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If Roe falls, what can Biden do on abortion access? Advocacy groups get creative

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — If the Supreme Court upends nearly 50 years of abortion rights as expected, all eyes will be on the White House and a liberal president who has vowed to fight to keep abortion access.

But what can he do, really?

In recent weeks, dozens of abortion advocacy groups, lawyers, providers and lawmakers have huddled to pitch ideas that range from from what advocates call creative to the seemingly far-fetched. The White House has met with many of these officials in recent weeks to hear them out, although it remains tight-lipped on where its legal strategy might be headed.

Could the government lease federal buildings and public lands to abortion clinics? Declare a public health emergency, and offer disaster relief money or health care grants to states anticipating an influx of patients?

What about federal travel vouchers for patients seeking health care in abortion-friendly states, or relaxed import rules for abortion pills made overseas? President Joe Biden, some argue, also could say that banning abortion pills by mail — as some states are trying to do — violates rules on interstate commerce.

“We are all thinking creatively about what administrative solutions might exist,” including increasing the availability of abortion pills, said Kimberly Inez McGuire, executive director of Unite for Reproductive & Gender Equity who met with the White House in one of its “listening sessions.”

“But in this specific moment, what I’m looking for from this administration is leadership,” she said.

Complicating much of the issue for the Biden administration are decades-long restrictions on federal spending legislation that prohibits the executive branch from spending money on most abortion services. That prohibition is unlikely to change so long as the Senate remains narrowly divided between Democrats and Republicans.

Still, abortion rights advocates say every idea is on the table. Under Biden’s control, they argue, are powerful institutions, including the Food and Drug Administration, which has approved access to the abortion pill by mail, and Medicaid, the government’s insurance program for low-income families.

That means post-Roe, the United States will likely spend years embroiled in legal battles over abortion, as conservative states bump up against the power of the presidency.

Biden “can’t reverse the Supreme Court with an executive order,” said David Cohen, a professor of law at the Drexel Kline School of Law, who has written in favor of fighting abortion restrictions.

“But there are things that he can do, and ways that he can harness the federal government to increase access, even if some states are trying to limit it,” Cohen said.

Biden hinted as much in an interview last week with ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live!

“I think what we’re going to have to do is that there are some executive orders I could employ, we believe. We’re looking at that right now,” Biden said.

Legal experts predict that much of Biden’s strategy will likely focus on the idea of “federal preemption” — the idea rooted in the Constitution that federal law always wins out over state laws.

For example, it’s possible that Biden might argue that states can’t lawfully restrict access to the abortion pill mifepristone because the FDA has already approved its use for all Americans, Cohen said.

Under Biden, the FDA also has determined that the drug is safe enough to prescribe through a telehealth appointment and mail to the patient, even as 19 states restrict the drug to being dispensed in-person.

That decision to allow access to the abortion pill, Cohen argues, “is rooted in federal law because the agency only exists and only has the authorization to authorize a person because of federal law.”

The idea of FDA policy outweighing state restrictions is currently being tested in court. GenBioPro, the manufacturer of generic mifepristone, is challenging Mississippi’s restrictions on the drug as being at odds with federal rules, with a decision expected this summer.

Advocacy lawyers also expect that Biden is working on the idea of expanding access to mifepristone, possibly by easing import restrictions on overseas providers. The drug is widely available in states that don’t restrict abortion, although international organizations like Aid Access have been mailing the drug to any U.S. resident even if a state prohibits it and despite objections by the FDA.

Another focus by Biden could be on Medicaid, the largest insurance payer of pregnancy-related services.

While federal money can’t be used for most abortion services, Medicaid — which the federal government jointly operates with states — is required to pay for abortion care in cases of rape, incest and if a physician certifies the pregnancy would put the patient’s life at risk.

Compliance among states with these rules has been uneven historically, and several conservative legislatures are pursuing laws with stricter exceptions. In Oklahoma, for example, the law only allows abortion in cases of rape and incest if it’s reported to the police, and to save the life of a mother “in a medical emergency.”

It’s possible Biden could take steps to enforce Medicaid’s exceptions as federal law, making it easier for patients to get reimbursed, several advocacy groups predict.

John Yoo, a former top legal adviser to the Bush administration, said he thinks the most consequential step Biden could probably take is leveraging his power over Medicaid and Medicare, as well as the federal health care exchanges governed by the Affordable Care Act. For example, Biden could require that insurers cover abortion services, at least in states where it’s legal.

“I don’t think those (steps) could pre-empt state laws that make it criminal to carry out abortion, but would provide federal support once (a person) could get to a state where abortion was legal,” said Yoo, a law professor at the University of California, Berkley.

Still, Yoo said he thinks Congress would have to lift its restrictions on federal spending on abortion — a provision known as the Hyde amendment — to make that happen.

Democratic lawmakers and advocacy groups say what matters most is that Biden is as aggressive as possible.

In a letter to the president, more than two dozen Democrats, including Sens. Patty Murray of Washington and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, called on Biden to invoke his “unique power to marshal the resources of the entire federal government to respond.”

URGE’s Inez McGuire said even symbolic statements by the president can make a difference.

Declaring that abortion access is a human right is an opportunity for the administration “to let young people know (and) communities of color know … that our struggle to fight for abortion access is seen and understood by this administration,” she said.

What stagflation means and why it matters

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — For months, sky-high prices have pummeled the budgets of everyday Americans.

But many have offset the damage, at least in part, with wage increases driven by high demand for workers and resilient consumer spending. In short, strong pockets of the economy have blunted the worst effects of severe inflation.

But the economy will likely cool off in the coming months as the Federal Reserve raises borrowing costs through a series of interest rate hikes — an effort to tame inflation by slowing down the economy and eating away at demand. If the policy works, it will dial back inflation while preserving a stable level of economic growth and low unemployment, experts told ABC News.

But an unsuccessful series of rate hikes could fail to reduce prices while dramatically slowing the economy, experts said. Such an outcome would bring about stagflation — a mix of the words stagnation and inflation — which describes an economy with low growth and high prices. In other words, the high prices remain, but the lifeline of elevated income disappears.

“Stagflation is basically the worst of all worlds,” Veronika Dolar, a professor of economics at Long Island-based State University of New York Old Westbury, told ABC News. “It’s the place you definitely don’t want to be.”

What is stagflation?

Usually, in good economic times, low unemployment forces employers to raise wages so they can retain or attract workers, which heightens consumer demand and steepens price increases. Conversely, a slow economy typically results in stagnant wages, reduced demand, and slashed prices, the latter of which helps to relieve the financial strain for those who lose their jobs or receive diminished pay, Dolar said.

On rare occasions, however, high inflation persists even as the economy slows and unemployment rises, resulting in stagflation, she said.

No single economic authority formally decides whether stagflation has occurred, unlike a period of recession, which the National Bureau of Economic Research determines, Campbell Harvey, a professor of finance at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, told ABC News.

The last major bout of stagflation took place in the 1970s, when an oil shortage sent gas and other related prices soaring as it simultaneously dragged down economic output. But the crisis of the 1970s offers few lessons for the current moment, since the U.S. economy is far less reliant on gas expenditures and foreign oil, Harvey said.

Instead, present-day inflation is owed to generous central bank and Congressional policies in response to the pandemic, which flooded the economy with money, spiked demand and exacerbated a supply chain bottleneck, Harvey said. Moreover, the price crunch has intensified amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he added.

Some economists, like Dolar, believe we’re already in a period of stagflation. She noted that the U.S. gross domestic product shrank at an annual rate of 1.4% over the first three months of this year, even as inflation remained historically high. But Harvey disagrees, saying stagflation hasn’t arrived but poses a real threat.

Why stagflation matters

Stagflation hurts people in two different ways, Harvey told ABC News.

“One, the stuff you’re buying is more expensive,” he said. “And two, you have less income.”

Echoing the sentiment, Dolar said: “You’re already on your knees, struggling, and you get kicked in your gut.”

The lack of purchasing power ripples through the economy, denting business revenue and draining savings, Harvey said.

Stagflation offers no easy solutions, since generous fiscal policy or low borrowing costs may juice the economy but also risk raising inflation, while increased borrowing costs could bring down inflation but risk slowing growth even further, Dolar said.

The treacherous economic moment calls for financial prudence, Harvey said.

“Now is not the time to max out your credit card to go for a vacation,” he said. “Now is not the time for a small business to go to the bank and bet the business to do an expansion.”

“Now is the time for risk management,” he added.

Royals mark Garter Day as Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Andrew skip public events

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(LONDON) — Members of Britain’s royal family stepped out Monday for Garter Day, marking the first time the annual tradition has returned since the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

Prince Charles and Camilla, duchess of Cornwall, and Prince William and Kate, duchess of Cambridge, were among the royals who publicly attended Garter Day celebrations, a day of pomp and pageantry that includes a procession around Windsor Castle.

Garter Day, celebrated annually on June 13, is the day new appointments are invested in the Order of the Garter, which was created by King Edward III in 1348 and is the “oldest and most senior Order of Chivalry in Britain,” according to the royal family’s website.

Absent from the public celebration of the day was Queen Elizabeth II, who has been suffering from mobility issues that caused her to miss several events during her Platinum Jubilee celebrations earlier this month.

The 96-year-old queen attended the Garter Day investiture and lunch privately, but did not attend the public procession to St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle nor the service.

Buckingham Palace later released a photo showing Elizabeth standing in between Prince Charles, the heir to the throne, and Camilla, both of whom were dressed in their Order of the Garter ceremonial dress.

Camilla was made a Royal Lady of the Order of the Garter Monday, part of her journey to becoming queen consort when the queen dies and Charles becomes king.

Joining the queen in not attending Monday’s public events was her second-oldest son, Prince Andrew, who is a member of the Order of the Garter.

A royal source told ABC News the last-minute change of plans for Andrew to not attend public events was a “family decision.”

In February, Andrew agreed to settle a sexual assault lawsuit in which a woman, Virginia Giuffre, alleged that Jeffrey Epstein trafficked her to the prince, who she claimed took advantage and sexually abused her when she was under 18.

Prince Andrew repeatedly denied the allegations and attacked Giuffre’s credibility and motives.

One month earlier, in January, Andrew lost his military titles and royal patronages amid the lawsuit.

Buckingham Palace announced at the time that Andrew’s titles and patronages were returned to his mother, the queen.

“With The Queen’s approval and agreement, The Duke of York’s military affiliations and Royal patronages have been returned to The Queen,” the palace said in a statement. “The Duke of York will continue not to undertake any public duties and is defending this case as a private citizen.”

Andrew did not attend any of the queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations earlier this month because he tested positive for COVID-19, according to a spokesperson.

The last public royal event Andrew attended was in March, when he attended a service of Thanksgiving for his late father, Prince Philip, at Westminster Abbey.

Surgeon general says kids need to be part of solution amid youth mental health crisis

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(LOS ANGELES) — Facing a growing mental health crisis among America’s teens and young adults, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy says the problem is not something adults can fix alone.

Adults need “to make sure that we’re hearing from kids so that their stories are our guiding light,” Murthy said. “Ultimately, we will know when we’ve reached the finish line when they’re doing well and they tell us they’re doing well and when data tells us that as well.”

After declaring a national advisory on the youth mental health crisis late last year, Murthy is now participating in a two-day conference called the Youth Mental Wellness Now! Summit, hosted by The California Endowment.

“I’m also particularly excited that we’re going to have a chance to hear from young people here in L.A. today,” Dr. Murthy told ABC News.

According to Murthy, adults need to hear directly from the youth what the problems are, and what they can do to help. The summit will feature actors and activists including Kendrick Sampson, best known for his roles in Insecure, The Vampire Diaries and How to Get Away with Murder, and Jordyn Woods, a model, actress and mental health advocate.

They will join California-based youth leaders Ja’Nell Gore from South Kern Sol whose parent company is YR Media, and Xochitil Larios from Communities United for Restorative Youth Justice in a fireside chat with the surgeon general.

The purpose of the youth-led summit is to create a national movement around youth mental health led by young people through the sharing of stories and to galvanize organizations to commit to support. They have concrete commitments in excess of $255 million.

Other organizations partnering with The California Endowment to host the event include The Steve Fund, California Children’s Trust, Youth Organize! California, YR Media and Revolve Impact.

Sometimes, the voice of young people is missing from initiatives to help them, but a strength of this summit is the central role young voices have.

“We wanted young people center stage,” said Dr. Bob Ross, CEO of The California Endowment. “We wanted to make sure that any go-forward strategy for investing in access to mental health services and optimizing the mental health and well-being of young people would be informed with young people as the experts, and additionally, having important and key adult allies more as listeners than talkers. You know, a lot of times you have these conferences, and it’s the expert adults that are doing all the talking.”

Gore emphasized that one importance of this summit is that “youth need to be able to hear other young people tell them that it’s OK to struggle with things.”

“This [is] like one of the first conferences of its kind,” said Jasmine Dellafosse, a nationally recognized youth activist who will emcee the summit.

“Often young people across California have been showing up and trying to address these issues for decades,” she said. “It’s actually an opportunity to connect policy and change with actual voices on the ground, and young people who were championing, you know, the issues in their communities while also still being extremely under-resourced.”

Murthy blames the youth mental health crisis on loneliness, isolation, economic hardship, uncertainty, and online and offline bullying, which were exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic. Other existential challenges like climate change, racism and violence in the community have also caused youth to lose hope.

In addition to these factors, Ross highlights “exposure to trauma in early childhood,” often rooted in race, social factors, the criminal justice system and violence, as being a primary cause of the crisis. He also acknowledged the “stigma behind mental health and seeking mental health supports” as perpetuating the crisis.

Murthy said the government’s three-pronged approach to addressing the crisis is to “expand access to treatment,” “invest in prevention,” “and eradicate the stigma around mental illness, which still prevents youth from coming forward and asking for help.”

In a show of solidarity, more than 30 organizations to date have announced 75 commitments in response to the surgeon general’s call-to-action.

To aid with expanding access to mental health services, the Vista Group has committed to investing $250 million over the next three years into U.S. providers of adolescent and youth mental health services. Pinterest has also designated more than a third of their $10 million commitment to advance emotional well-being to support NGOs (non-government organizations) and nonprofits focused on youth to expand access.

The UCLA Center for Scholars & Storytellers will partner with Disney Branded Kids, CAA, Joy Coalition, YouTubeKids and leading showrunners to research best practices on how to incorporate mental health messaging to positively impact youth through their programming and marketing. The CW is committed to developing storylines in its programming to inform and support audiences.

Other organizations are committed to supporting youth utilizing digital technologies. Meta plans to enhance parental supervision controls and introduce a new feature called “nudges,” which are notifications that encourage teens to switch to a different topic if they’re repeatedly looking at the same topic.

“Today, again, it’s just a step forward,” Murthy said. “We’re not done until every child in America has access to good mental health care.”

Some Uvalde victims’ relatives hopeful, others unsatisfied by federal gun safety proposal

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(UVALDE, Texas) — Three weeks after one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history, some relatives of students gunned down at Robb Elementary School say they’re hopeful about the federal anti-gun violence proposal announced by a bipartisan group of senators Sunday.

But others say they’re dissatisfied with the extent of the proposed legislation and the lack of answers in their community.

The agreement, if passed into law, would provide funding for mental health, including behavioral health centers, and create incentives for the creation of so-called “red flag” laws to remove firearms from people who are a danger to themselves or others; increase money for school safety; and strengthen the federal background check system as it relates to convicted domestic violence abusers or those with restraining orders.

Amelia Sandoval, whose grandson Xavier Lopez was killed in the attack, told ABC News that she has not been watching news coverage while she processes her grandson’s death. But when briefed on the proposed legislation, she choked up, saying, “Praise God. This is just the beginning, but praise God.”

Briana Ruiz, whose child survived the shooting, told ABC News that the proposed measures just aren’t enough.

“I feel like it’s a pathway to hopefully, eventually get to what many are asking for … but the age limit should have been raised as well,” she said, referring to the requirements to purchase an AR-style weapon like the one used in the attack.

Ruiz, who at one point was a teacher’s aide in accused shooter Salvador Ramos’ class, said she laments how an 18-year-old in Texas cannot buy beer or cigarettes, but can purchase an AR-15.

Twenty-two people, including 19 young children, were killed in the attack in Uvalde, Texas, on May 24.

Some in Uvalde said the proposed legislation is important, but it’s not their primary focus right now.

Monica Garza-Herrera, a relative of fourth-grade victim Amerie Jo Garza, said she was glad to hear about the federal framework — but she said she’s looking for local answers as well.

“What I want to know is what they’re going to do as far as here in our hometown to change things for our students that are still in school,” Garza-Herrera told ABC News.

She said there’s pain in the community, and she worries about whether her grandchildren and her sister, who is a teacher in the school district, are safe. She also wants to know if faster action on the part of law enforcement could have saved more children’s lives.

“Could they have been saved, even though they were shot?” she said. “Would they have gotten in there sooner? What do they plan to do about that? That’s what I’m waiting for them to tell us.”

While those answers may take time, President Joe Biden said he hopes to move quickly to get the legislative framework adopted into law. The framework has the backing of 10 Republicans, which suggests that, if adopted, the proposal would have enough votes to overcome its biggest hurdle in the Senate.

“Each day that passes, more children are killed in this country,” Biden said. “The sooner it comes to my desk, the sooner I can sign it, and the sooner we can use these measures to save lives.”

Russia-Ukraine live updates: Ukraine pleads for heavy weapons ahead of NATO meeting

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “special military operation” into neighboring Ukraine began on Feb. 24, with Russian forces invading from Belarus, to the north, and Russia, to the east. Ukrainian troops have offered “stiff resistance,” according to U.S. officials.

The Russian military has since launched a full-scale ground offensive in eastern Ukraine’s disputed Donbas region, capturing the strategic port city of Mariupol and securing a coastal corridor to the Moscow-annexed Crimean Peninsula.

Here’s how the news is developing. All times Eastern:

Jun 14, 6:37 am
Ukraine pleads for heavy weapons ahead of NATO meeting

The only way to end the war in Ukraine, either on the battlefield or behind the negotiation table, is a parity of weapons, Mykhailo Podoliak, an adviser to the head of the Ukrainian Presidential Office, said on Monday.

“Being straightforward — to end the war we need heavy weapons parity,” Podoliak said on Twitter.

According to the presidential adviser, Ukraine’s military wish list includes 1,000 howitzers, 300 multiple launch rocket systems, 500 tanks, 2,000 armored vehicles and 1,000 drones.

“Negotiations are possible from a strong position, which requires parity of weapons,” Podoliak said. “There is simply no other way.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba echoed Podoliak’s plea for weapons on Monday in a tweet that recounted Ukraine’s recent military triumphs achieved with limited resources.

“Ukraine has proven it can punch well above its weight and win important battles against all odds,” Kuleba said, pointing at victories in the battles of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy and Kharkiv. “Imagine what Ukraine can do with sufficient tools,” the Foreign Minister added. Kuleba urged Ukraine’s partners “to set a clear goal of Ukrainian victory and speed up deliveries of heavy weapons.”

Podoliak said a meeting of NATO defense ministers will be held in Brussels on June 15.

“We are waiting for a decision” on the weapons, Podoliak said.

The group, known as the Ukraine Defence Contact Group, will convene a meeting for the third time in a bid “to ensure that we’re providing Ukraine what Ukraine needs right now,” U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III said at a press briefing in Bangkok, Thailand, on Monday.

Austin, who will be in attendance in Brussels, said that Ukraine needs support “in order to defend against Russia’s unjustified and unprovoked assault.” The secretary of Defense noted that looking ahead, Ukraine will require help “to build and sustain robust defenses so that it will be able to defend itself in the coming months and years.”

In his Monday evening address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called on Ukrainians to tell people in the occupied territories “that the Ukrainian army will definitely come.”

“Tell them about Ukraine. Tell them the truth. Say that there will be liberation,” the president said.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian officials played down threats of possible food shortages in the country due to the ongoing conflict. While Ukraine lost 25% of its sown area as a result of Russia’ full-scale invasion, the country’s food security was “in no way” threatened, Taras Vysotsky, the first deputy minister of Agrarian Policy, said at a press briefing for Ukrainian media on Monday.

“Despite the loss of 25% of sown areas, the structure of crops this year as a whole is more than sufficient to ensure consumption, which in turn also decreased due to mass displacement and external migration,” Vysotsky said.

The deputy minister added that Ukraine has “already imported about 70% of essential fertilizers, 60% of plant protection products and about a third of the required amount of fuel” before the war erupted in late February. According to Vysotsky, current sowing volumes are enough to ensure domestic consumption and even exports.

Jun 13, 9:26 am
Bodies of tortured men exhumed in Bucha

Another mass grave has been dug up in Bucha, uncovering the bodies of seven men who authorities believe were tortured and killed during the bloody occupation of the city in March.

Police told ABC News their hands were tied with ropes behind their backs and they were shot in the knees and head.

“They were killed in a cruel way,” police spokesperson Iryna Pryanyshnykova said. “These were civilian victims. The people here were killed by Russian soldiers and later they were just put into a grave to try to hide this war crime.”

It’s not clear why the men were killed, Pryanyshnykova said.

She said experts will analyze DNA to identify the victims.

-ABC News’ Britt Clennett

Jun 13, 6:24 am
Zelenskyy: Ukraine fighting for ‘every meter’ of Severodonetsk

Russian forces have pushed the Armed Forces of Ukraine out of the center of Severodonetsk, Ukrainian officials said.

“They are pressing in Severodonetsk, where very fierce fighting is going on — literally for every meter,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in an address on Sunday evening.

Russian forces now control about 70% of the city, as intense shelling makes mass evacuation and the transportation of goods impossible, Sergiy Haidai, another Ukrainian official, said.

Around 500 people, including 40 children, are sheltering in the city’s Azot chemical plant, Haidai said.

While the Ukrainians try to organize their evacuation, authorities of the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic have given an ultimatum to Ukrainian troops in the city.

“They have two options: either follow the example of their colleagues and give up, or die. They have no other option,” said Eduard Basurin, deputy head of the People’s Militia Department of the DPR.

-ABC News’ Yulia Drozd and Tanya Stukalova

Jun 12, 5:33 pm
Zelenskyy sends virtual message to Sean Penn’s CORE benefit

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed the annual Hollywood fundraiser for actor Sean Penn’s nonprofit Community Organized Relief Effort (CORE) Saturday night with a powerful video message urging people to continue to support Ukraine in its war against Russia.

“All of you have heard about the horrors that Ukraine is going through. Tens of thousands of explosions and shots, hundreds of thousands wounded and killed, millions who have lost their homes,” Zelenskyy said in his virtual speech. “All of this is not a logline for a horror film. All of this is our reality.”

Zelenskyy’s video message included footage showing missiles striking homes and apartment complexes in Ukraine, civilians dead in the streets of Ukrainian cities and children playing in parks amid the backdrop of bombed buildings.

Among those attending the CORE fundraiser, held at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angles, were Penn and CORE co-founder Ann Lee, former President Bill Clinton, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, singer John Legend, and actors Patrick Stewart and Sharon Stone.

The group said the event raised more than $2.5 million for CORE’s disaster relief and preparedness work, including its urgent humanitarian response in Ukraine.

Zelenskyy noted that Penn traveled to Ukraine at the start of the Russian invasion and witnessed the atrocities firsthand. He thanked Penn and his group for the continued support for Ukraine.

“We have been resisting it for 107 days in a row,” Zelenskyy said of Russia’s aggression in Ukraine. “We can stop it together. Support Ukraine, because Ukraine is fighting for the whole world, for democracy, for freedom, for life.”

Jun 12, 4:17 pm
Russia’s firepower superiority 10 times that of Ukraine’s in Luhansk: Military chief

Ukraine’s Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Valeriy Zaluzhny said Sunday that he told his American counterpart, Gen. Mark Milley, U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that Russian firepower superiority in the Luhansk region is far greater than that of Ukrainian forces.

Zaluzhny said that during a briefing he told Milley that Russian forces are concentrating their efforts in the north of the Luhansk region, where they are using artillery “en masse” and their firepower superiority is 10 times that of Ukraine’s.

“Despite everything, we keep holding our positions,” Zaluzhny said.

Zaluzhny also said Russia has deployed up to seven battalion tactical groups in Severdonetsk, a city in the Luhansk region. He said Russian shelling of residential areas in Kharkiv in northeast Ukraine has resumed.

Russian forces destroyed a second bridge leading into Severodonetsk and are now targeting a third bridge in an effort to completely cut off the city, Luhansk region Gov. Sergiy Haidai said Sunday. Ukraine’s army still controls around one third of the city, he said.

Haidai said that Ukrainian forces are still holding onto the Azot chemical plant in Severodonetsk, where around 500 civilians are taking shelter.

If Severodonetsk falls, Lysychansk will be the only city in the Luhansk region that remains under Ukraine’s control.

Zaluzhny said that as of Sunday, the front line of the war stretched 1,522 miles and that active combat was taking place on at least 686 miles of the front line.

Zaluzhny said that during his briefing with Milley, he reiterated Ukraine’s urgent request for more 155 mm caliber artillery systems.

Jun 12, 12:48 pm
Russian cruise missile attack confirmed in western Ukraine

Russia claims a cruise missile strike destroyed a large warehouse in western Ukraine storing weapons supplied to the Ukrainians by the United States and European allies.

While police in the Ternopil region of Ukraine, where at least one cruise missile hit, told ABC News that no weapons were destroyed, the region’s governor said part of a military facility was damaged.

Ternopil’s governor Volodymyr Trush posted a video showing widespread damage from what he said were four Russian missiles launched Saturday from the Black Sea. Trush said 22 people were wounded, including a 12-year-old child, in the missile strikes.

In addition to the military facility, Trush said four five-story residential apartment buildings were damaged. One of the missiles hit a gas pipeline, he said.

Russia’s defense ministry said Kalibr high presicion sea-based, long-range missiles struck near Chortkiv in the Ternopil province and destroyed a large warehouse full of anti-tank missile systems, portable anti-aircraft missile systems and artillery shells supplied by the United States and European countries.

Departing plane’s crew acted appropriately in harrowing incident with desperate Afghans: US military

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Multiple military reviews have found a cargo-plane crew acted appropriately and broke no rules in the course of a deadly incident during the chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan last year, the Air Force announced Monday.

On Aug. 16, an Air Force C-17 landed at Kabul’s Hamid Karzai International Airport bringing equipment to assist in the evacuation of civilians when it was swarmed by hundreds of Afghans who had breached the airport perimeter, military officials said.

“Faced with a rapidly deteriorating security situation around the aircraft, the C-17 crew decided to depart the airfield as quickly as possible,” an Air Force statement said a day later.

Harrowing video of the scene showed a large crowd surround the moving aircraft — with some clinging on as it took off and some falling through the air.

Upon landing at Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, human remains were found in the wheel well of the plane. The aircraft was temporarily impounded to give time for it to be inspected and for the remains to be recovered.

Among the dead, local authorities said, was teenage soccer player Zaki Anwari. The General Directorate of Physical Education and Sports said in a statement on Facebook at the time that he had fallen to his death.

“He was kind and patient, but like so many of our young people he saw the arrival of the Taliban as the end of his dreams and sports opportunities,” an agency spokesman told The New York Times then.

On Monday, the Air Force announced that reviews by the staff judge advocate offices of U.S. Central Command and Air Mobility Command had agreed the crew “was in compliance with applicable rules of engagement specific to the event and the overall law of armed conflict.”

The crew’s operational leadership also reviewed the mission and found that it had “acted appropriately and exercised sound judgment” by getting the plane airborne as quickly as possible, given the situation, according to Air Force spokeswoman Ann Stefanek.

“The aircrew’s airmanship and quick thinking ensured the safety of the crew and their aircraft,” she said.

Stefanek also acknowledged the Afghans who died.

“This was a tragic event and our hearts go out to the families of the deceased,” she said.

Inside the Trump-backed effort to take ‘control’ of elections ahead of 2022 and 2024

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(WASHINGTON) — In late April, after a year and a half of former President Donald Trump and his associates pushing false claims of election fraud, a few hundred attendees gathered at a golf resort in Williamsburg, Virginia, for an “Election Integrity Summit” organized by Trump allies who were at the forefront of his effort to overturn the 2020 election.

Inside a ballroom at the Kingsmill Resort, Cleta Mitchell, a longtime conservative lawyer who played a key role in the former president’s efforts to hold onto power, took the microphone and urged summit attendees to recruit and create election “task forces” in their communities ahead of the upcoming midterms to avoid a repeat of the last presidential election.

“Imagine if we had had local task forces in these counties? What if we had citizens like you in 2020, overseeing this?” Mitchell said at the private summit, which ABC News attended by purchasing a ticket.

“We could have stopped it,” Mitchell told the crowd. “That’s why we’re doing what we’re doing here tonight.”

‘Task forces’ around the country

The Virginia event is one of the latest in a blitz of summits being held in swing states across the country, led by Mitchell and organized by the “Election Integrity Network,” a project of the Conservative Partnership Institute, a right-wing nonprofit organization that is spearheaded by Trump’s former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, who is a senior partner, and Mitchell, who serves as a senior fellow.

The series of summits comes after Trump, who continues to spread false claims that the 2020 election was stolen, made donations amounting to $1 million from his political action committee’s war chest to CPI — one of his largest donations in the current election cycle. Despite there being no evidence of widespread voter fraud, many Republican voters say they agree with Trump’s assertions that the election was “stolen” and “rigged” — with 71% of Republicans agreeing with the former president’s claims that he was the rightful winner, according to a recent ABC News/Ipsos poll.

Meadows, amid the Jan. 6 House committee’s ongoing investigation into the Capitol insurrection, has emerged as a key figure who at times acted as a mediator for Trump as he worked to overturn Biden’s win leading up to the Jan. 6 attack. Mitchell made headlines when she was one of the pro-Trump lawyers on the phone call in which the former president demanded of Georgia election officials that they “find” enough votes to reverse Biden’s win, which sparked an ongoing investigation.

Now, months out from the 2022 midterms and with an eye on the 2024 presidential election, the group led by Meadows and Mitchell is working to put in place so-called “election integrity task forces” around the country. Their multi-day summits feature recruiting and training sessions for poll watchers and election officers, as well as panels hosted by Mitchell and others speaking on topics ranging from “The Left’s Plans to Corrupt the 2022 Election” to “Voting Systems and Machines” and “Building the Election Integrity Infrastructure.”

So far this year the group has held half a dozen summits in swing states including Georgia, Michigan, Arizona, Florida, Pennsylvania and Virginia, according to the group’s website. In June the group will host summits in North Carolina and Wisconsin. Tickets start at $30, and influential conservative groups including Heritage Action and Tea Party Patriots Action have already participated in previous summits.

Meadows himself was announced to appear as the keynote speaker for summits in Georgia and Arizona, and was listed to speak on “What Happened in 2020 and What We Must Do to Protect Future Elections in Arizona,” according to a schedule posted by the group online. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis spoke at a Florida summit hosted by CPI earlier this year, according to social media posts.

Neither Meadows nor Mitchell responded to a request for comment from ABC News. Officials with Trump’s Save America PAC also did not respond to a request for comment.

Inside the summit

The Virginia summit attended by ABC News in late April began with a two-hour “Poll Watcher & Election Officer Training Workshop” led by Clara Belle Wheeler from the conservative group Virginia Fair Elections.

“It takes an army,” Wheeler told the group gathered for the first session of the summit, urging attendees to become poll watchers or election officers ahead of the midterms, and then walking attendees through the process of how to register to volunteer.

Wheeler pointed to the 2021 Virginia gubernatorial election, won by Republican candidate Glenn Youngkin, as a proof of concept heading into 2022.

“We made such an impact in the 2021 election that every major news outlet across the country talked about the army of poll watchers in Virginia,” Wheeler said.

Following the training session, attendees were moved into a ballroom to watch the 42-minute film from Citizens United president and close Trump ally David Bossie called “Rigged: The Zuckerberg Funded Plot to Defeat Donald Trump,” which claims that Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg swung the 2020 election through the $419 million he donated to support voter turnout and education efforts. Attendees gave the screening a standing ovation, after which Citizens United’s JT Mastranadi took questions from the crowd.

Gowri Ramachandran, senior counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice, a bipartisan public policy institute, warned that the efforts by CPI to recruit poll workers and election officers could be dangerous given the rhetoric used and the emphasis placed on false claims about the last election.

“It’s not healthy to recruit folks to either be poll workers or poll watchers with such an extreme hostile level of suspicion towards both election workers and their fellow citizens and their fellow voters,” Ramachandran told ABC News. “Especially because there is no reason to think that there was something that needed to be stopped in 2020. That’s a lie that the election was rigged. So telling people that becoming a poll worker or poll watcher is a way to stop something that that didn’t even happen in the past is just not a healthy way to bring people into the process.”

Ramachandran said that while it’s good that people are engaged in the process and have an interest in how elections are run, “it’s not good to, without context, without understanding, have a bunch of people who’ve been fed a diet of lies for the last year and a half about elections, have them go out and do this sort of [work] without context.”

Mitchell moderated multiple panels during the Virginia summit, including one titled, “The Left’s Plans to Corrupt the 2022 Election with Our Tax Dollars and How to Protect the Vulnerable Votes from Leftwing Vote Manipulators.”

According to a schedule obtained by ABC News, the Virginia summit also included panels featuring Tea Party Patriots cofounder Jenny Beth Martin and former Trump adviser Mike Roman, who pushed unsubstantiated claims about voter fraud after the 2020 election.

‘Control the local apparatus’

Beyond its own marketing, the summit series has received broad promotion from pro-Trump channels, including extensive promotion on Trump White House adviser Steve Bannon’s popular “War Room” podcast.

Bannon featured multiple guests from the summits, including Mitchell, in the lead-up to the Virginia summit, which he encouraged viewers to attend.

During a “War Room” appearance days before the Virginia event, Mitchell described the program as “arming people to fight back against the radical left,” saying her goal was to “keep them from stealing it ever again.”

“Are these active workshops where they actually understand how to take over and grab hold of and control the local apparatus in their local elections?” Bannon asked Mitchell.

“Absolutely,” Mitchell said. “That’s absolutely what we’re doing.”

Racial disparities in traffic fatalities wider than previously estimated: Study

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Philadelphia resident Latanya Byrd’s 27-year-old niece Samara Banks and three of Banks’ sons were struck and killed by a speeding driver in 2013. They were crossing Roosevelt Boulevard, a 12-lane road that passes through some of the city’s most diverse and lowest-income neighborhoods.

“It was just so devastating,” Byrd told ABC News. “We lost two generations in one swoop. I mean, just an instant snap of the finger.”

As the local population has swelled, Byrd said outdated transportation infrastructure — grass paths instead of pavements, dangerously short pedestrian signal cycles, overcrowded bus stops, to name a few — can partially explain why this road is one of America’s deadliest.

Byrd’s story exemplifies a larger trend of racial disparities and inequity in traffic fatalities, as reported by the Governors Highway Safety Association and National Highway Traffic Safety Administration last year.

And a new study published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine last week reveals that these disparities may be even wider than initially estimated, especially for “vulnerable” modes of travel such as walking and cycling.

Previous estimates were derived by calculating national traffic fatality counts by race and ethnicity across travel modes, sometimes adjusting for the population of each racial and ethnic group.

“But that assumes that everyone of all races and ethnicities cycle, walk or drive the same number of miles, and that we find is not true,” Matthew Raifman, a Boston University School of Public Health doctoral candidate who co-authored the new study, told ABC News.

Using 2017 national traffic fatality and household travel data, Raifman and co-author Ernani Choma, a research fellow at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, analyzed the travel activity of different racial and ethnic groups by the additional variables of travel mode, distance traveled, time of day and urbanicity.

They found that when examining only car drivers or passengers, the traffic fatality rate per mile traveled was 1.8 times higher for Black Americans than white Americans.

That rate increases to 2.2 times and 4.5 times when considering only pedestrians and cyclists, respectively.

The rates for Hispanic Americans follow similar, though less severe, patterns. Asian Americans had the lowest fatality rates across all modes of travel.

During the nighttime, racial and ethnic disparities in traffic deaths were exacerbated.

Byrd partially attributed these disparities to systemic underinvestment in protected walking and cycling infrastructure in working class neighborhoods, which are disproportionately communities of color — while most road repairs occur elsewhere.

“It can be the same road that’s getting fixed every year, and it’s nowhere near as bad as the roads in the lower-income section of the city,” she said.

The fact that Black and Hispanic Americans die at higher rates due to traffic accidents yet bike and walk fewer miles in aggregate is a problem in itself, Choma told ABC News.

“It might indicate that, for example, Black Americans or Hispanic Americans are less able to cycle, they don’t have access to transportation in that way,” he said. “Maybe it’s less bike lanes. Maybe they don’t even bike because they feel unsafe.”

Raifman said their analysis could also indicate racial inequity in the medical service chain — emergency response times, quality of care, access to health insurance and pre-existing conditions.

“Traffic fatalities don’t necessarily occur at the point of the collision,” he said. “Some people die in a hospital or an emergency room or en route to an emergency room.”

Choma added that without safe access to bike lanes and pedestrian crossings, Black and Hispanic Americans also lose out on the health benefits that come from physical activity, as well as the environmental benefits like reducing air pollution.

Byrd co-founded the advocacy group Families for Safe Streets Greater Philadelphia to confront the “epidemic” of traffic violence. She successfully lobbied for automated speed cameras, which were placed at eight intersections on Roosevelt Boulevard in June 2020.

The U.S. Department of Transportation created the Safe Streets and Roads for All program in May to allocate federal transportation funding to cities and local governments. President Joe Biden also recently signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, providing $550 billion in spending on roads, bridges, transit and more.

With more complete data on specific streets, walking and cycling activity levels, as well as other social costs of traffic crashes, like injuries and property damage, Raifman and Choma said they hope future research will spur local policymakers to address the root of racial disparities in traffic deaths.

“We have these two big challenges. We have structural racism, and we have traffic fatalities, and they’re related. They’re interlinked,” Raifman said. “Instead of just investing in reducing traffic fatalities, why not do it in a way that’s also addressing the systemic, structural racism challenges in our society?”

Hunter Biden’s ex-wife speaks out to ABC News in first TV interview

June 14, 2022 by WDNY Radio

(NEW YORK) — Kathleen Buhle was married to Hunter Biden, the son of President Joe Biden, for over two decades and raised three daughters with him before their divorce five years ago.

Now, Buhle has penned a memoir, If We Break: A Memoir of Marriage, Addiction and Healing, sharing the first glimpse into her experience in their 24-year marriage.

In an exclusive interview with ABC News’ Amy Robach, Buhle opens up what it was like to watch her husband disappear into drug and alcohol addiction.

“I think with addiction especially, there’s so much shame surrounding it that it becomes something that we don’t talk about,” Buhle told Robach in an interview airing Tuesday on Good Morning America.

Tune into Good Morning America on Tuesday, June 14, between 7 and 9 a.m. EST, to watch Amy Robach’s full interview with Kathleen Buhle.

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