s Barton School of Business.

“Wichita State University is committed to freedom of speech and expression and supports the exchange of ideas and perspectives by those among our campus community who may support or object to this event,” the university said in an official response by email earlier this month.

“It is inevitable that viewpoints will conflict, however Wichita State strives to maintain an environment that is a marketplace of ideas to the benefit of all individuals, where freely exchanging ideas is not compromised because the ideas or the entity presenting those ideas are considered offensive, unwise, disagreeable, too conservative, too liberal, too traditional or radical.”

Public image

Former Secretary of State and Wichita congressman Mike Pompeo, who toured WSU this spring to promote his memoir, did not respond to requests for comment through a spokesperson.

In “Never Give an Inch,” the precursor to a 2024 presidential bid that didn’t materialize, Pompeo recounts flying to the Saudi capital of Riyadh days after Khashoggi’s killing on a diplomatic mission.

“In some ways, I think the president was envious that I was the one who gave the middle finger to The Washington Post, The New York Times and other bed-wetters who didn’t have a grip on reality,” he wrote, mocking the media for portraying Khashoggi as a “Saudi Arabian Bob Woodward who was martyred for bravely criticizing the Saudi royal family.”

The former CIA director does not dispute the intelligence agency’s “medium to high confidence” determination that Prince Mohammed directly ordered the assassination, despite his repeated public denials.

President Joe Biden vowed while campaigning to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” after the high-profile assassination. But since taking over as president, he has since eased into a tense working relationship with the crown prince, giving him an awkward fist bump in 2022 that he upgraded to a handshake when the two met earlier this month.

‘Sportswashing’

Shea, the Human Rights Watch researcher, said Prince Mohammed weathered the storm of global criticism and emerged with a strategy for deflecting from the country’s human rights record that centers on winning over U.S. consumers.

Its main avenues for doing that are through major investments in sports and entertainment, a practice that has been labeled “sportswashing” by critics.

“Many if not all of the investments coming from the [public investment fund] have the objective of burnishing their image in the United States,” Shea said, pointing to the recently announced plan to merge the PGA and the Saudi Arabia’s LIV Golf tour.

“If you’re a golf fan, the last thing you want is to be lectured by human rights people like me about the human rights implications of watching Saudi-backed golf.”

But conditions in the oil-rich kingdom are dire for anyone who speaks out against the regime’s leadership.

More people were executed in Saudi Arabia last year — 196 — than in any of the last 30 years since Amnesty International has been counting.

In an interview with Fox News last week, the crown prince confirmed that his government sentenced a retired teacher to death for posts he made on social media.

“Do we have bad laws? Yes. Are we are changing that? Yes,” he said.

He did not mention that the counterterrorism law used to sentence Muhammed al Ghamdi to death was reissued in 2017, the same year he became crown prince, Shea said.

State media in Saudi Arabia heralded the Fox appearance as a “comeback interview” for Prince Mohammed as he looks to win back public opinion in the west.

Relatives of detained Saudis urge 'ashamed' prince to act on cases

AFP
Fri, September 29, 2023 

Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto ruler of Saudi Arabia, an absolute monarchy whose judges are appointed by royal order 

(EVELYN HOCKSTEIN)

Relatives of Saudis facing heavy sentences for social media posts are calling on the kingdom's de facto ruler to take action after he voiced shame over their cases.

In a rare interview with Fox News last week, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was asked about Mohammed al-Ghamdi, a retired school teacher sentenced to death in July for posts on X, formerly Twitter, where he had around 10 followers.

Prince Mohammed acknowledged that details of the case described in media reports were "true" and said he disapproved of the judgement.

"We are not happy with that. We are ashamed of that," he said, blaming "bad laws" he had so far been unable to change.

He also raised the possibility that Ghamdi might be spared death.

"I'm hoping that in the next phase of trials, the judge there is more experienced. And they might look at it totally different," Prince Mohammed said.

The comments raised hackles among human rights activists who have denounced repression since Prince Mohammed became first in line to the throne six years ago, which they say is intended to stamp out criticism of the government.

Activists have long urged that sentences such as Ghamdi's be overturned.

Ghamdi's brother, United Kingdom-based government critic Saeed al-Ghamdi, told AFP this week that Prince Mohammed could change the laws -- and shape the outcomes of individual cases -- if he wanted to.

Saudi Arabia is an absolute monarchy with no elected parliament and does not allow political opposition.

Judges are appointed by royal orders.

"Everything is in the hands of the crown prince," Saeed al-Ghamdi said.

"Since he discovered that there are judicial rulings he is ashamed of, he has the opportunity to cancel them."

He added: "I hope that there will be a real retreat, not only in reversing the death sentence, but in releasing him and (people caught up in) all similar cases."

- 'New bad laws' -

Ghamdi was tried under a counterterrorism law passed in 2017, the same year Prince Mohammed became crown prince.

At the time, Human Rights Watch condemned the law's "vague definition of terrorism, which could allow authorities to continue to target peaceful criticism."

Joey Shea, Saudi Arabia researcher for Human Rights Watch, told an online press conference this week that application of the counterterrorism law undermines Prince Mohammed's claim that Ghamdi's sentence is the product of old laws that haven't been changed yet.

"These are not old bad laws," she said.

"These are new bad laws that came into effect in 2017 when Mohammed bin Salman was crown prince."

The specific allegations against Mohammed al-Ghamdi centre on posts criticising the government and expressing support for jailed religious clerics including Salman al-Awda and Awad al-Qarni.

Prosecutors have also sought the death penalty against both of those men.

Awda's son, Abdullah Alaoudh, said he did not find Prince Mohammed's expression of shame over the Ghamdi case to be credible.

The crown prince's statements "are not serious and are part of evasion, an attempt to address the American people" and improve his image, said Alaoudh, Saudi director of the Washington-based Freedom Initiative.

Areej al-Sadhan, whose brother is serving a 20-year jail term for social media posts critical of the monarchy, said Prince Mohammed had the power to reverse such sentences.

"With one signature, he can release all these innocent prisoners who have been sentenced under this law," she said, referring to the counterterrorism law.

- 'Behind closed doors' -

Saudi Arabia also came under heightened global scrutiny last year for decades-long sentences handed down against two Saudi women, Salma al-Shehab and Nourah al-Qahtani, for online posts critical of the government.

A Saudi official, who asked to remain anonymous due to the sensitivity of the matter, told AFP that harsh sentences for social media posts were the work of conservative judges who wanted "to embarrass the crown prince in front of the world."

Prince Mohammed wants to rebrand Saudi Arabia under his Vision 2030 reform agenda, which aims to transform the Gulf kingdom's oil-dependent economy, including through global tourism and by turning it into a business hub.

The prolific use of the death penalty, however, has been a major obstacle in that effort. The kingdom has a history of carrying out executions by beheading.

So far this year, 111 executions have been carried out, according to an AFP tally based on state media reports.

During his Fox interview, Prince Mohammed said he was "trying to prioritise the change (of laws) day by day" but was slowed by a shortage of government lawyers.

Lina al-Hathloul, head of monitoring and communication for the rights group ALQST, said there should be more transparency when it comes to how existing laws are applied.

"If everything is happening behind closed doors," she said, "we cannot say that the government is really ready to change the situation."

Exclusive-US-Saudi defence pact tied to Israel deal, Palestinian demands put aside 

: Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman receives U.S. President Joe Biden at Al Salman Palace upon his arrival in Jeddah

By Samia Nakhoul, James Mackenzie, Matt Spetalnick and Aziz El Yaakoubi

Updated Fri, September 29, 2023

(Reuters) -Saudi Arabia is determined to secure a military pact requiring the United States to defend the kingdom in return for opening ties with Israel and will not hold up a deal even if Israel does not offer major concessions to Palestinians in their bid for statehood, three regional sources familiar with the talks said.

A pact might fall short of the cast-iron, NATO-style defence guarantees the kingdom initially sought when the issue was first discussed between Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Joe Biden during the U.S. president's visit to Saudi Arabia in July 2022.

Instead, a U.S. source said it could look like treaties Washington has with Asian states or, if that would not win U.S. Congress approval, it could be similar to a U.S. agreement with Bahrain, where the U.S. Navy Fifth Fleet is based. Such an agreement would not need congressional backing.

Washington could also sweeten any deal by designating Saudi Arabia a Major Non-NATO Ally, a status already given to Israel, the U.S. source said.

But all the sources said Saudi Arabia would not settle for less than binding assurances of U.S. protection if it faced attack, such as the Sept. 14, 2019 missile strikes on its oil sites that rattled world markets. Riyadh and Washington blamed Iran, the kingdom's regional rival, although Tehran denied having a role.

Agreements giving the world's biggest oil exporter U.S. protection in return for normalisation with Israel would reshape the Middle East by bringing together two longtime foes and binding Riyadh to Washington after China's inroads in the region. For Biden, it would be a diplomatic victory to vaunt before the 2024 U.S. election.

The Palestinians could get some Israeli restrictions eased but such moves would fall short of their aspirations for a state. As with other Arab-Israeli deals forged over the decades, the Palestinian core demand for statehood would take a back seat, the three regional sources familiar with the talks said.

"The normalisation will be between Israel and Saudi Arabia. If the Palestinians oppose it the kingdom will continue in its path," said one of the regional sources. "Saudi Arabia supports a peace plan for the Palestinians, but this time it wanted something for Saudi Arabia, not just for the Palestinians."

The Saudi government did not respond to emailed questions about this article.

'LESS THAN A FULL TREATY'

A U.S. official, who like others declined to be named because of the sensitivity of the matter, said the parameters of a defence pact were still being worked out, adding that what was being discussed "would not be a treaty alliance or anything like that ... It would be a mutual defence understanding, less than a full treaty."

The official said it would be more like the U.S. relationship with Israel, which receives the most advanced U.S. weapons and holds joint air force and missile defence drills.

A source in Washington familiar with the discussions said MbS had asked for a NATO-style treaty but said Washington was reluctant to go as far as NATO's Article 5 commitment that an attack on one ally is considered an attack on all.

The source said Biden's aides could consider a pact patterned on those with Japan and other Asian allies, under which the U.S. pledges military support but is less explicit about whether U.S. troops would be deployed. However, the source said some U.S. lawmakers might resist such a pact.

Another template, which would not need congressional approval, would be the agreement signed with Bahrain on Sept. 13, in which the U.S. pledged to "deter and confront any external aggression" but also said the two governments would consult to determine what, if any, action would be taken.

The source in Washington said Saudi Arabia could be designated a Major Non-NATO Ally, a step which had long been considered. This status, which several Arab states such as Egypt have, comes with a range of benefits, such as training.

The second of the regional sources said Riyadh was compromising in some demands to help secure a deal, including over its plans for civilian nuclear technology. The source said Saudi Arabia was ready to sign Section 123 of the U.S. Atomic Energy Act, establishing a framework for U.S. peaceful nuclear cooperation, a move Riyadh previously refused to take.

The Gulf source said the kingdom was prepared to accept a pact that did not match a NATO Article 5 guarantee but said the U.S. had to commit to protecting Saudi Arabia if its territory was attacked. The source also said a deal could be similar to Bahrain's agreement but with extra commitments.

'LOTS OF WORK TO DO'

In response to emailed questions about details in this article, a U.S. State Department spokesperson said: "Many of the key elements of a pathway towards normalisation are now on the table and there is a broad understanding of those elements, which we will not discuss publicly."

"There's still lots of work to do, and we're working through it," the spokesperson added, saying there was not yet a formal framework and stakeholders were working on legal and other elements.

The spokesperson did not address specifics about the U.S.-Saudi defence pact in the response.

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has hailed the possibility of a "historic" peace with Saudi Arabia, the heartland of Islam. But to secure the prize, Netanyahu has to win the approval of parties in his a far-right coalition which reject any concessions to the Palestinians.

MbS said in a Fox News interview this month that the kingdom was moving steadily closer to normalising ties with Israel. He spoke about the need for Israel to "ease the life of the Palestinians" but made no mention of Palestinian statehood.

Nevertheless, diplomats and the regional sources said MbS was insisting on some commitments from Israel to show he was not abandoning the Palestinians and that he was seeking to keep the door open to a two-state solution.

Those would include demanding Israel transfer some Israeli-controlled territory in the West Bank to the Palestinian Authority (PA), limit Jewish settlement activity and halt any steps to annex parts of the West Bank. Riyadh has also promised financial aid to the PA, the diplomats and sources said.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has said any bargain must recognise the Palestinian right to a state within the 1967 borders, including East Jerusalem, and must stop Israeli settlement building. However, all the sources said a Saudi-Israeli deal was unlikely to address those flashpoint issues.

Netanyahu has said Palestinians should not have a veto over any peacemaking deal.

Yet, even if the U.S, Israel and Saudi Arabia agree, winning support from lawmakers in the U.S. Congress remains a challenge.

Republicans and those in Biden's Democratic Party have previously denounced Riyadh for its military intervention in Yemen, its moves to prop up oil prices and its role in the 2018 killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who worked for the Washington Post. MbS denied ordering the killing.

"What's important for Saudi Arabia is for Biden to have the pact approved by Congress," the first regional source said, pointing to concessions Riyadh was making to secure a deal.

For Biden, a deal that builds a U.S.-Israeli-Saudi axis could put a brake on China's diplomatic inroads after Beijing brokered a rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which Washington accuses of seeking nuclear arms. Tehran denies this.

"There was a sense that the U.S. has abandoned the region," said one diplomat. "By courting China, the Saudis wanted to create some anxiety that will make the U.S. re-engage. It has worked."

(Reporting by Samia Nakhoul in Dubai, James Mackenzie, Dan Williams and Ali Sawafta in Jerusalmen, Aziz El Yaacouby in Riyadh, Steve Holland, Matt Spetalnick, Humeyra Pamuk and Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Writing by Samia Nakhoul; Editing by Edmund Blair)

 How 'green' is New Mexico really? Do recent oil and gas reforms go far enough?

Adrian Hedden, Carlsbad Current-Argus
Thu, September 28, 2023 


Air pollution from New Mexico’s nation-leading oil and gas industry drove it to be ranked as third-least environmentally friendly state in the U.S., according to a study published on Monday.

The study commissioned by real estate company PortlandRealEstate.com used a combination of the quantity and kinds of emissions present in the state, amount of fossil fuel production and access to nature and water quality. PortlandRealEstate.com is a real estate advisory guide based in Portland, Oregon and southern Washington, made up of brokers and agents, and intended to advise potential homeowners on market conditions.

New Mexico was ranked with the third-lowest score of 35.2 out of 100, behind Louisiana at 34.6 and Mississippi at 33.7.

More: Permian Basin oil production dips although projections show growth in coming years

The study credited New Mexico as having the fourth-lowest water quality, estimating 1.1 million residents in the state were served by contaminated or unsafe facilities.

New Mexico also had the 13th-lowest air quality in the U.S., with some of the highest quantity of fossil fuel emissions in the nation, while it produces more than 9 million short tons of coal each year.

Other oil and gas states like North Dakota and Oklahoma were ranked fifth- and seventh-least green states, the study read, while Texas was ninth.

More: New Mexicans call for end of oil and gas during United Nations climate summit

Texas had the highest carbon dioxide emissions in the country, emitting 624 million tons per year, read the report.

“It is interesting to see how each state has scored in the various factors that contribute to a less green environment,” read a statement from PortlandRealEstate.com. “When deciding where to live or buy a home, a greener environment is a deciding factor for many.”

New Mexico leads in oil production, but at what cost?

New Mexico’s high ranking was likely due to its position as the second-highest producer of crude oil in the U.S. after Texas, with which New Mexico shares the Permian Basin – the U.S. busiest onshore oilfield.

More: Oil drilling could be blocked from southeast New Mexico cave system. Here's how to object.

Last year, New Mexico produced about 1.6 million barrels per day (bpd), according to the latest data from the Energy Information Administration, more than doubling in the last five years from about 683,000 bpd in 2018.

Oil and gas usually make up about a third to half of New Mexico’s state General Fund revenue and was largely responsible for a $2.2 billion growth in General Fund revenue for Fiscal Year 2023 through May, according to the latest analysis from the Legislative Finance Committee.

That marked a 25.7 percent increase compared to the same date range a year ago for the latest total of $10.6 billion, the report read.

More: $1.2 billion in Permian Basin oil and gas assets sold to Vital Energy as region leads US

“The state’s revenue strength is due to many factors, including persistently high inflation and a tight labor market, though most revenue strength appears attributable to oil and gas as production has continued to soar,” read the report.

But the economic growth brought on by oil production also brought concerns for environmental impacts.

New Mexico’s southeast Permian Basin region was being considered for a “non-attainment” designation of the National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for ground-level ozone by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

More: New Mexico struggles to meet pollution goals, study says, despite oil and gas restrictions

That would mean the area was in violation of the standard, adding restrictions to future permitting that could ultimately stymie future fossil fuel production.

Ground-level ozone, a cancer-causing greenhouse gas, is formed by volatile organic compounds (VOCs) largely emitted from oil and gas operations, when the chemicals interact with sunlight.

In an attempt to limit air pollution emissions, the New Mexico Environment Department in 2022 enacted new rules to increase requirements for leak detection and repair at oil and gas facilities in the Permian Basin, focusing on the emission of VOCs.

More: Permian Basin adds oil and gas rig after months of declining output in New Mexico, Texas

That followed rules enacted in 2021 by the State’s Oil Conservation Division to require all fossil fuel operators capture 98 percent of produced gas by 2026 and banned the routine use of flaring or the burning off of excess gas.

Do state, federal oil gas rules go too far, or not far enough?

Despite these regulatory strides in increasing environmental regulations on the oil and gas industry, activist groups said the State should do more to reduce its impact on climate change by shifting quickly away from fossil fuels.

Amid the recent United Nations Climate Ambition Summit last week in New York City, Melissa Troutman with Santa Fe-based WildEarth Guardians said continued extraction in New Mexico would lead to worsening health problems for front-line communities along the oilfields.

More: $1B oil and gas deal coming in Permian Basin despite slight dip in forecast oil production

“There is absolutely, without a doubt, no future for anyone without an end to the extraction and burning of fossil fuels – quickly,” she said. “Our elders and our children are riddled with strange diseases and cancers that health professionals are just now linking to the extraction of fossil fuels.”

Mariel Nanasi of New Energy Economy said the state had strong potential for renewable energy and would be ideal to lead a national transition away from fossil fuels.

She criticized Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s efforts to incentivize hydrogen power development, an energy supply Nanasi said still required the use of extracted natural gas.

More: Oil and gas is 'deforming' New Mexico's land, study says, as drilling set to grow

“New Mexico is blessed with abundant solar and wind resources but rather than actualize that potential too often politicians have pandered to the financial pressure of their donors, especially the oil and gas industry, and promoted false solutions like dangerous hydrogen and carbon capture and sequestration,” she said.

Despite outcry from the environmental community that government action didn’t go far enough, industry groups charged that regulations went too far in limiting fossil fuel production and thus threatening economic stability.

In response to the Bureau of Land Management’s recently proposed oil and gas leasing reforms, Western Energy Alliance President Kathleen Sgamma said the regulations were the latest in an effort by the federal government to stymie American energy production.

More: Oil and gas industry adds billions to New Mexico's budget as economists warn of volatility

The rules would increase royalty and rental rates oil and gas companies pay to operate on public land, while also requiring environmental analysis of proposed oil and gas land leases consider climate change impacts for approval.

The agency also sought to increase requirements for bonding of oil and gas wells, which operators pay into to fund the cleanup of wells should they be abandoned on federal land.

The Alliance estimated these regulations would increase energy costs for Americans by $1.8 billion.

“BLM is discouraging companies from wanting to develop federal oil and natural gas by pricing small businesses and entrepreneurs out of the market and increasing energy costs for Americans,” Sgamma said in a Monday statement.

“The proposed rule contains significant measures designed to impede, impair, and disincentivize oil and gas development on federal land.”

Adrian Hedden can be reached at , achedden@currentargus.com or @AdrianHedden on X, formerly known as Twitter.

This article originally appeared on Carlsbad Current-Argus: New Mexico ranks as third-least environmentally friendly state

Biden calls for up to three oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico, disappointing all sides

MATTHEW DALY
Fri, September 29, 2023 



Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., chair of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, speaks during a committee hearing, May 2, 2023, on Capitol Hill in Washington. The Biden administration on Friday proposed up to three oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico over the next five years — and none in Alaska — as it tries to navigate between energy companies that have pressed for greater oil and gas production and environmental activists who have urged President Joe Biden to shut down new offshore drilling in the fight against climate change. 

(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden's administration on Friday proposed up to three oil and gas lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico but none in Alaska as it tries to navigate between energy companies seeking greater oil and gas production and environmental activists who want Biden to shut down new offshore drilling in the fight against climate change.

The five-year plan includes proposed sales in the Gulf of Mexico, the nation’s primary offshore source of oil and gas, in 2025, 2027 and 2029. The three lease sales are the minimum number the Democratic administration could legally offer if it wants to continue expanding offshore wind development.

Under the terms of a 2022 climate law, the government must offer at least 60 million acres of offshore oil and gas leases in any one-year period before it can offer offshore wind leases.

The provision tying offshore wind to oil and gas production was added by Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a top recipient of oil and gas donations and a key vote in favor of the climate law, which was approved with only Democratic votes in the House and the Senate. The landmark law, the Inflation Reduction Act, was signed by Biden as a key step to fight climate change but includes a number of provisions authored by Manchin, a centrist who represents an energy-producing state.

For instance, if the Biden administration wants to expand solar and wind power on public lands, it must offer new oil and gas leases first.

“The Biden-Harris administration is committed to building a clean energy future that ensures America’s energy independence,” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said in a statement. The proposed offshore leasing program “represents the smallest number of oil and gas lease sales in history” and “sets a course for (the Interior Department) to support the growing offshore wind industry,” she said.

The lease program will guard against environmental damage caused by oil and gas drilling and other adverse impacts to coastal communities, Haaland said.

Still, the plan allows drillers such as Chevron, BP and ExxonMobil to participate in as many as three oil and gas auctions over the next five years, a top priority for the industry that could lock in decades of offshore oil and gas production.

The plan goes against Biden's campaign promise to end new offshore drilling and could become a political liability for the Democratic president, who already faces sharp opposition from environmental groups angry at his decision earlier this year to approve ConocoPhillips' massive Willow oil project in Alaska.

ConocoPhillips CEO Ryan Lance called Willow “the right decision for Alaska and our nation.” But environmental groups call the $8 billion project a “carbon bomb” that would betray Biden's pledge to cut planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030. Opponents mounted a #StopWillow campaign on social media that has been seen hundreds of millions of times.

Interior Deputy Secretary Tommy Beaudreau appeared to acknowledge the contradiction on Thursday, telling a Senate hearing that the administration’s options were limited by the climate law.

“The (oil leasing) program is definitely informed by the IRA and the connection that the IRA makes between offshore oil and gas leasing and renewable energy leasing,” he said, referring to the Inflation Reduction Act.

The Interior Department can’t sell the rights to drill for oil and gas offshore without first publishing a schedule that outlines its plans. The administration faced a Saturday deadline to release the five-year plan.

Environmentalists said the decision to lease more oil reserves would worsen climate change impacts from oil and gas emissions and leave coastal communities exposed to spills that occur regularly in the Gulf of Mexico.

“President Biden is unfortunately showing the world that it’s OK to continue to prioritize polluters over real climate solutions,” said Beth Lowell, U.S. vice president for the environmental group Oceana. “Expanding dirty and dangerous offshore drilling only exacerbates the climate catastrophe that is already at our doorstep.''

The American Petroleum Institute, the top lobbying group for the oil and gas industry, said Biden "is choosing failed energy policies that are adding to the pain Americans are feeling at the pump.''

“This restrictive offshore leasing program is the latest tactic in a coordinated strategy to reduce energy production, limiting consumers' access to affordable reliable energy and compromising our ability to lead on the global stage,'' API CEO Mike Sommers said in a statement.

The oil industry and its allies have said since last year that the administration’s delay in finalizing a new offshore leasing framework after the prior five-year plan expired in 2022 would cause problems for companies trying to make their own plans. They’ve called for more leasing, not less, to ensure a steady supply of domestic oil.

At the last lease sale, in March, companies including Chevron, BP and ExxonMobil bid $264 million for drilling rights in the Gulf, a sharp rise from the previous auction in 2021. That lease sale was the first after the Biden administration raised royalty rates that companies must pay on the oil they produce to 18.75%, up from the previous rate of 12.5%.

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Associated Press writer Matthew Brown in Billings, Mont., contributed to this story.

Biden administration approves more offshore drilling in bid to expand wind energy

Ella Nilsen, CNN
Fri, September 29, 2023 

Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg/Getty Images

The Biden administration announced Friday it is planning as many as three new oil and gas drilling lease sales in federal waters over the next five years – a move that could anger Republicans, pro-industry groups and climate advocates alike and that will likely prompt legal challenges.

But the plan, which the Interior Department was required by law to create, comes with a trade-off: It allows officials to offer more federal waters for clean wind energy.

The five-year drilling plan “represents the smallest number of oil and gas lease sales in history,” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland said in a statement. The administration had previously proposed more drilling areas – up to 11 possible sales.

The three sales would all take place in the Gulf of Mexico, scheduled for 2025, 2027 and 2029. The plan nixed the possibility of lease sales off Alaska’s Cook Inlet.

The plan “sets a course for the Department to support the growing offshore wind industry and protect against the potential for environmental damage and adverse impacts to coastal communities,” Haaland said.

The Inflation Reduction Act required the Interior Department to propose a certain number of oil and gas leases in federal waters in exchange for the ability to propose clean offshore wind energy projects. Three was the lowest number that would allow it to move forward with offshore wind lease sales around the country, the department said, given the requirements of the law.

Tying clean wind energy to fossil fuel drilling was a key demand of Sen. Joe Manchin, the West Virginia Democrat who wrote much of the bill.

Biden’s plan is in stark contrast to that of the Trump administration, which originally proposed 47 lease sales off all coastal areas in the US, including the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, over the five years from 2024 to 2029.

But even three drilling sales will frustrate climate advocates, who have pressed the administration to take a tougher line on offshore drilling and wanted no new oil and gas lease sales approved. Brettny Hardy, an attorney at Earthjustice, a nonprofit environmental litigation firm, said she believes the administration could satisfy the requirements of law by doing the bare minimum.

“They could achieve all of the wind development they have planned with only one oil and gas sale in the five-year program,” Hardy said. “The agency can still hold those sales without any more oil and gas leasing. Under their regulations, all they need to do is hold an oil and gas sale in order to issue the wind leases that were sold.”

That argument likely would not go over well with Republicans in Congress or Manchin, who has frequently blasted the administration for what he characterizes as anti-energy policies in pursuit of climate action.

Heading into an election year, Republicans are also keen to tie any administration actions that seemingly pare down oil and gas drilling to raising gas prices – two things that are largely unrelated as gas prices are tied to the whims of global markets.

As CNN reported last year, the White House was involved in crafting Interior’s proposed offshore drilling plan, two sources familiar with the discussions told CNN, a sign of how sensitive top officials are to the politics around oil and gas decisions.

Interior’s pared-back plan will likely prompt legal challenges from the oil industry and Republican states. And even with the reduced number of proposed projects, the five-year plan could still set up the next fight between the Biden administration and Gulf Coast communities and environmental advocates who want the administration to stop approving new oil and gas projects altogether.

With past major new oil projects that have been approved, such as the Willow project in Alaska, the Biden administration has frequently said it must comply with laws that require certain projects to go forward. Still, that answer hasn’t satisfied environmental and youth climate groups – who have warned that new oil and gas project approvals risks alienating young voters ahead of the 2024 presidential election.

Hardy said that the Biden administration “still has a responsibility to minimize harm to Gulf communities” as they decide the short-term future of the federal offshore oil and gas leasing program.

Biden to Offer Smallest-Ever Offshore Oil Rights Sale Plan

Jennifer A. Dlouhy and Jennifer Jacobs
Thu, September 28, 2023



(Bloomberg) -- The Biden administration is charting plans to sell offshore oil-drilling rights in the Gulf of Mexico over the next five years, while trimming the program to its smallest level ever.

The oil leasing plan being released by the Interior Department on Friday will contain only a low number of sales, according to people familiar with the deliberations who declined to be named because the blueprint isn’t yet public. That’s far from the 11 sales the agency proposed last year, and it would be the lowest in history.

Still, even a single auction is a blow to environmentalists who argued new leasing isn’t compatible with the urgent need to decarbonize by mid-century and would lock in oil development for decades — even as domestic demand shrinks.

Oil industry advocates had pushed for a robust sale schedule to ensure steady production in the Gulf of Mexico, which provides roughly 15% of US crude output today.

The plan’s release comes as dwindling crude stockpiles push oil futures toward $100 a barrel. However, it would take years for any new leases to lead to exploratory drilling, much less actual crude production.

A major factor in the administration’s decision is an Inflation Reduction Act provision blocking the Interior Department from issuing new offshore wind leases unless in the prior year it had held an oil lease sale putting at least 60 million acres up for grabs. The requirement developed by Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat from West Virginia, was seen tying the agency’s hands and forcing at least one oil auction to allow future sales of wind rights in the Gulf of Maine and off the Oregon coast.

White House and Interior Department spokespeople didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. But Deputy Secretary of the Interior Tommy Beaudreau on Thursday told a Senate panel the five-year program “is definitely informed by the IRA and the connection the IRA makes between offshore oil and gas leasing and renewable energy leasing.”

Offshore wind supporters have told administration officials that they need a pipeline of new coastal opportunities to nurture a domestic supply chain that includes manufacturing of turbine towers, foundations, blades and other gear. But environmentalists stressed that the Interior Department need only hold one or two oil sales to meet offshore wind targets.

“We’re in a climate crisis, and we’re not going to drill our way to less emissions,” said Valerie Cleland, a senior ocean advocate with the Natural Resources Defense Council. “If the administration’s primary goal is to maximize all future offshore wind leasing, the administration could do all of the offshore wind leasing in the pipeline with one — at most two — offshore oil and gas lease sales.”

On the campaign trail, President Joe Biden promised to combat climate change and ban new oil and gas permitting on public lands and waters. Activists argue the industry already has a substantial portfolio of untapped leases — about 9 million acres worth, according to government data.

“We know the solution is to shift away from fossil fuels,” said Jacqueline Savitz, chief policy officer for the conservation group Oceana. “And we know President Biden knows that. He promised he wasn’t going to sell any new leases, he’s not required to do this by law, and if he does propose new leases, he’s breaking that promise.”

But the oil industry has argued the recent approach — with generally twice-yearly sales of leases across a broad swath of the Gulf of Mexico — is the most efficient way to foster development necessary to meet the world’s energy needs. They stress the oil extracted from the Gulf is among the least carbon-intensive in the world.

The typical pattern of two sales a year is an appropriate “frequency that allows the industry to step up and get the acreage they need in order to sustain production and build production,” said Erik Milito, head of the National Ocean Industries Association.

Congress will have 60 days to review the blueprint and advance legislation seeking changes once the plan is released.

The schedule is a legally required precursor to leasing offshore waters for oil development; this one is set to govern potential sales through late 2028. While a different, future administration could seek to alter course, the blueprint itself takes years to develop, defying quick pivots.

An earlier Biden administration proposal left the door open for as many as 11 auctions of offshore oil and gas leases — 10 in the Gulf of Mexico and one in Alaska’s Cook Inlet. The previous Obama-era plan, which expired June 30 of last year, also contained 11 sales.

(Updates with further leasing details and industry comment starting in first paragraph.)


Biden administration to release long-awaited offshore oil plan Friday

Rachel Frazin
Thu, September 28, 2023 



The Biden administration will release on Friday its long-awaited plan that maps out the next five years of offshore drilling, a top official said.

“We’ll be publishing the five-year program tomorrow,” Deputy Interior Secretary Tommy Beaudreau said in response to questions from Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) during a Senate hearing Thursday.

“The program is definitely informed by the IRA and the connection that the IRA makes between offshore oil and gas leasing and renewable energy leasing,” he added, referring to the Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act.

The Interior Department can’t sell the rights to drill for oil and gas offshore without first publishing a schedule that outlines its plans.

The Inflation Reduction Act is the name of the Democrats’ signature climate, tax and health care bill. To win support from Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), a key swing vote, provisions were added that tied the future of offshore wind to the future of offshore drilling.

Specifically, the bill said that to hold an auction for offshore wind rights, an auction has to have been held for offshore oil and gas rights in the past year.

Prior to the bill’s passage, the Interior Department released a draft plan last year that did not say how many auctions the federal government would have for rights to drill offshore. The draft plan said it may have as few as no lease sales or as many as 11.

While he did not elaborate, Beaudreau’s comments about the plan being informed by that legislation make the possibility of no lease sales unlikely.

Exclusive-Biden's 5-year offshore oil plan to have just three auctions - sources

Updated Thu, September 28, 2023 

FILE PHOTO: A massive drilling derrick is pictured on BP's Thunder Horse Oil Platform in the Gulf of Mexico


By Jarrett Renshaw and Nichola Groom

(Reuters) -The Biden administration's five-year plan for offshore oil and gas leasing will not include any sales in 2024 and will feature just three in the final four years, the lowest number of auctions in the history of the program, according to three sources familiar with the matter.

The plan is almost certain to disappoint both environmental groups and oil companies. In recent years, politicians, environmentalists and the oil industry have cast the national leasing program as a symbol of either the need to rein in fossil fuel development to avert the worst impacts of climate change or as a critical tool to shore up domestic energy supplies and keep pump prices low.

Since 1992, no five-year plan has had fewer than 11 lease sales and most have had 15 to 20, according to data from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

The schedule for leasing in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska for 2024-2028 is due on Friday following several delays and months of battling between environmentalists and drilling advocates over what the policy should look like.

The final plan will mark a dramatic reduction from a proposal the Trump administration had crafted in 2018 that envisioned 47 lease sales, including in California and the Atlantic.

It will, however, fall short of U.S. President Joe Biden's campaign promise to end new federal drilling entirely to fight climate change, after court decisions required continued leasing and last year's Inflation Reduction Act made them a pre-requisite for new offshore wind power lease auctions.

The White House is expected to argue on Friday that holding oil lease sales is the price to pay if it wants to achieve its ambitious wind energy goals.

"The administration heard from the offshore wind industry that they need the IRA leasing mandates to be fulfilled to enable the U.S. offshore wind energy to continue to grow," a source familiar with the plan told Reuters.

Biden sees offshore wind power as a key tool in his administration's effort to decarbonize the economy.

"The number of oil and gas lease sales will be the lowest in history and will enable the rapid expansion of the offshore wind industry," the source said.

The Interior Department is required by law to create a national oil and gas leasing schedule every five years. It has been without one since the previous one expired in June 2022 due to heated debate over the program.

The Biden administration unveiled a proposed plan in July last year that had contemplated between zero to 11 lease sales.

The plan will be subject to a 60-day waiting period before it can be approved by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.

(Reporting By Jarrett Renshaw and Nichola GroomEditing by Marguerita Choy, David Gregorio and Deepa Babington)

A group of bull sharks lived in a golf-course pond for 17 years. Scientists say they could be in other ponds in Australia.

Maiya Focht
Updated Fri, September 29, 2023

The group of bull sharks found in Carbrook Country Club seems to have lived there for more than half a bull shark's expected life span.

Getty Images

A group of bull sharks lived in a freshwater golf-course pond for more than 17 years.


Scientists say it's the longest they've ever seen sharks live in freshwater.


They're unsure if the original sharks are still alive since they haven't been spotted since 2015.

For almost two decades, a golf course in Australia boasted a unique selling point — a shark-infested pond near its fourteenth hole.

Bull sharks in a pond are odd enough. Sharks in a golf-course pond are odder still. But this group of bull sharks is even odder.

It's somewhat of a scientific marvel because the sharks have lived in fresh water longer than any other group of bull sharks that scientists have observed.

Groups of bull sharks have been trapped in freshwater areas in Panama and South Africa, but those groups lasted about four years, Melissa Cristina Márquez, a marine biologist who wasn't involved in the study, reported in Forbes.

A recent study concluded bull sharks could survive in fresh and brackish water for long periods, shown by the bull sharks that lived in the golf-course pond for an estimated 17 years — more than half of bull sharks' projected 30-year life span.

"This new publication highlights their impressive adaptability to a wide variety of environments," Amy Smoothey, a shark scientist who wasn't involved in the study, told Slate.
How the sharks ended up on a golf course

In the mid-1990s, three severe floods pushed six juvenile bull sharks from nearby rivers into the golf course's pond. When the flood waters receded, the sharks were left stranded.

Bull sharks usually spend their early lives in the brackish waters between a river and the ocean, hiding out from larger saltwater predators. They typically head into the sea at about five years of age, the study says. Or, in the event of a flood, they can end up stranded in ponds like this group.

Besides tossing the occasional scrap into the water to catch a look at the fish, the golf course left the bull sharks alone. They were never tagged.

The club did, however, make the sharks its mascot and logo.

Bull sharks typically live out their adult lives in salt water, though they can swim into brackish waters where river meets sea.

Alessandro Cere/Getty Images

Where are the bull sharks now?

Since the sharks were never tagged, what scientists know about the health and current whereabouts of the first sharks comes from word of mouth.

They know one shark was illegally hunted, and another turned up dead from natural causes, but the study said the others could have died or escaped over the years, especially during a series of floods in 2013.

The last time any shark was spotted in the pond was in 2015, but the scientists aren't sure if that was from the original group or not.
Watch out for stagnant bodies of water

"I think a lot of people would be scared to learn there could be bull sharks in their local pond, but the fact is, it's pretty amazing that there are animals that are able to do this," Vincent Raoult, a marine ecologist at Deakin University in Australia who wasn't involved in the study, told the New York Times.

When bull sharks usually make the headlines, it's for their attacks on humans. This species comes in third place for the most attacks on humans, trailing behind great white and tiger sharks.

As extreme floods become more common and severe with the climate crisis, it's important to be wary of bodies of water that may have recently flooded, especially in areas with bull sharks.

Even though it's unlikely that a shark will be in your favorite pond, "you should never bathe in stagnant bodies of water that once had a connection to the sea. You never know if sharks are living there," Peter Gausmann, a shark scientist, told the NYT.

Union Workers Who Support Trump Are Delusional Morons

Collin Woodard
Thu, September 28, 2023 

Instead of attending last night’s debate over which unpopular loser would make a better vice presidential candidate, Donald Trump decided instead to speak at Drake Enterprises, a small parts supplier in Michigan’s Clinton Township that is notably not unionized. Somehow, that got spun into a few stories and posts about Trump speaking to union members, which is only true in the sense that some people at the event claimed to be union members. We have no real reason to doubt them, but that doesn’t mean you’re not a delusional moron if you think Trump is in any way pro-union.

Now, it’s not surprising that some UAW members are also Trump voters. His support among voters without college degrees is scarily high, and you can probably find a few MAGA chuds in pretty much any industry. It would also be understandable if they focused on how excited they were for Trump to hurt the people they hate, which is basically his whole schtick. Yeah, he’ll probably gut worker protections, make it harder for workers to unionize and make it easier for the rich to continue getting richer, but you can also guarantee that if he’s elected again, he’ll make life hell for queer people, women and racial minorities, which is what bigots care about most.

To anyone with basic reading comprehension skills, it’s clear that Trump is anti-worker and anti-union. And a lot of Republicans love that, especially business owners. But if you think for a second that Trump actually supports the UAW or unions in general, you’re a delusional moron. The only unions Trump is ever going to help out are police unions. But hey, at least he’ll probably hurt the people that UAW Trump supporters hate even more.

Jalopnik

United States Customs and Border Patrol Releases 10 UFO Videos
Cassidy Ward
Wed, September 27, 2023

United States Customs and Border Patrol Releases 10 UFO Videos

If Resident Alien’s Harry Vanderspeigle (Alan Tudyk) really did crash land in Colorado a few years back, he and his craft might have been recovered by shadowy government agencies and whisked away to a secret facility that doesn’t officially exist. At least, that’s what might have happened if UFO conspiracy theorists are correct.

Over the last several months there’s been an uptick in UAP (unidentified anomalous phenomena) reports here in the real world, punctuated by whistleblower David Grusch testifying before congress about an alleged government-run UFO recovery and reverse engineering project. Now, we’ve got even more UAPs to mull over thanks to a release from Customs and Border Protections.

Customs and Border Patrol Releases UAP Documents

In early August and with little fanfare, the United States Customs and Border Patrol released 10 videos depicting reported UAPs along with 387 pages of supporting documents including testimony from eyewitnesses.

RELATED: We May Have Found and Killed Martian Life 50 Years Ago

The videos, some of which leaked a few years back, have added fuel to the already raging fire of public discourse around flying saucers. One video in particular, from 2013, shows an unidentifiable spot flying over an airport. The video is black and white, and the footage is grainy. The object, whatever it is, cruises over the airport at what appears to be a consistent rate, on a path taking it toward the ocean.

It doesn’t look all that unusual. If you’d tell us it was a bird or a small UAV, we’d probably believe it. The trouble starts when it gets near the water and appears to change shape. Shortly thereafter, the object seems to disappear, reappear, then vanish for good.

Some viewers have interpreted that as the object having dipped beneath the water and emerged again, seemingly without losing any speed. That would be an impressive engineering achievement, but the video is so poor, it could just as easily be a digital artifact. The important thing is what we know, and that is not equivalent to extraterrestrials.

We’ve filled the space around us with a growing number of cameras and orbiting satellites, and they’re all recording all the time. More than that, we (humans) are creating more technology, some of which isn’t public knowledge. It was probably inevitable that we would start to catch things on camera that we can’t explain. But there’s a pretty big gap between “look at that weird thing” and “I bet it came from across the stars.” Still, there is some weird stuff going on in the sky and we should devote some resources to figuring out what it is.

Schumer Proposes UAP Transparency Bill

With that in mind, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Senator Mike Rounds (R-SD) introduced an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act which would establish a structure for how and when UAP documents would be released to the public.

RELATED: NASA Releases Details of Organization's UFO Investigation

“For decades, many Americans have been fascinated by objects mysterious and unexplained and it’s long past time they get some answers. The American public has a right to learn about technologies of unknown origins, non-human intelligence, and unexplainable phenomena. We are not only working to declassify what the government has previously learned about these phenomena but to create a pipeline for future research to be made public. I am honored to carry on the legacy of my mentor and dear friend, Harry Reid and fight for the transparency that the public has long demanded surround these unexplained phenomena,” Schumer said, in a statement.

The bill requires that government agencies turn over any UAP information they possess within 300 days of the act going into effect. Meanwhile, President Biden has 90 days to form a review board to investigate those documents. Finally, that board will have 180 days to review any information and an additional 14 days to publish their findings. All of which is to say we’re at least a year and a half out from seeing the extraterrestrial goods, if any goods should exist.

In the meantime, catch up on the first two seasons of SYFY's Resident Alien, streaming now on Peacock.