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Chris Looney helped dismantle the first nest of Asian giant hornets in the US. Now he’s preparing for the next stepThe eradication of the first nest of Asian giant hornets on US soil somewhat resembled a science fiction depiction of an alien landing site. A crew of government specialists in white, astronaut-like protective suits descended upon the hornet nexus to vanquish it with a futuristic-looking vacuum cleaner, to the relief of onlookers.The nest of the fearsome invasive insects, notoriously known as “murder hornets”, was found in a tree crevice near Blaine, in Washington state, via a tracking device attached to a previously captured worker hornet. The Washington state department of agriculture (WSDA) confirmed the nest had been successfully removed, with dozens of live captives taken back for inspection.“It was cold so they were docile, so between their slowness and the protective gear no one was hurt,” said Chris Looney, a WSDA entomologist who was tasked with vacuuming up the hornets.Wielding a lengthy, toxic stinger, the hornets can cause renal failure and death in people, as dozens of people in Japan have found out to their cost. One entomologist in Canada described the feeling of being stung as like “having hot tacks pushed into my flesh”.They can also squirt venom, as Looney saw first-hand when his lab workbench was sprayed by hornets as they roused themselves following capture. “I was more worried about getting permanent nerve damage in the eye from the squirted venom than being stung,” said Looney, who wore goggles for the capture. “They are pretty intimidating, even for an inch-and-a-half insect. They are big and loud and I know it would hurt very badly if I get stung. They give me the willies.”Murder hornets do not earn their moniker from killing people, however, with honeybees far more likely to be targeted. A honeybee colony can be decimated within a few hours, with the hornets decapitating their victims and feeding severed body parts to their young. This poses a gnawing concern for hobbyist beekeepers and even farmers in the US north-west, where managed honeybees are crucial for the pollination of crops such as blueberries and raspberries.Asian giant hornets were first discovered in North America last year, popping up in British Columbia, Canada, before a handful of specimens made it south of the border to Washington state. The hornets, native to east Asia, most likely arrived on the continent clinging to imported goods sent via sea or air. A close relative of the hornet has already made separate inroads into France and the UK.A key, and unnerving, question is how far they will manage to spread across America. Looney said the removal of the first nest found in the US was just a “small victory” in a battle likely to rage for several years to contain the insects. Thousands of sightings have been reported in Washington, and while many are false or mistaken, Looney said it was likely the hornets had spread, potentially establishing dozens more nests.“It’s hard to say how they will behave here compared to their native range, but the fear is that there are large apiaries of bees that could be sitting ducks, while as the hornets move south to warmer weather their colonies could grow larger,” he said. “The object of our work is to avoid finding this out.”Scientists who have modeled the potential spread of the hornets predict they will be able to extend down the west coast into California. The Rocky Mountains and drier interior of the US pose major barriers to an eastward push but environs on the east coast such as New York would be ideal homes for the murder hornets should they inadvertently be transported there.Looney said he was “troubled” by evidence that overwintering hornet queens like to bury themselves in straw and hay, commodities that are regularly shifted around the US by train or truck. A hornet queen that hitched a ride would still face challenges establishing a nest even if moved to the east coast – it could immediately be crushed underfoot, after all – but the potential pathway is there.“I’m more worried about human transportation of these hornets than I initially was,” Looney conceded.The Asian giant hornet is just the latest invasive species to make its mark on North America. Burmese pythons are now legion in southern Florida, while Asian carp are common in the Mississippi river system. In the insect world, the spotted lanternfly is a growing agricultural pest and emerald ash borers have arrived to lay waste to stands of trees.These arrivals are symptoms of the growth in international trade and tourism, while climate change is making many parts of the US more hospitable for certain invasive species. The Asian giant hornet, for example, is thought to favor the sort of elevated temperatures that the US is experiencing as the planet heats up. This could help it spread at the rate of its cousin species in France, which has been able to advance up to 78km a year. If it is not controlled, the murder hornet could fundamentally change ecosystems across the US.Still, even in a fraught year racked by a pandemic, social unrest and economic disaster, Looney said any fears of being assailed by a murder hornet should be “low on the anxiety meter”.He added: “We should be concerned about it but we will do our best until the money runs out or the battle is won or lost. If we fail, it will be unpleasant. But there are other things to be much more worried about right now.”

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Texans have already cast more ballots in the presidential election than they did during all of 2016 — an unprecedented surge of early voting in a state that was once the country's most reliably Republican, but may now be drifting toward battleground status.

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A Democratic congressman told Hunter Biden’s former business associate, Tony Bobulinski, that he will defend him from attacks calling Bobulinski a "partisan hack" over his decision to go public with claims about the Biden family's foreign business dealings.Democratic Representative Ro Khanna sent an email to Bobulinski, who has donated to Khanna in the past, wishing him well and saying he vouched for him that he has "never been a ‘partisan hack’ in our interactions and have talked about putting country over party," Fox News reported.“Tony, hope you are doing okay. I did give an on the record statement to The NY Times that I know you, you have always acted honorably with me, and you and other family members supported me,” Khanna wrote in his message. “I have told any media outlets that have asked the same thing.”The California Democrat said that he “refused to comment on the details of your allegations because I don’t have personal knowledge about that, but have said I respect your service to our country and that you have never been a ‘partisan hack’ in our interactions and have talked about putting country over party.”In a Fox News interview that was aired Tuesday, Bobulinksi accused Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden of “lying” about whether he was directly involved in his son’s foreign business dealings.The former U.S. Navy lieutenant and corporate investor was the former CEO of SinoHawk Holdings, which he said was a partnership between the CEFC China Energy conglomerate and the Biden family. He was the recipient of a May 13, 2017 email that discussed a plan to have 10 percent in their related joint venture, Oneida Holdings, “held by H for the big guy?” The “big guy” was Joe Biden, and “H” was Hunter, Bobulinski confirmed.Bobulinski said he had several meetings with the former vice president, one on May 2, 2017, according to text messages about the meeting.Bobulinski said he decided to go public with documents and information on the Bidens after Democratic congressman Adam Schiff said on television that this “smear” of Biden “comes from the Kremlin,” a claim Bobulinski called "absolutely disgusting."“I also have made it clear that I do not think you are a Russian agent,” Khanna added in his email to Bobulinski. “I will continue to make that statement to any media that asks.”“I remain appreciative for your past support and your requesting your family members to support,” Khanna said. “After the heat of the election, if you want to, I am happy to chat.”Bobulinski also said he was warned by former partner Rob Walker that going public with his claims against the Bidens would “bury all of us.”“Throughout 2015 and 2016 while Joe was still the sitting vice president of the United States, these guys had been doing extensive work around the world,” Bobulinski said in the Fox News interview, adding that “the only qualification they had was the Biden name.”

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The night of Oct. 12 was like any other for former beauty queen Leanza Cornett, according to her roommate, Sue Roberts.

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Video of debate where Democrat Jon Ossoff calls Republican incumbent a ‘crook’ has been viewed more than 11m times on Twitter

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Tens of thousands of Muslims marched in Bangladesh’s capital on Friday to protest the French president's support of secular laws allowing caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, burning effigies of him and calling for a boycott of French products. Protests were also reported across the country after Friday's weekly Muslim prayers. In Dhaka, tens of thousands of people from more than a dozen Islamist parties and groups poured into the streets near the Baitul Mokarram national mosque demanding that Bangladesh sever relations with France.

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The election on the island follows the historic protests following the scandal that led to Gov. Ricardo Rosselló's resignation.

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The footage from body-worn cameras that was taken as police responded to a call about Walter Wallace Jr. shows him emerging from a house with a knife as relatives shout at officers about his mental health condition, a lawyer for the man's family said Thursday.

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The training manual quotes from Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf, calling for the "perpetually constant and regular employment of violence."

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A new tropical depression has formed in the Caribbean, putting the 2020 hurricane season within reach of breaking a slew of meteorological records.

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Just two days ago Trump rally left many supporters hospitalised due to freezing cold

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First Read is your briefing from "Meet the Press" and the NBC Political Unit on the day's most important political stories and why they matter.

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Joe Biden is in Michigan while Donald Trump arrives in Pennsylvania, both key to the White House race.

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Just ahead of the election, the US is seeing what could be the largest outbreak of the pandemic so far.

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Former prisoner Davion Hampton from Florida wants to vote in this US election. But he can't.

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Chenren and Cathy Shao haven't let political differences get in the way of their eight-year marriage.

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For some Americans, civil unrest after police shootings is driving their support for Donald Trump.

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Millions of Christians worldwide will unite on Sunday, Nov. 1 to join the global Body of Christ for the 2020 International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted (IDOP).

from CBNNews.com https://ift.tt/2TFVbhN Worldwide Mark International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church

Millions of Christians worldwide will unite on Sunday, Nov. 1 to join the global Body of Christ for the 2020 International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted (IDOP).

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Joe Biden has been vague about his plans for the military if he wins the election, but one specific promise he has made is to roll back the Trump administration policy that effectively bars transgender service members from serving openly in accord with their gender identity.

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Amid rising crime rates, a polarizing election and the continued high-profile police killings of Black Americans, some police veterans say they can't recall a tougher time to be an officer.

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The U.S. Justice Department on Friday urged a federal judge to swiftly reject a last-minute bid by two Massachusetts men to avoid being extradited to Japan to face charges that they helped former Nissan Motor Co Ltd Chairman Carlos Ghosn flee the country. The department in a court filing said Japanese agents are slated to come to the United States in the "coming days" to transport U.S. Army Special Forces veteran Michael Taylor and his son, Peter Taylor, back to Japan. The U.S. State Department informed their lawyers on Wednesday it had approved turning them over.

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The mother of the Black man who was fatally shot by a suburban Chicago police officer has filed a federal lawsuit accusing law enforcement of letting him bleed to death in the eight minutes it for took an ambulance to arrive. The lawsuit was filed Thursday by Zharvellis Holmes, the mother of 19-year-old Marcellis Stinnette, who was shot to death Oct. 20 by a Waukegan police officer. Tafara Williams, the 20-year-old Black woman who was with Stinnette when he was killed and who was also shot and wounded, filed a similar lawsuit on Wednesday.

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The blue wave is coming - if you believe the polls

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Almost a year after an internal review cleared several officers of any wrongdoing during the arrest of a Black paraplegic man who was dragged out of a patrol car, a police civilian oversight board has condemned the actions of five Miami police officers who took Trayon Fussell-Dumas into custody during a traffic stop.

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The flu shot is effective for about six months. You should get it in October so it lasts through March and covers you through flu season.

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Two members of a white supremacist group were arrested Thursday and accused of intimidating a Michigan family, authorities said.

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आईपीएल के मौजूदा सीजन की शुरुआत में नाकाम रहने के बाद किंग्स इलेवन पंजाब ने लगातार 5 जीत दर्ज की थी, लेकिन राजस्थान रॉयल्स ने पंजाब के इस विजयी रख पर रोक लगा दी.

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Non-essential shops will close until mid-December to help curb the highest infection rate in Europe.

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Every 30 seconds, a Latino in the US turns 18 and becomes eligible to vote.

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Berlin's new airport is finally opening to the public, 10 years behind schedule and billions over budget.

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Could this zombie-inspired experience be for people who want to be frightened but be Covid-19 safe?

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A body camera worn by a suburban Chicago police officer who shot a Black couple in their car was only turned on moments after the shooting, a fact that the lawyers representing the woman say suggests an attempt to cover up what had happened even before he fired.

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Rodrigo Cruz, 22, was the driver of the minivan involved in the two deaths, the Las Vegas police said.

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Vermont Secretary of State Jim Condos called out Kavanaugh's "erroneous claim" and called for a public correction

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One of Thailand’s most popular anti-establishment politicians has been charged for his role in an illegal flash mob protest last year, in a move that is likely to fuel the current wave of pro-democracy protests. Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, 41, a charismatic billionaire and founder of the dissolved Future Forward party, is accused of five public assembly violations linked to the rally in Bangkok's central shopping district last December, Krisadung Nutcharat, his lawyer, said on Thursday. The charges include failing to notify police of a public gathering, blocking a sky train station, using a megaphone without permission and holding a rally close to a royal residence. Four other people from his Progressive Movement Group and Move Forward Party face similar charges. All five deny any wrongdoing. Mr Thanathorn has been an outspoken advocate of the protest movement that has gripped the Thai capital, Bangkok, since June, and he recently condemned a short-lived emergency order aimed at keeping demonstrators off the streets. During last year’s elections, he and his pro-democracy Future Forward Party, proved to be enormously popular with young, first-time voters, and garnered the third-largest share of seats.

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French President Emmanuel Macron declared Thursday that France is "under attack," hours after an Islamic terrorist wielding a knife decapitated a woman and killed two other people at a church in southern France.The attack occurred near the Basilica of Notre-Dame in Nice, a city on France’s southern coast. Two women and a man were killed. At least two of the three victims, including the woman who was reportedly decapitated, were inside the church.“It’s very clear that it is France that is under attack,” Macron said during an address outside the basilica where the attack occurred, calling the incident an "Islamist terrorist attack.”“France will not give up on our values," the French president said.Shortly after the attack, Macron boosted security around the country, increasing the number of soldiers at schools and places of worship from 3,000 to 7,000 troops.The French president also participated in a crisis meeting at the Interior Ministry on Thursday before traveling to Nice in the wake of the attack, which put France on its highest level of alert.Mayor Christian Estrosi said that the suspected knife attacker was shot by police while being detained and was taken to the hospital alive.The “terrorist” shouted “Allahu akbar,” which is Arabic for “God is great,” as police arrested him, the mayor said, adding that, “the meaning of his gesture left no doubt.”The incident was one of three attacks against France on Thursday. A Saudi man was arrested after he attacked a guard with a sharp tool at the French consulate in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, according to Saudi state media. The guard was hospitalized and suffered minor injuries. Meanwhile, an individual in the French city of Avignon wielded a knife and threatened people passing by while shouting “Allahu akbar” until police fatally shot the suspect.Earlier this month, Samuel Paty, a 47-year-old history teacher, was beheaded in a Paris suburb by an 18-year-old Moscow-born Chechen immigrant who was angered by Paty showing caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad to his class.After Paty was killed, Macron vowed to crack down on Islamic extremism in France, promising that “the fear is now going to change sides,” and that “the Islamists cannot be allowed to sleep peacefully in our country.”

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Rittenhouse, charged in Wisconsin with first-degree homicide over the shooting of three people at Kenosha protests, had been fighting his extradition.

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OPINION: James is fashioning himself as a moderate who believes in bipartisanship. The problem is when it comes to the party of Trump, you can’t play it both sides. John James is a Black man who has a shot at becoming the next U.S. Senator from the great state of Michigan.

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The footage from body-worn cameras that was taken as police responded to a call about Walter Wallace Jr. shows him emerging from a house with a knife as relatives shout at officers about his mental health condition, a lawyer for the man's family said Thursday.

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A man was trapped in a hole teeming with rats for half an hour after a New York City pavement collapsed from under him last Saturday. Leonard Shoulders dropped almost 15 feet into the sinkhole and was unable to cry for help out of fear the rats would get in his mouth. “Rats crawling on him. He can’t move. He just… it was so bad,” the victim’s brother Greg White told NBC News. “He didn’t wanna yell ’cause he was afraid there was gonna be rats going inside his mouth.” Mr Shoulders plunged more than 12 feet into the vault, breaking his arm and leg, when the ground gave way beneath him while he waited for a bus in the Bronx. “He went down feet first," Mr White added. “He was just standing and the sidewalk just — It was like a suction. Like a sinkhole. He just went down."

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‘UPS will always focus first on our customers, and will never stop working to solve issues and make things right’

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'Maybe he’s working for the Chinese,' former mayor baselessly claims

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U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Friday said that any new coronavirus aid package should be considered in early 2021, possibly closing the door to such legislation shortly following the Nov. 3 elections. In an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, McConnell said, "I think that will be something we’ll need to do right at the beginning of the year, targeted particularly at small businesses that are struggling and hospitals that are now dealing with a second wave of the coronavirus." McConnell, who has resisted considering a comprehensive aid package being sought by Democrats, added, "We probably need to do another package," but said it would have to be "more modest" than the $3-trillion measure the House of Representatives passed in mid-May.

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The 2020 presidential election again highlights one of the most confusing and controversial parts of the U.S. elections: The Electoral College.

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The Supreme Court needs to state again that a child cannot be sentenced to life without parole unless a trial court determines that child is beyond rehabilitation.

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Azerbaijan on Thursday launched its heaviest missile strikes in a month of fighting on the largest city in its Armenian-populated breakaway region of Nagorno-Karabakh, separatist officials said.

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The Trump administration plans to use proceeds from the sale of fuel confiscated from Iranian tankers to benefit victims of terrorism, officials announced Thursday. The U.S. government in August seized 1.1 million barrels of fuel from four Iranian tankers that were en route to Venezuela. The fuel has since been sold, and officials say the proceeds will go to a special fund for victims of state-sponsored terrorism.

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A worsening pandemic and fears about losing their protections as civil servants amid political chaos is leading many intelligence officers in the U.S. government to consider leaving their agencies, according to current and former intelligence officers who spoke to Yahoo News.

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The former U.S. attorney general spoke to The 19th about voter suppression, redistricting and the importance of Breonna Taylor’s case.

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Two alleged members of the white supremacist group The Base were arrested Thursday morning in connection with a harassment campaign against a Michigan family.According to the state attorney general, the two men, Justen Watkins, 25, and Alfred Gorman, 35, mistakenly believed the family home belonged to a left-leaning podcast host. The duo allegedly took pictures outside the house dressed in Nazi gear late last year, and posted pictures to the internet with captions threatening Daniel Harper, the host of the anti-fascist podcast “I Don’t Speak German.” The men are charged with gang membership, unlawful posting of a message, and using computers to commit a crime after what was described as a joint operation between state police and the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It comes three weeks after the FBI’s high-profile bust of members of an unrelated, Boogaloo-infused Michigan paramilitary group who are charged with plotting to kidnap Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.An affidavit by Michigan State Police Detective Sergeant Sherry Workman shows that the arrests arose from a “domestic terrorism investigation” conducted alongside the FBI. “The Base” is a rough English translation of “al-Qaeda,” whether intentional or otherwise; the terror groups share no other links.Sutton Roach, an FBI spokesperson, confirmed that the bureau executed arrest warrants Thursday morning on Watkins and Gorman but declined further comment.Harper, the podcaster The Base attempted to target, told The Daily Beast the arrests were a long time coming.“Given the flurry of federal activity around the Base and various related groups between mid-2019 and spring 2020, I assumed that there was either an ongoing investigation or that they had hit a dead end,” he said.Harper, who tracks far-right groups like the Base, said that, as months passed, he guessed authorities might have been sidetracked by other fringe movements. “There was also the possibility that they had gotten distracted by the ongoing pandemic and/or the boogaloo boys,” he said.It was unclear whether investigators were unable to find violations of federal law, as the two Base leaders were charged only with Michigan violations. The affidavit does not accuse Watkins or Gorman of outright acts of violence.According to the police affidavit, sometime after mistakenly stalking a Dexter, Mich. home believed to belong to antifascist podcaster Harper, Watkins boasted on the Base’s Telegram channel that he was ready to commit lurid violence against what he described as a Jew-run America. He allegedly ran what the affidavit calls a “hate camp” in Bad Axe, Mich. where he instructed Base members in “tactical and firearms training” that the fascist organization turned into propaganda and recruitment videos."I will train with firearms, explosives, knives, Ryder trucks, and anything else I have to destroy this KIKE SYSTEM THAT IS GENOCIDING MY people," Watkins allegedly wrote in early 2020, in what the affidavit describes as a manifesto posted to Telegram. That manifesto allegedly ended: "To victory with PURE UNADULTERATED ARYANVIOLENCE! HAIL TERROGRAM!"The affidavit does not indicate how long the Michigan police and the FBI have been investigating the December 2019 incident. But the local sheriff’s office has been aware of it since the residents of the house, Richard and Dawn Shea, reported the tactically-geared men on their porch taking pictures.The Base encourages terror tactics against its enemies, and often incorporates those people into its propaganda, as members allegedly did with Harper and the pictures of the house.The affidavit suggests a recent leadership change in The Base, which was founded by Rinaldo Nazarro, a former military contractor who was first identified by The Guardian early this year. Following his identification by the Guardian, Nazarro passed on leadership to Watkins, the latter man claimed, according to the arrest affidavit.“In early 2020, several members of The Base were arrested across the United States for criminal activities relating to their involvement in The Base,” it continues. “Following the highly public arrests, and ‘doxxing’ (publishing private identifying information about an individual on the internet) of The Base's founder and then leader, Watkins announced that the former leader had appointed Watkins as the new leader of The Base.”The arrests alluded to in the affidavit include the bust of multiple Base members for allegedly planning a mass shooting at a pro-gun rally in Richmond, Virginia, this year, and for allegedly plotting an attack on an anti-fascist couple in Georgia. Three of the arrested members, including one who was on the lam from Canada, allegedly hoped the attack on the gun rally would be part of a plot to overthrow the government and establish a white ethnostate, according to an arrest affidavit in that case.FBI Director Christopher Wray testified last month that white supremacist terrorism comprised the “biggest chunk” of domestic terrorism currently menacing America. He also revealed that the FBI had more than 1,000 domestic-terrorism investigations open; 107 people were arrested as the result of those investigations in 2019.But the bureau has also drawn substantial criticism for opacity surrounding its domestic counterterrorism efforts, particularly while the Trump administration misleadingly portrays an equal or greater terror threat from antifascist and Black-liberation activists. The Daily Beast reported on Monday that the bureau is sitting on a legally-required public accounting of white-supremacist and other domestic terrorism, as well as government efforts to combat it.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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SpaceX’s second astronaut flight is off until mid-November because red lacquer dripped into tiny vent holes in two rocket engines that now must be replaced. SpaceX and NASA officials announced the discovery of the potentially damaging contamination Wednesday. The clogged holes were found after the aborted launch of a GPS satellite on Oct. 2.

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The city of Miami Beach is “concerned” about a string of new coronavirus cases in its workforce, mainly among police and fire-rescue personnel.

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The airline's boss Scott Kirby tells the BBC passenger testing is "key to reopening the world economy".

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Three people from around the world who lost their jobs during the pandemic explain how it has affected their lives.

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Village People's lead singer says he doesn't endorse the US president, who regularly plays the classic at rallies.

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A video shows the train derailing in front of drivers on a Texas highway.

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Guns and ammo will no longer be on display at Walmart but still be available for purchase upon request in stores where they are sold.

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It’s no secret that Sen. Lindsey Graham is in the fight of his political life in the closing days of his campaign to win reelection to the U.S. Senate.“I’m getting overwhelmed,” Graham begged on-air with Fox News’ Sean Hannity last month, as his Democratic rival Jaime Harrison brought in a record-shattering $57 million in donations to unseat him. “Help me—they’re killing me money-wise. Help me.”But with ersatz ally President Donald Trump nowhere to be seen, a group that once despised Graham—and whose most prominent members have spent months propping up bizarre conspiracy theories, posting wildly racist content on social media, and undermining confidence public health guidelines in the midst of the pandemic—are coming to the rescue.The question is, does Graham want their help?“This is not a time for us to be squabbling over differences of opinion,” Pressley Stutts, chair of the Greenville Tea Party, said at an event on Wednesday afternoon, before introducing nearly a dozen grassroots conservative leaders “to stand tall” with Graham.“Sen. Graham is in the race of his life,” said Stutts, introducing conservative activists who lambasted Harrison—or “Harris,” as several of them called him—for being a “Marxist-Leninist” who would impose socialism on South Carolina.Sam Manley, a conservative podcaster, put the stakes of the race directly: “If you ever vote your way into socialism, you’ll have to shoot your way out.”This ringing endorsement for Graham’s re-election—which included Michael LaPierre, who tried to primary Graham this year—amounts to a cease-fire between the Palmetto State’s most well-known elected official and a coterie of some of his most dedicated trolls. During the Tea Party wave in 2010, Graham—once seen as one of the most mainstream members of the Republican Party—became one of the movement’s most loathed “RINOs,” or Republicans In Name Only. Leaders of the state’s Tea Party chapters attempted to recruit then-Gov. Mark Sanford to primary Graham after he voted to confirm Justice Elena Kagan to the Supreme Court, and one speaker at a Greenville Tea Party rally that year made accused Graham of “trying to sell out your own countrymen” to avoid being outed.For his part, Graham once relished his battles with the state’s most conservative activists, calling the inter-party skirmishes “more fun than any time I’ve been in politics,” but with polls showing Graham in a statistical dead heat with Harrison, the senator is scrambling to resolve those well-documented problems with voters who have largely moved from the Tea Party to Team MAGA—even though the group’s brand of politics couldn’t be less in sync with Graham’s own.Stutts, the group’s chair, is a longtime critic of vaccinations, and has publicly discouraged people from wearing face masks during the coronavirus pandemic and spread the conspiracy theory that billionaire Bill Gates is working to reduce the human population.Why Hasn’t Trump Come to Lindsey Graham’s Rescue?Stutts has even claimed in an April interview that a potential vaccine for COVID-19 could possibly “contain a microchip” for the government to track its citizens.“Even if it doesn’t contain a microchip, I could foresee the day, because right now you have to show your ID or your passport and here in South Carolina, we have to get that real ID just to fly commercially,” Stutts said on a conservative YouTube vlog at the time. “And I can see the point where they're going to say, okay, show me your vaccination papers next.”At one Greenville Tea Party event in 2018, Stutts even hosted a talk with Jennifer Smith, who described herself as a “naturopath,” who referenced the baseless theory that vaccines cause autism and said that she did not get her newborn son vaccinated for Hepatitus B because he was “not a promiscuous homosexual” or an IV drug user.Among the group’s other featured speakers at recent events include John Guandolo, the leader of a Dallas-based anti-Muslim group who was forced last year to pay $600,000 in a civil lawsuit for assaulting a county sheriff after the man confronted him about passing around hate literature at a meeting of the National Sheriffs’ Association.The group has also held protests against social distancing rules in South Carolina, which Graham has said are critical to stopping the spread of the virus, despite rising rates of infection in the state.“Tired of putting up with an onerous and inept government?” the group posted on Facebook in September. “Join us September 15th and let your voice be heard, too. Our legislators need to know that we've had enough! Show up. Stand up. Speak up! It's your family that has been negatively affected… ThugArmy mount up!!”Greenville Tea Party members and business partners have made even more extreme claims. Dan Harvell, a taxpayer advocate who spoke at Wednesday’s event and said that he was supporting Graham for the sake of “the traditional American values that we will have for our children,” has posted memes claiming that Sen. Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee for vice president, slept her way to becoming San Francisco’s district attorney, and has called former first lady Michelle Obama a “race-baiter.”The Graham campaign did not respond to a request for comment about whether he disavowed the support of the Greenville Tea Party and its members, and neither did the group. But state Democrats called the dynamic of Graham playing along with a group he once despised the latest in a long arc of allowances the senator has made under Trump.“This is yet another demonstration of the extreme lengths Sen. Graham is going to in order to save his flailing campaign,” said Manuel Bonder, coordinated campaign spokesperson for the South Carolina Democratic Party. “Instead of scrambling to consolidate his support amongst fringe conspiracy theorists who know he is a hypocrite, Sen. Graham should focus on leading South Carolina through this crisis and delivering the relief working families and businesses desperately need.”Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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The former president was ousted earlier this year and now hints he was victim of political retribution.

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Two anonymous grand jurors say more Louisville police officers should face criminal charges in Breonna Taylor's death.

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Democratic senators should have refused to participate in the absurdly rushed effort to pack Amy Coney Barrett on to the Supreme Court in the midst of the election, instead of giving Republicans’ partisan power play the veneer of legitimacy.But that ship has sailed and now, with Justice Barrett officially on the court, a new potential challenge to the Constitution looms as the GOP is banking on its newly super-packed Supreme Court majority to reinstall Trump in the White House if he stands to suffer a narrow loss in one or more swing states.Now voters, and Joe Biden, may have to decide whether to accept an effort by the Supreme Court to decide who will sit in the White House in 2021 by preventing all duly cast ballots from being counted. Trump’s second Supreme Court appointee, Brett Kavanaugh, openly threatened to do just that on Monday, even as Trump’s last minute addition to the court, Amy Coney Barrett, headlined another White House superspreader event to celebrate her mid-election installation and provide Trump with campaign propaganda in the process.We’ve been here before—just ask Al Gore. Joe Biden and his Democratic Party must make clear, now, that they will not let the court’s conservatives steal a second presidential election for the Republican Party. Voters should make it crystal clear that the nation will not accept a second attempt to undermine the electoral process, and with it our democracy.On Dec. 8, 2000, the Supreme Court’s then five-justice right-wing majority directed Florida to stop a state-wide recount of certain ballots ordered by the Florida Supreme Court in the face of the razor-thin outcome of that state’s vote in the presidential election voting, which was to be determinative of the outcome in the Electoral College. On Dec. 12, the same right-wing majority issued a decision effectively handing the election to George W. Bush by effectively barring the completion of the recount, thereby preventing the nation from learning which candidate had actually received the most votes.The reasoning of the majority in Bush v. Gore was so embarrassingly flimsy, and transparently partisan, that the opinion openly cautioned lower courts to avoid relying upon it in future cases. This, they said, was a one-off.Many questioned why Al Gore accepted—and urged voters to go along with—the literally anti-democratic outcome decreed by the court. Yet, by the time the justices had taken it upon themselves to hand the presidency to their favored candidate it was too late; by having chosen to participate in the Supreme Court litigation, Gore had conceded that the five right wing justices had the power to decide the election, even if it meant preventing all of the votes from being counted.In fact, Gore’s decision to actively participate in the Supreme Court challenge to the counting of votes in Florida had been reasonable, under the circumstances. At the time, few could have anticipated that a majority of the Supreme Court’s justices, whatever their political preferences, would ultimately choose to use their unelected positions to undermine democracy so brazenly, and thereby risk undermining the legitimacy of the court itself in the process. But, having gotten away with their audacious gambit in 2000, undermining elections and suppressing votes has since become ever more integral to the GOP playbook for retaining power as the party’s voter base ages and shrinks.Indeed, the packed Supreme Court, and lower federal appellate courts, have proven to be key to that strategy, including in recent weeks as they have ruled in favor of GOP vote-suppression strategies with ever greater frequency.Thus, unlike in 2000, if the Supreme Court gets a hold of a contested election, there is little doubt what it will do. There is now every sign that the GOP is planning for a Bush v. Gore sequel with a starring role for Justice Amy Coney Barrett, whom Trump has openly entreated to stand ready to intervene on his behalf.Indeed, four of the five members of the court’s pre-Barrett five-member reactionary majority have already more than hinted that they are poised to do just that. Last week, the court came one vote short of imposing an emergency stay upon a Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling upholding the right of voters to have ballots postmarked by election day, but received by Nov. 6, counted. The Pennsylvania state court decision was grounded in the Pennsylvania state constitution, and it is well-established that a state’s highest court—not the U.S. Supreme Court—is the last word on interpreting that state’s constitution and laws.The background for the decision is a novel, and frankly absurd, argument being advanced by the GOP (and vaguely adverted to by Justice Rehnquist in an opinion in Bush v. Gore that was adopted by only three justices) that, because the U.S. Constitution states that state “Legislature[s]” determine “Times, Places, and Manner” of federal elections, state courts are implicitly barred from interpreting state constitutions in ways that vary from the literal meaning of those laws, including to favor voter access to the polls. Conservatives claim to favor interpreting the Constitution in conformity with its original understanding, and there is no reason to believe that the Framers meant to cut state courts out of the business of interpreting state election laws by using the term “legislature” in this way.The Supreme Court’s 4-4 vote against a stay of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision was not accompanied by an explanation. Nonetheless, simply by means of their votes, four members of the court appear to have signaled their sympathy to the GOP argument, and while the court denied an emergency stay, it remains free to take up the case again. Indeed, their separate concurrences in a decision issued on Monday night voiding an extension on the time to receive mail ballots in Wisconsin, Justices Kavanaugh and Gorsuch expressly adopted this radical theory, with Kavanaugh stating that “a state court may not depart from the state election code enacted by the legislature.”Furthermore, there is every reason to expect that newly minted Justice Barrett is poised to join the four other most right-wing justices’ position, potentially by ordering Pennsylvania not to count absentee ballots received after election day (which are highly likely to favor Biden), even though doing so will violate the state’s constitution. Indeed, in anticipation of the new justice favoring its position, the GOP has already filed a new set of papers asking the court to take up the merits of the Pennsylvania case before election day.Those hoping for a resuscitation of the challenge to the Pennsylvania court decision had reason to be heartened by Monday night’s Supreme Court ruling, which rejected a trial court order requiring Wisconsin to count ballots mailed by election day, but received within six days thereafter. In his opinion justifying the Supreme Court’s action, Kavanaugh adopted Trump’s mendacious rhetoric about the purportedly inherently suspicious nature of mail ballots, referring to the “chaos and suspicions of impropriety that can ensue if thousands of absentee ballots flow in after election day and potentially flip the results of an election.” Yet, as Justice Kagan stated in dissent, “there are no results to ‘flip’ until all valid votes are counted”, and there is nothing “chaotic” or “suspicious” about counting all ballots executed and mailed before election day.The possible revisiting of the Pennsylvania case, which has implications for the potential counting of late-received ballots in other states, is only one of several gambits the GOP might attempt to reinstall Trump before a ready and waiting, right-wing Supreme Court majority, if the opportunity presents itself.So then what can the majority of the voting public, the majority of which is almost certain (once again) to vote against Trump, do to prevent another such blatant undermining of democracy? Some of the potentially necessary steps are obvious, and untroubling; others may be more difficult to accept, but could nonetheless prove essential to the preservation of the nation’s democracy.First, and most importantly, Democratic voters need to vote in sufficient numbers not only to win, but to win decisively, in swing states. The millions of dollars that the GOP has been spending in pre-election vote suppression litigation has not only been focused on winning the election for Trump, which appears to be highly unlikely in states like Pennsylvania and Wisconsin at this point, given Trump’s position in the polls, but also to keep the margins of a Biden win as tight as possible. This is because it will only be possible for the GOP to move the election into the courts if, as in 2000, the vote count is very close in one or more states that can determine the outcome in the Electoral College.Accordingly, as Greg Sargent has observed, the GOP hopes of undermining democracy in the courts “could end with a relative whimper” if the vote count, particularly the early reported count, is decisively in Biden’s favor—a result that appears to be increasingly likely (albeit not certain).Second, people must be prepared to take to the streets to make clear that another judicial attempt to undermine democracy will simply not be accepted by the majority of the nation’s citizens.It is possible that, after election day, we have a contest that Biden on the road to winning once all the votes are counted, including those cast by mail but not yet counted in a state like Pennsylvania. Under those circumstances, the GOP may make their play for a Supreme Court intervention, in the form of a preemptive stay that threatens to void all or part of the vote count, like the stay Bush obtained in 2000.In the face of such GOP entreaties to the court, citizens will need to take to the streets in massive numbers to demand that every vote be counted, and make clear that a repeat of the judicial intervention to thwart democracy will neither be tolerated nor accepted.If the court receives a strong message that another attempt to install an unelected president in office not only stands unaccepted by the majority of citizens, but also that the court’s legitimacy and authority could be heavily damaged in the process, some members of the court’s reactionary majority may choose to step back from the brink and refuse to intervene in a presidential election again.Finally, if the court’s majority does make the reckless choice to take up a GOP attempt to undermine the vote count, Joe Biden will have a potentially momentous decision to make: whether to accept the court’s authority to do so. He should not.If the court takes up a GOP challenge to counting potentially decisive votes after the election in a swing state, Biden should refuse to participate in the litigation, thereby definitively challenging the authority and the legitimacy of the court in taking it upon itself to select the president.Critics may argue that, by taking such a dramatic step, Biden could lose his chance of prevailing before the Supreme Court.Yet, unlike in 2000, if the court accepts a case that could end up determining the outcome of the election, there is little basis for doubt regarding the likely outcome. If five or six of the court’s right-wing justices choose to cause the court to intervene, they will almost certainly ultimately also vote in favor of reinstalling Trump, no matter how tenuous the legal rationale that may be required to reach that result. Accordingly, Biden will not be foregoing much of anything by refusing to participate.Others will argue that a choice by Biden to directly challenge the Supreme Court’s authority will instigate a constitutional crisis. Yet that gets the situation backwards; it is the GOP and the Supreme Court’s reactionary justices that have brought the nation to the brink of such a crisis, and it will take the nation over the edge if they attempt to install yet another president who may not have won the election.Therefore, a decision by Biden not to accept a Supreme Court intervention to frustrate the counting of citizens’ votes would not undermine the constitutional order. To the contrary, it would avoid placing an unearned veneer of legitimacy upon an improper challenge to democracy, thus avoiding a repeat of Democratic senators’ erroneous decision to participate in the Coney Barrett confirmation hearings, which gave that court-packing exercise an equally undeserved appearance of regularity.Indeed, defying the Supreme Court’s gerrymandered right-wing majority, and refusing to recognize its authority to reinstall Trump, could ultimately prove to be the only means of preserving our democracy.Read more at The Daily Beast.Get our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.

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SpaceX's Crew-1 launch is now set for November 14 after the company checked tiny holes in its rocket engines for bright-red lacquer.

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President hurried Arizona Senator Martha McSally before calling up three politicians from other states - plus Nigel Farage - to address the crowd

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