Truth Social Exec Forced Off Board After Ignoring Trump Demand: Report

Mary Papenfuss

Sat, October 15, 2022 

A co-founder of Truth Social’s media parent company was forced off the board of the firm after he ignored demands by Donald Trump to give some of his stock to Melania Trump, a whistleblower has told The Washington Post.

Trump pushed for the giveaway to his wife even though he had already been given 90% of the stock in the Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG) in exchange for the use of his name and some other “minor involvement,” former company executive Will Wilkerson told the Post.

The company co-founder reportedly dodged the request, telling Trump that it would leave him with a tax bill he couldn’t pay. “Do whatever you need to do,” Trump snapped back, according to Wilkerson.

He was forced off the board five months later in what Wilkerson believes was payback for failing to turn over a “small fortune” to Melania Trump, the newspaper reported Saturday.

The incident was one of a series of bombshell revelations supported by several documents viewed by the newspaper about bitter infighting in the Trump business, technical screwups, questionable financial representations, and what Wilkerson insisted were violations of Securities and Exchange regulations, according to the Post.

Wilkerson submitted a whistleblower complaint to the Securities and Exchange Commission in August regarding the company. Wilkerson’s attorney’s told the newspaper that he is also cooperating with current investigations into Trump Media by the SEC and by federal prosecutors from the Southern District of New York.

Wilkerson was fired from his job Thursday as TMTG senior vice president of operations after he spoke to The Post.

Trump Media said in a statement responding to several specific questions from the Post regarding Wilkerson’s information that Trump as company chairman had hired former California Republican Congressman Devin Nunes as CEO to “create a culture of compliance and build a world-class team to lead Truth Social.”

The statement complained that the Post “sent us an inquiry rife with knowingly false and defamatory statements and other concocted psychodramas.”

It did not specifically address any of the Post’s questions, according to the newspaper.

The new information follows a lengthening list of bad news for Trump’s Truth Social media venture.

Digital World Acquisition Corp. — the special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) that Truth Social needs to go public — revealed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing last month that investors had already backed out of $139 million in commitments of the $1 billion previously announced by the company.

There’s likely more to come. Investors, who agreed to put up the money nearly a year ago, can now drop their commitments because Digital World missed its initial Sept. 20 deadline to merge with Trump Media. That deadline was extended by three months after shareholders refused to approve its bid for a 12-month extension. But investors can still pull out.

A major web-hosting operator complained in August that Truth Social owed about $1.6 million in contractually obligated payments, an allegation suggesting the operation’s finances are in “significant disarray,” Fox Business News reported.

In another setback, Truth Social’s application for a trademark was turned down in August because its name was too similar to other operations.

Trump insisted last month that he was unconcerned about any Truth Social money woes because, he explained, “I’m really rich,” he posted on the social media platform. “I don’t need financing.”

Yet in the next sentence he asked: “Private company, anyone???” in what appeared to be an invitation to investors.

Check out the full Washington Post story.

This article originally appeared on HuffPost and has been updated.

Related...

• Investors Fleeing Company That Hopes To Merge With Trump's Truth Social, Take It Public

• Trump Unconcerned About Truth Social Money Issues: 'I'm Really Rich'

• Trump's Truth Social App Barred From Google Play Over Content Moderation

• Trump's Truth Social Reportedly Faces Major Money, Trademark Woes

A co-founder of the firm behind Truth Social says Trump retaliated against another exec who refused to gift some of his shares to Melania

Kelsey Vlamis
Sat, October 15, 2022 

President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump stand onstage during a "Salute to America" event on the South Lawn of the White House, Saturday, July 4, 2020, in Washington.

Patrick Semansky/Associated Press

Will Wilkerson, co-founder of Trump's media company, filed an SEC whistleblower complaint in August.

Wilkerson detailed several allegations about the company to The Washington Post.


An email obtained by the Post showed another co-founder believed Trump was retaliating against him.

A co-founder of Trump Media & Technology Group, the company behind Truth Social, said former President Donald Trump pushed another executive to give some of his shares to Melania Trump and retaliated when the request was declined, according to a Washington Post report.

Will Wilkerson, who filed a whistleblower complaint about the company to the SEC in August, made the allegation in a story published by the outlet on Saturday. The Post, which obtained materials submitted with Wilkerson's complaint, detailed accusations of infighting and potentially illegal activity at the company.

Trump had been given a 90% stake in the company when it was founded, according to the SEC complaint. But Wilkerson told the Post he was with fellow co-founder Andy Litinsky in October 2021 when the latter received a call from Trump. At the time, the company had recently reached a merger deal that would catapult the value of its stock. Wilkerson said the former president asked Litinsky to give some of his shares to Melania Trump.

Wilkerson told the Post that Litinsky demurred and explained the gift would result in a tax bill he would be unable to pay: "Trump didn't care. He said, 'Do whatever you need to do.'"

Litinsky, a former contestant on "The Apprentice," was removed from the company's board five months later in what Wilkerson believed was retaliation. According to a March email obtained by the Post, Litinsky also believed he had been retaliated against.

"President Trump over the past 2 months has repeatedly demanded that I give my TMTG equity to Melania Trump," Litinsky wrote, according to a screenshot of the email published by the Post. "As I have informed him several times, I have earned that equity, and also 'gifting' equity to Melania Trump would be a taxable event of which I can't afford to pay the taxes."

Litinsky also said Trump had threatened to "blow up the company" if his demands weren't met, adding he believed Trump was now "retaliating" against him and that he'd be seeking legal counsel, according to the screenshot of the email.

A spokesperson for Trump did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment. Litinsky did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment sent via his consulting and production company, ZideLitinsky Media.

In a statement provided to Insider, a representative for Trump Media & Technology Group blasted the Post's reporting and touted Truth Social's successes.

"As Chairman of TMTG, President Trump hired Devin Nunes as CEO to create a culture of compliance and build a world-class team to lead Truth Social," the statement said, noting the platform has launched on the Apple and Google app stores, attracted millions of users, and "executed multiple feature updates."

"Ignoring these achievements, the Washington Post published a story rife with knowingly false and defamatory statements and other concocted psychodramas," the statement continued. The statement did not comment directly on specific allegations.

Wilkerson, who was serving as senior vice president of operations, said he was fired on Thursday after talking to the Post, the outlet reported. Lawyers for Wilkerson did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment but told the Post he is cooperating with the SEC and New York prosecutors investigating Trump Media.

Read the original article on Business Insider

What is Fog Reveal? A legal scholar explains the app some police forces are using to track people without a warrant

Anne Toomey McKenna, Visiting Professor of Law, University of Richmond
Mon, October 17, 2022 

THE CONVERSATION

The Rockingham County Sheriff's Department in Wentworth, N.C., is among the law enforcement agencies the AP found using the Fog Reveal location tracking tool. AP Photo/Allen G. Breed

Government agencies and private security companies in the U.S. have found a cost-effective way to engage in warrantless surveillance of individuals, groups and places: a pay-for-access web tool called Fog Reveal.

The tool enables law enforcement officers to see “patterns of life” – where and when people work and live, with whom they associate and what places they visit. The tool’s maker, Fog Data Science, claims to have billions of data points from over 250 million U.S. mobile devices.

Fog Reveal came to light when the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a nonprofit that advocates for online civil liberties, was investigating location data brokers and uncovered the program through a Freedom of Information Act request. EFF’s investigation found that Fog Reveal enables law enforcement and private companies to identify and track people and monitor specific places and events, like rallies, protests, places of worship and health care clinics. The Associated Press found that nearly two dozen government agencies across the country have contracted with Fog Data Science to use the tool.

Government use of Fog Reveal highlights a problematic difference between data privacy law and electronic surveillance law in the U.S. It is a difference that creates a sort of loophole, permitting enormous quantities of personal data to be collected, aggregated and used in ways that are not transparent to most persons. That difference is far more important in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision, which revoked the constitutional right to an abortion. Dobbs puts the privacy of reproductive health information and related data points, including relevant location data, in significant jeopardy.

The trove of personal data Fog Data Science is selling, and government agencies are buying, exists because ever-advancing technologies in smart devices collect increasingly vast amounts of intimate data. Without meaningful choice or control on the user’s part, smart device and app makers collect, use and sell that data. It is a technological and legal dilemma that threatens individual privacy and liberty, and it is a problem I have worked on for years as a practicing lawyer, researcher and law professor.
Government surveillance

U.S. intelligence agencies have long used technology to engage in surveillance programs like PRISM, collecting data about individuals from tech companies like Google, particularly since 9/11 – ostensibly for national security reasons. These programs typically are authorized by and subject to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and the Patriot Act. While there is critical debate about the merits and abuses of these laws and programs, they operate under a modicum of court and congressional oversight.

Domestic law enforcement agencies also use technology for surveillance, but generally with greater restrictions. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable search and seizure, and federal electronic surveillance law require domestic law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before tracking someone’s location using a GPS device or cell site location information.

Fog Reveal is something else entirely. The tool – made possible by smart device technology and that difference between data privacy and electronic surveillance law protections – allows domestic law enforcement and private entities to buy access to compiled data about most U.S. mobile phones, including location data. It enables tracking and monitoring of people on a massive scale without court oversight or public transparency. The company has made few public comments, but details of its technology have come out through the referenced EFF and AP investigations.
Fog Reveal’s data

Every smartphone has an advertising ID – a series of numbers that uniquely identifies the device. Supposedly, advertising IDs are anonymous and not linked directly to the subscriber’s name. In reality, that may not be the case.

Private companies and apps harness smartphones’ GPS capabilities, which provide detailed location data, and advertising IDs, so that wherever a smartphone goes and any time a user downloads an app or visits a website, it creates a trail. Fog Data Science says it obtains this “commercially available data” from data brokers, permitting the tool to follow devices through their advertising IDs. While these numbers do not contain the name of the phone’s user, they can easily be traced to homes and workplaces to help police identify the user and establish pattern-of-life analyses.

Fog Reveal allows users to see that a specific mobile phone was at a specific place at a specific time. Electronic Frontier Foundation, CC BY

Law enforcement use of Fog Reveal puts a spotlight on that loophole between U.S. data privacy law and electronic surveillance law. The hole is so large that – despite Supreme Court rulings requiring a warrant for law enforcement to use GPS and cell site data to track persons – it is not clear whether law enforcement use of Fog Reveal is unlawful.
Electronic surveillance vs. data privacy

Electronic surveillance law protections and data privacy mean two very different things in the U.S. There are robust federal electronic surveillance laws governing domestic surveillance. The Electronic Communications Privacy Act regulates when and how domestic law enforcement and private entities can “wiretap,” i.e., intercept a person’s communications, or track a person’s location.

Coupled with Fourth Amendment protections, ECPA generally requires law enforcement agencies to get a warrant based on probable cause to intercept someone’s communications or track someone’s location using GPS and cell site location information. Also, ECPA permits an officer to get a warrant only when the officer is investigating certain crimes, so the law limits its own authority to permit surveillance of only serious crimes. Violation of ECPA is a crime.

The vast majority of states have laws that mirror ECPA, although some states, like Maryland, afford citizens more protections from unwanted surveillance.

The Fog Reveal tool raises enormous privacy and civil liberties concerns, yet what it is selling – the ability to track most persons at all times – may be permissible because the U.S. lacks a comprehensive federal data privacy law. ECPA permits interceptions and electronic surveillance when a person consents to that surveillance.

With little in the way of federal data privacy laws, once someone clicks “I agree” on a pop-up box, there are few limitations on private entities’ collection, use and aggregation of user data, including location data. This is the loophole between data privacy and electronic surveillance law protections, and it creates the framework that underpins the massive U.S. data sharing market.

The need for data privacy law

Without robust federal data privacy safeguards, smart device manufacturers, app makers and data brokers will continue, unfettered, to utilize smart devices’ sophisticated sensing technologies and GPS capabilities to collect and commercially aggregate vast quantities of intimate and revealing data. As it stands, that data trove may not be protected from law enforcement agencies. But the permitted commercial use of advertising IDs to track devices and users without meaningful notice and consent could change if the American Data Privacy Protection Act, approved by the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Energy and Commerce by a vote of 53-2 on July 20, 2022, passes.

ADPPA’s future is uncertain. The app industry is strongly resisting any curtailment of its data collection practices, and some states are resisting ADPPA’s federal preemption provision, which could minimize the protections afforded via state data privacy laws. For example, Nancy Pelosi, speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, has said lawmakers will need to address concerns from California that the bill overrides the state’s stronger protections before she will call for a vote on ADPPA.

The stakes are high. Recent law enforcement investigations highlight the real-world consequences that flow from the lack of robust data privacy protection. Given the Dobbs ruling, these situations will proliferate absent congressional action.

This article is republished from The Conversation, an independent nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. It was written by: Anne Toomey McKenna, University of Richmond. 

Read more:


High-tech surveillance amplifies police bias and overreach


Body cameras help monitor police but can invade people’s privacy

Current member of IEEE-USA, serving on its AI Policy Committee, and Co-Chair of its Privacy, Equity, and Justice in AI Subcommittee. Prior grant research work includes: funding from National Security Agency (NSA) as part of the National Initiatives in Cyber Education to develop an open access course, "Cyberlaw: Policy & Operations" since published nationwide by NSA; and funding from U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services to analyze, via published legal memos, issues of privacy, Constitutional rights, and other legal issues in the use of UAVs (drones) by domestic law enforcement.

Who is author Gabrielle Blair, and what does this Mormon mom want men to do before having sex?

Marco della Cava, USA TODAY

Mon, October 17, 2022 

Gabrielle Blair has a message for men. And the women who love them. It's all right there in the title of her new book, "Ejaculate Responsibly: A Whole New Way to Think About Abortion" (Workman Publishing), out October 18.

To cut to the chase: They're called condoms, they're easy to buy and not expensive. Men, Blair is saying, it's time to man up.

If you are guessing Blair is a leading feminist thinker who perhaps is a professor at a small liberal arts college, you'd be impossibly wrong. She is a mom of six and member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints who has a flair for interior decor and lives in a small town in western France.

Gabrielle Blair's new book tackles the responsibility the author feels that men have towards women when it comes to sex that doesn't lead to unwanted pregnancies. The book grew out of a series of viral tweets she wrote in 2018.

So why are we talking about her? For the long answer, you can read our interview with Blair from May of this year. We caught up with her as she was finishing a book that grew out of a long (OK, very long) Twitter thread that went viral in 2018 and found new purchase after leaked documents that suggested – correctly – the Supreme Court would overturn abortion rights enshrined by Roe v. Wade.

But for the quicker skinny:

Before taking on sex and responsibility, Gabrielle Blair talked decor

Blair, 47, grew up in St. George, Utah, and had a keen eye for design that she shared in a blog that gradually grew in popularity. Her specialty: practical yet fun decor that was compatible with a rambunctious household of six kids.

In 2015, Blair's blog success led into a book that became a bestseller, "Design Mom: How to Live with Kids: A Room-by-Room Guide."

An impromptu 2018 Twitter post launched Blair into the mainstream

In the summer of 2018, Blair was growing frustrated by online discussions – most of them led by men – about women and their bodies that seemed to place the responsibility and blame for unwanted pregnancies on the female partner. She started to vent in a Twitter thread that grew to 63 posts but sat on it for a few months.

The essence of her controlled fury comes down to her belief that unwanted pregnancies are utterly controllable when men take advantage of a precaution that is not under legal threat in any state of the union.

Finally, during the contentious hearings to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, hearings that included allegations of sexual assault, Blair decided she had had enough and hit "Send."

Blair's comments were blunt and direct and urged men to be more responsible

Typical of Blair's tweets was this no-nonsense introduction: "I’m a mother of six, and a Mormon. I have a good understanding of arguments surrounding abortion, religious and otherwise. I've been listening to men grandstand about women's reproductive rights, and I'm convinced men actually have zero interest in stopping abortion."

Another tweet laid bare her stance that men, thanks to easily available and inexpensive condoms, need to step up play a much larger role in ensuring that abortion is not the de facto option for a woman.

“A woman can be the sluttiest slut in the entire world who loves having orgasms all day long and all night long and she will never find herself with an unwanted pregnancy unless a man shows up and ejaculates irresponsibly," she wrote.

Interview: Mormon mom of six writes viral Twitter thread focusing on male responsibility in pregnancy

The internet heard Blair's roar, big-time, with polarized responses

Abortion-rights march on College Avenue on June 24, 2022, in Appleton, Wis.

Blair thought her passionate rant on behalf of women would not be heard. After all, her expertise was in design. But both the content and delivery resonated; as of last spring the thread had garnered 37 million impressions on Twitter, and that’s not counting those who find the treatise on Facebook, Instagram, Medium, or her Design Mom blog. The thread also has been translated into many languages, including Japanese.

As anticipated, responses continue to run the gamut from supportive (@annavrmac wrote: "Women have taken all the risk and burden for long enough. Time for men to take responsibility") to critical ("You are talking about irresponsible men & have disregard for the other part of the bargain," wrote @TJNugent520).

That twitter thread and the response it generated led to her new book, which her publisher describes as a series of 28 brief arguments that "make the case for moving the abortion debate away from controlling and legislating female bodies and on to men’s lack of accountability in preventing unwanted pregnancies."

Her most controversial tack involves vasectomies – for boys

Grace Rykaczewski, 21, of Morristown, N.J., poses for a portrait as she demonstrates against abortion, Saturday, May 14, 2022, outside the Supreme Court in Washington. "Once it's overturned, for the pro-life movement this is only the beginning," said Rykaczewski, who goes by the handle, "Pro Life Barbie" on social media.

Borrowing from legendary 18th-century writer Jonathan Swift, who once wrote that a solution for famine could be selling children for food, Blair is eager to push buttons with her suggestion that perhaps giving reversible vasectomies to boys could be a way for men to appreciate the responsibility inherent in the act of sexual intercourse.

“That’s obviously not a real thing, but it’s more my way of pointing out how unwilling we all are to ask sacrifices of men when we’ll do so readily of women,” Blair told USA TODAY, adding that with advancements in vasectomy techniques, “it one day might be possible for a man to have one that is easily and effectively reversed.”

Blair has a deep passion for the U.S., but work and concern keep her in France

The Blair brood makes a meal. Mom Gabrielle Blair (center, in front of cupboard) is a longtime designer and blogger who turned her attention to the issue of unwanted pregnancies in a Twitter thread in 2018. It has since garnered nearly 40 million impressions.

Blair and her children live in a small town in the Normandy region of France, in large part because that move was made possible because of  the tech-related job of her husband, Ben, 49. The couple have also lived in New York, Colorado and, most recently, the San Francisco Bay Area.

Though Blair expected to return one day, she is worried about the political leanings on display in America, particularly when it comes to women's rights. Even before it was confirmed that the Supreme Court would overturn Roe v. Wade, the opinion that made abortion legal nationwide in 1973 – a move that has led some conservative politicians to push for a federal ban on abortion in all 50 states – Blair expressed concern.

“America feels very unstable right now,” she says, her voice softening. “I don’t want America, the country that I love, to be unstable.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Mormon mom and blogger Gabrielle Blair on men's role in pregnancy

Tax the rich for more EVs? California Democrats split



 A Lyft ride-share car waits at a stoplight in Sacramento, Calif., July 9, 2019. Lyft is the primary funders of Proposition 30, which would raise taxes on the rich to pay mostly for electric vehicle infrastructure. (AP Photo/Rich Pedroncelli, File)More

KATHLEEN RONAYNE
Sun, October 16, 2022

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — A California ballot measure that would tax the rich to help put more electric cars on the road may seem tailor-made to win support from Democrats in a state known for climate leadership, but Proposition 30 has one notable opponent: Gov. Gavin Newsom. That's put the Democratic governor on the opposite side of his own party and against his traditional environmental allies.

The proposition before voters would add a 1.75% tax on personal income of more than $2 million, or fewer than 43,000 people. State analysts estimate it would raise up to $5 billion a year, mostly to help people buy electric vehicles and to build charging stations, with some also dedicated to resources for fighting wildfires.

Environmental and health group backers say California needs dedicated funding to speed the transition away from gas-powered cars and help lower planet-warming emissions. Transportation accounts for 40% of California's greenhouse gas emissions, and increasingly deadly wildfires are another major source of carbon.

“We can't meet our climate goals without something like this," said Mary Creasman, chief executive officer for California Environmental Voters. “It's either going to be all of us who pays, or it's going to be the wealthiest who can afford to pay."

Newsom has branded Proposition 30 as a money grab by ridesharing giant Lyft, which has spent at least $45 million backing it. State regulators have mandated that all rideshare trips be zero-emission by 2030. Uber has not taken a position on the measure.

“Don’t be fooled, Prop. 30′s being advertised as a climate initiative, but in reality it was devised by a single corporation to funnel state income taxes to benefit their company,” Newsom says in one TV ad.

Supporters reject that characterization, saying that Lyft got involved after environmental groups were already discussing a ballot measure. Creasman said it was important to “call our own team and governor out for lying" about the origins of the measure.

In an election year where Newsom is expected to cruise to reelection for a second term, the fight over Proposition 30 has become perhaps the most contentious of the season for Democrats. It comes months after state air regulators approved a Newsom-backed plan to ban the sale of most new gas-powered cars in the state by 2035. Newsom notes that he has already dedicated $10 billion to various programs aimed at boosting EV adoption over the next six years.

Half the money raised in Proposition 30 for electric vehicles would go into an equity account designed to expand transportation options and limit air pollution in low-income or disadvantaged neighborhoods. It could be used to help people buy electric cars or to put cleaner delivery trucks, buses and even e-bikes on the roads.

Wildfires, too, have become an increasingly urgent problem as climate change makes the state hotter and drier. Most of the state’s deadliest and most destructive wildfires have occurred in the last few years, and the state estimates wildfires released more than 85 million metric tons of carbon emissions in 2021 — more than the annual emissions from electricity.




Lyft says it supports the measure because reducing emissions is good climate policy.

“Proposition 30 funds this through a tax on individuals who earn more than $2 million a year. I’m fortunate enough to be impacted by this tax and happy to pay it to help turn back the clock on this existential threat,” Logan Green, the company’s chief executive officer, wrote in a blog post.

Joining Newsom in opposing the measure are the California Teachers Association, the California Chamber of Commerce and some venture capitalists who are helping fund the “No" campaign.

The money raised by the tax wouldn't count toward a state budget rule that says a certain percentage of revenue must go to K-12 education, a provision the teachers don't like. Meanwhile, the nonpartisan Legislative Analyst's Office said the proposal could force lower spending in other areas based on certain budget rules, something supporters of the measure dispute.

Business groups note that California's personal income tax is already the highest in the nation, and the ballot measure would put it over 15% for the highest earners. Loren Kaye, foundation president for the California Chamber of Commerce, also warned that a rapid expansion of electric vehicles could strain the energy grid, an argument the Newsom administration has rejected.

Backers of Proposition 30 include the California Democratic Party, the Clean Air Coalition, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the American Lung Association, which have rejected characterizations that the measure is designed to benefit Lyft specifically, noting there's no provision that would expressly set aside money for rideshare drivers.

While Newsom's existing commitment to electric vehicle infrastructure is significant, the state needs a more stable long-term revenue source, supporters argue. The tax increase would last for 20 years if the measure passes.

“We need a consistent, reliable source of funding that keeps us going through good budget years and bad budget years," said Bill Magavern, policy director for the Coalition for Clean Air. Referring to Lyft, he added, “If the goal is to limit pollution, does it matter who is driving the EV?"

Why The U.S.’ Largest Shale Gas Basin Misses Out On The LNG Boom

Editor OilPrice.com
Sun, October 16, 2022 

Regulatory hurdles are stymieing growth in natural gas production in the Marcellus-Utica basin, the largest U.S. gas-producing region, which is set to miss out on the expected boom in American liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports in the coming years.

Not only is Marcellus-Utica missing the opportunity to export and monetize natural gas in a world scrambling for LNG supply, but it is also unable to provide more natural gas to the regions close to it in New England, analysts and the pipeline industry say.

In one of the most ironic twists in American energy these days, the U.S. Northeast is importing LNG from foreign producers to meet its gas demand.

New England’s predicament is the result of the regulatory hurdles the U.S. states in the Northeast have posed to natural gas pipeline infrastructure, the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America says. The association calls for permitting reform and regional support to pipeline companies that are ready to build infrastructure but have seen a lot of projects delayed and tied up in lengthy court battles, which have swelled costs.


One such project was the Atlantic Coast project, a pipeline from West Virginia to North Carolina along a route that had to pass through the Appalachian Trail in Virginia. In the summer of 2020, despite a major win on the right-of-way issue at the U.S. Supreme Court, the developers of the pipeline definitely scrapped the project due to ongoing delays and major cost overruns.

“This announcement reflects the increasing legal uncertainty that overhangs large-scale energy and industrial infrastructure development in the United States. Until these issues are resolved, the ability to satisfy the country’s energy needs will be significantly challenged,” the top executives of Dominion Energy and Duke Energy said at the time.

Over the past few years, developers haven’t proposed many new gas pipelines in the U.S. Northeast due to permitting issues and bans from states such as New York.

The midstream infrastructure capital has shifted from Marcellus-Utica down to the U.S. Gulf Coast, Kevin Little, senior vice president for natural gas at Macquarie Energy, said during Hart Energy’s America’s Natural Gas conference.

Projects for LNG exports are now being developed in Texas and Louisiana, and despite the fact that greenfield natural gas projects are tough to develop even in Texas and Louisiana, America’s LNG exports are set to double by 2027, Little said.

On the East Coast, the hurdles are greater.

“If you have to get an act of Congress to get your permits to build a pipeline, if you’ve got to go to the Supreme Court and you still can’t build a pipeline, this is not a great environment to build midstream infrastructure,” the expert said, as carried by Hart Energy.

In the U.S., LNG export capacity is growing as new trains at Sabine Pass and Calcasieu Pass came online this year. But in order to continue growing, the LNG industry will need more domestic midstream infrastructure - pipelines - to carry natural gas from production centers to LNG export terminals on the U.S. Gulf Coast and demand centers on the Eastern Seaboard.

More pipeline capacity is also needed for New England’s energy demand, the Interstate Natural Gas Association of America said last month as energy prices spike in the region.

“Without additional energy infrastructure, New Englanders will continue to face uncertainty and the risk of future energy shortages,” INGAA said in September.

“BandAid fixes” to New England’s gas supply such as suspending the Jones Act to temporarily ease receipt of more LNG imports and federal assistance in paying for New England consumers’ energy bills, “are not lasting or affordable solutions to addressing electric reliability concerns,” INGAA president and CEO Amy Andryszak wrote in an op-ed in Boston Herald last month.

“While all eyes have been on Europe for how their energy crisis will play out, the reality is many American consumers face similar reliability issues here at home, particularly in New England,” Andryszak said, but noted that there’s one significant difference between New England and Europe.

“The U.S. is the No. 1 gas producer in the world, and New England is a stone’s throw away from the most prolific natural gas resource basin in the country — the Marcellus and Utica shale formations in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia,” Andryszak wrote.

“Rather than hoping to get their hands on an LNG tanker when in a bind, New England could expand American energy infrastructure and change course for future generations.”

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

Putting Kurds in spotlight, Iran's leaders try to deflect national protest


: Smoke rises from the Iraqi Kurdistan headquarters of the Kurdistan Freedom Party
1

Mon, October 17, 2022 
By Parisa Hafezi and Daren Butler

DUBAI (Reuters) -Facing their biggest challenge in years, Iran's religious leaders are trying to portray the angry protests over the death of Mahsa Amini as a breakaway uprising by her fellow Kurds threatening the nation's unity rather than its clerical rule.

Amini, a 22-year-old from Kurdistan province in northwest Iran, died in the custody of the Islamic Republic's morality police after she was detained for violating strict codes requiring women to dress modestly in public.

Protests which started at Amini's funeral in her Kurdish hometown of Saqez spread rapidly across the country, to the capital Tehran, cities in central Iran, and the southwest and southeast where Arab and Baluch minorities are concentrated.

Across the country, including at universities and high schools, the rallying cry "Women, Life, Freedom" and the same calls for the downfall of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei were heard, yet much of the crackdown by security forces focused on the northwest where most of Iran's estimated 10 million Kurds live.

Riot police and Basij paramilitary forces have been transferred to the area from other provinces, according to witnesses, and tanks were sent to Kurdish areas where tensions have been particularly high.

Iran has also attacked Iranian Kurdish armed groups in neighbouring Iraq it says are involved in the unrest. Iran's Revolutionary Guards fired missiles and drones at militant targets in northern Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdish region, where authorities said 13 people were killed.

"The Kurdish opposition groups are using Amini's case as an excuse to reach their decades-long goal of separating Kurdistan from Iran, but they will not succeed," a hardline security official said.

His comments were echoed by a former official, who told Reuters senior security officers were concerned that "the support Kurdish people are getting from across Iran will be used by Kurdish opposition groups to push for independence."

Iranian state media have called the nationwide protests a "political plot" ignited by Kurdish separatist groups, particularly the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI).

'SEPARATIST THREAT'

"Since the very start of the uprising the regime has tried to portray it as a Kurdish ethnic issue rather than a national one, invoking a separatist threat emerging from the Kurdish region," said Ali Fathollah-Nejad, a political scientist at the American University of Beirut.

Those efforts by authorities had been undermined, Fathollah-Nejad said, by significant solidarity between Iran's different ethnic groups during the nationwide protests.

Still, looking across their border to Iraq, and further west to Syria, Iranian authorities can point to Kurdish ambitions for self-rule taking root when central government was challenged.

In Iraq, Kurds who for years fought Saddam Hussein won enough Western military protection after the 1991 Gulf War to establish a degree of autonomy, which was strengthened when Saddam was toppled 12 years later in a U.S.-led invasion.

Syrian Kurdish forces also exploited the tumult of the 2011 uprising against President Bashar al-Assad, allying with the United States against Islamic State and carving out a swathe of northeast Syria under their control.

In Turkey, where around a fifth of the 85 million-strong population is Kurdish, Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants have fought an armed insurgency against the state since 1984 in which tens of thousands of people have died.

In Iraq and Syria, Kurds have demonstrated in solidarity with the protesters in Iran. In Turkey, a deputy leader of the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party told Reuters the party "salutes the women in Iran" calling for their rights.

"As in Turkey, Iraq and Syria, in Iran it is the Kurds who seek democracy, the Kurds who seek freedom," said Tuncer Bakirhan, a former mayor who was removed from his post and jailed over alleged militant ties.

Reuters could not immediately reach Iranian officials for comment, but the government routinely denies allegations that it discriminates against any ethnic groups in its population and says all citizens regardless of ethnicity are treated equally.

Iran's constitution grants equal rights to all ethnic minorities and says minority languages may be used in the media and schools. But rights groups and activists say Kurds face discrimination along with other religious and ethnic minorities under the country's Shi'ite Muslim clerical establishment.

Amnesty International has reported that "scores if not hundreds" of political prisoners affiliated to the Kurdish group KDPI and other proscribed political parties are in jail after being convicted in unfair trials.

"The regime has never recognised the rights of its Kurdish population," said Hiwa Molania, a Kurdish Iranian journalist based in Turkey.

Despite those restrictions at home, and the examples of Kurdish autonomy in Iraq and Syria, many Iranian Kurds insist they are not seeking secession.

"Iranian Kurds want their constitutional rights to be respected," said Kaveh Ghoreishi, an Iranian Kurd journalist and researcher. "People in the Kurdistan province... want a regime change and not independence."

Ali Vaez, senior Iran analyst at the International Crisis Group, said accusations of Kurdish separatist ambitions aim to create a "rally around the flag effect" that encourages Iranians to support the leadership rather than the protesters.

However, the real danger was not any breakaway ambitions of Iran's minorities, but their treatment by Iran's leadership.

"The system’s disregard for the legitimate grievances of ethnic and sectarian minorities ... have rendered the country increasingly vulnerable to the civil strife that has pulled countries in the region like Syria and Yemen into a deadly downward spiral," Vaez said.

(Writing by Dominic Evans, Editing by William Maclean)

Factbox-Ethnic groups swept up in Iran's nationwide protests

California Kurds protest following death of Zhina Mahsa Amini, in Los Angeles


Mon, October 17, 2022 at 3:34 AM


(Reuters) - Protests in Iran have swept all parts of the nation since Mahsa Amini's death in police custody, including areas home to ethnic minorities with long-standing grievances against the state.

The authorities have accused armed dissidents from some of these minorities of fomenting trouble. Critics say these accusations aim to present the protests as ethnic unrest rather than a country-wide uprising, and to justify a crackdown.

Protesters have stressed national unity with chants such as "Turks, Kurds, Arabs, Lors, are together".

Iran, with a population of 87 million, is home to seven ethnic minorities alongside majority Persians. Rights groups say minorities have long faced discrimination. Iran denies this.


Here is some background on some of the ethnic groups:

BALUCHIS

Some of the deadliest unrest so far was on Sept. 30 in the Sistan-Baluchistan province of southeastern Iran at the Pakistani border, home to the Baluch minority.

Amnesty International has said security forces killed at least 66 people in a violent crackdown after Friday prayers in Zahedan, the provincial capital.

The authorities said militants attacked a police station, triggering a shootout. The Revolutionary Guards said five members of its forces and the volunteer Basij militia were killed during the Sept. 30 violence.

Iran has blamed the shooting on Jaish al-Adl, or Army of Justice, a Baluchi militant group. Neither Jaish al-Adl nor any other group has claimed a role.

The Baluchi minority, estimated to number up to 2 million, follow Sunni Islam rather than the Shi'ite Islam of Iran's clerical rulers.

Amnesty said in a report earlier this year that 26% of people executed by the authorities since 2022 were members of the Baluch minority, saying this epitomized "entrenched discrimination and repression they have faced for decades".

Jaish al-Adl has said previous attacks it carried out on Iranian forces were in retaliation for oppression of Sunnis in Sistan-Baluchistan. Iranian authorities say the group operates from safe havens in Pakistan and have repeatedly called on the neighbouring country to crack down on them.

KURDS

The unrest has been particularly intense in Kurdish regions where the latest wave of protests first began on Sept. 17 during the funeral of Mahsa Amini, the 22-year-old woman who died in morality police custody.

Rights group Hengaw says it has recorded the deaths of at least 32 civilians killed by government forces during protests.

Estimated to number some 10 million, Iranian Kurds are also Sunnis and mostly live in northwestern regions bordering Turkey and Iraq - which also have large Kurdish minorities.

Amnesty says Kurds have suffered deep-rooted discrimination in Iran, with their social, political and cultural rights repressed and the region facing economic neglect.

Kurdish human rights organisation Hengaw has identified 23 Kurdish people killed in the latest protests.

The Revolutionary Guards, which have put down unrest in the Kurdish region for decades, have accused armed Iranian Kurdish dissidents of involvement in the protests.

The Guards have mounted drone and missile attacks against what they have described as terrorist targets in Iraq, killing 14 people on Sept. 28 including at least one child - according to Iraqi Kurdish authorities.

ARABS

Iran's Arabs, estimated to number 1.6 million, reside mainly along the border with Iraq in the southwestern, oil-rich province of Khuzestan. They have long complained of inequity in employment and political rights.

Protesters have taken to the streets of the provincial capital Ahvaz during the latest demonstrations.

In 2021, protests over water shortages were particularly intense in the Khuzestan region - where drought has been a major problem - and were met by a crackdown by the security forces.

Iran has previously accused Sunni Arab states of a role in fomenting trouble in the region. In 2018, Iran accused Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates of paying for an attack that killed 25 people in Ahvaz, half of them members of the Guards.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE denied any role.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by William Maclean)

Satellite photos show damage at Iran prison amid protests



In this photo provided by Islamic Republic News Agency, IRNA, on Sunday, Oct. 16, 2022, a charred building is seen after a fire on the property of the Evin prison, in Tehran, Iran. Flames and smoke rising from the prison had been widely visible Saturday evening, as nationwide anti-government protests triggered by the death of a young woman in police custody entered a fifth week. 

JON GAMBRELL
Sun, October 16, 2022 

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — A weekend fire at Iran's notorious Evin Prison damaged one of the largest buildings in the complex, according to satellite photos analyzed Monday. Authorities raised to eight the number of inmates killed, doubling the initial toll.

What happened on Saturday night at the prison — for decades the main holding facility for political detainees and a centerpiece of the state's systematic crushing of dissent — remains unclear. Online videos purport to show chaotic scenes with a prison siren wailing as flames rise from the complex, the apparent crackle of gunfire and people screaming: “Death to the dictator!”

The fire erupted as nationwide anti-government protests triggered by the death of a young woman in the custody of the country's morality police entered a fifth week. Tensions have escalated to a point unseen since the mass demonstrations that accompanied the country's 2009 Green Movement protests.

The fire at one of Tehran's most heavily guarded facilities potentially raises the stakes for those continuing to rally against the government and the mandatory headscarf, or hijab, for women after the Sept. 16 death of Mahsa Amini.


Satellite photos taken Sunday by Planet Labs PBC and analyzed by The Associated Press show the roof burning away from a large building that's part of the northern section of Evin Prison. The prison also houses prisoners convicted of criminal charges.

The Iran Prison Atlas, a project by the California-based rights group United for Iran, which collects data on Iranian prisons and prisoners, had previously identified the structure's wards as housing prisoners convicted on fraud and theft cases — not those held on political charges. However, the Iran Prison Atlas has said that wards have changed over the years.

The reformist newspaper Etemad on Monday quoted Mostafa Nili, a lawyer for some political prisoners at Evin, as identifying one of the affected areas as Ward 8. He described those imprisoned there as political prisoners and others convicted on financial charges.

He also said political prisoners in Ward 4 of the prison inhaled tear gas during the incident. The semiofficial Tasnim news agency also said Evin's Wards 6 and 7 sustained damage as well. Iranian state television rushed a camera crew to the site early Sunday morning, filming a reporter walking through one ward with prisoners asleep in bunks as firefighters doused the embers of the blaze.

The TV described the fire as having taken place at a sewing workshop, something Iran's judiciary chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejehi repeated on Monday. He blamed the incident on “the enemy's agents.” Iran has been portraying all unrest in the country as stirred up by the United States, Israel and other nations it views as enemies.

Earlier Monday, Iran's judiciary raised the death toll from the blaze to eight, after initially reporting four deaths over the weekend.

Authorities have blamed “rioters” for setting the blaze, though they haven't described what measures they took against the prisoners on site. Video of the fire purports to show people on the roof of the building, tossing liquid on the flames at first. Apparent gunfire echoes through other videos, including what appears to be some sort of ordinance being lobbed into the prison complex, followed by the sound of an explosion.

As the fire grew larger, one video includes voices shouting: “Death to the dictator!” That cry against Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has become common at night in Tehran amid the protests, even though it carries the risk of a death sentence in a closed-door Revolutionary Court.

Evin Prison, in northern Tehran abutting the foothills of the Alborz Mountains, first opened under Iran's Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi in 1972. Iran's theocracy took over the facility after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. Iran's paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which answers only to Khamenei, operates its own prison cells at the complex, as does Iran's Intelligence Ministry, which reports to the country's presidency.

The Guard typically holds dual nationals and those with ties to the West there — prisoners often used in swaps with the West. Jason Rezaian, a Washington Post journalist detained by Iran on flimsy spying allegations for 544 days was held there before being freed as Tehran's nuclear deal with world powers took effect.

“Evin is no ordinary prison," Rezaian wrote on Twitter, sharing videos of the fire this weekend. "Many of Iran’s best & brightest have spent long stretches confined there, where brave women & men are denied their basic rights for speaking truth to power.”

Deputy State Department spokesman Vedant Patel, speaking to reporters in Washington on Monday, said the three U.S.-Iranian citizens it knows are detained at Evin Prison are safe. He did not say where that information came from.

“The wrongfully detained U.S. citizens are accounted for and they are safe,” he said, adding that they remain in detention and their safety is relative considering the conditions of their imprisonment.

Iran carries out executions, as well as punishments such as amputations, prescribed under Islamic laws and ordered by the country's hard-line court system, at Evin. Human rights activists have long documented abuses at the site. Last year, an online account purportedly by an entity describing itself as a group of hackers, leaked a series of videos to the AP showing fighting and grim conditions at the prison.

The wider protests now rocking Iran erupted after public outrage over the death of 22-year-old Amini in police custody. She was arrested by Iran’s morality police in Tehran for violating the Islamic Republic’s strict dress code. Iran’s government insists Amini was not mistreated in police custody, but her family says her body showed bruises and other signs of beating after she was detained.

So far, human rights groups estimate that over 200 people have been killed in the protests and the violent security force crackdown that followed. Iran has not offered a death toll in weeks. Demonstrations have been seen in over 100 cities, according to the group Human Rights Activists in Iran. Thousands are believed to have been arrested.

Meanwhile, the European Union on Monday slapped sanctions on 11 Iranian officials and four Iranian entities over their suspected role in the crackdown against the protests, imposing travel bans and freezing assets.

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Associated Press writers Lorne Cook in Brussels and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

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Follow Jon Gambrell on Twitter at www.twitter.com/jongambrellAP.