TV News LIES

Six transgender Idahoans filed a federal lawsuit on Wednesday challenging the state’s new bathroom law, which civil rights experts say is the most restrictive in the nation.

The law, which is set to go into effect in July, carries criminal penalties for people if they enter a bathroom or locker room that does not align with their sex assigned at birth in both government-owned buildings and private businesses.

Anyone who “knowingly” enters such a bathroom could face a year in jail for a misdemeanor first offense, or up to five years in prison for a felony second offense.

Idaho’s bathroom law is the “most punitive and broadest sweeping law in the country,” said Paul Carlos Southwick, the legal director for the ACLU of Idaho. So far, it is the only state to criminalize transgender people’s bathroom usage in private businesses.

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Democrats are coalescing around progressive political outsider Graham Platner and his bid to oust incumbent Republican Sen. Susan Collins in Maine after primary rival Gov. Janet Mills ended her struggling bid Thursday.

Mills, who is term limited as governor, jumped into the race late last year as one of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D-N.Y.) top recruits, but she had trouble gaining traction in polls and fundraising while Platner surged ahead — despite various controversies around his campaign. She ended her bid Thursday in a statement without endorsing Platner.

But Schumer and the Democrats’ Senate campaign arm got behind Platner as Mills exited the ring, joining progressive Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and nearly two dozen state legislators who were expected to endorse on Thursday. The winnowed field adds to Democrats’ bullishness about what’s expected to be one of the closest Senate races in the country this fall.

“The base couldn’t have spoken more clearly,” Democratic strategist Christy Setzer said.

“Candidates and electeds who act like we’re living in normal times won’t fare well,” Setzer added. “We’re not interested in so-called establishment candidates who are bringing a butter knife to that fight.”

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Congress finally ended the historic Department of Homeland Security shutdown, resolving the longest crisis of its kind in American history.

In an abrupt afternoon voice vote on Thursday, April 30, the House of Representatives passed a funding bill for the agency with seemingly unanimous support, sending it to President Donald Trump's desk.

The vote resolved a political showdown that has plagued Capitol Hill and the country for about 75 days. The ordeal, which exposed fierce acrimony between House and Senate Republicans, left thousands of workers without pay, upended air travel and jeopardized Americans' safety. After the White House unilaterally shifted money to pay the agency's workers, it also likely wrought longer-term implications for Congress' authority over federal spending.

A military entourage for King Charles and Queen Camilla's visit April 30 to Arlington National Cemetery carried the United Kingdom's national flag upside down, setting off pithy remarks in the British pres

Photographs show that during the royal couple's stop at the Virginia cemetery, the Union Jack's red and white stripes were wrong side up.

"King Charles' US state visit ended in bizarre fashion as the Union Flag was flown upside down during the farewell event," London's Daily Express tabloid wrote. The paper cited Mark Stone, a U.S. correspondent for British network Sky News, who posted on X: "Rather a diplomatic gaffe by the Americans here. The Union flag is upside down at the Arlington Cemetery event."

In its US version, the Express headline noted: "Huge 'signal of distress' mistake made as Trump and King Charles pay respects." In the world of flags, flying the Union Jack upside down literally signifies a situation of distress.

The king and queen have not yet remarked on the juxtaposition. Charles and Camilla paid their respects and laid a wreath and a posy at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in the cemetery before traveling to rural Virginia to attend separate events. Arlington National is the final resting place for over 400,000 active-duty service members, veterans, and their families, honoring those who served the U.S.

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According to the Global Sumud Flotilla aid mission, at least 15 boats were raided, with those on board “abducted” by Israeli forces and unaccounted for.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry said approximately 175 activists from more than 20 boats were in Israeli custody.

The Global Sumud Flotilla said various vessels were “systematically disabled” after being raided, leaving activists stranded at sea.

“After smashing engines and destroying navigation arrays, the military retreated - intentionally leaving hundreds of civilians stranded on powerless, broken vessels directly in the path of a massive approaching storm,” it said.

Shortly before the raid, activists said they were approached by military speedboats identifying themselves as Israeli. Soldiers reportedly pointed lasers and semi-automatic weapons at those on board, ordering them to get on their hands and knees. They added that boat communications were being jammed.

“No state has the right to claim, police, or occupy international waters. Yet, that is exactly what Israel has done, extending its regime of control outward, occupying the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Europe."

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Israel is in crisis. Since October 2023 it has been in a permanent state of war with numerous internal and external foes, from the Palestinians of Gaza to Iranian state and society.

Many politicians, analysts and commentators have seen this as proof of strength. Building on the Israeli far right’s increased usage of the Hebrew trope of "Greater Israel" (Eretz Yisrael Ha-Shlema), they often talk of a Pax Israelica in the Middle East.  

The term is telling in that it merely replicates the more familiar Pax Americana, for which Israel functions regionally as a bridgehead. If there were any period when the notion of Israel as a regional hegemon remotely made sense, it was the few years following the September 2020 Abraham Accords. Until 7 October 2023.

Since then, the Israeli military has veered from one conflict to another in successive failed attempts to crush its foes.

It decimated Gaza but Hamas is still standing. It famously "decapitated" Hezbollah in Lebanon but the group is back as a guerrilla force resisting Israeli occupation. The drone and missile stocks that former defence minister Yoav Gallant - wanted by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for crimes against humanity – claimed were all but destroyed are back in action.

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After hours spent carefully preparing her cakes, Abrar Abdu stood stunned in silence before her oven. 

In her small, darkened workshop in Gaza City, the only light came from her phone’s torch, illuminating more than 27 ruined cakes - the result of a sudden power cut and a faulty oven.

Abdu, 34, who runs a small cake business in the Palestinian enclave, was forced to apologise to customers after failing to deliver their orders, refund every payment and absorb the full cost of the wasted ingredients.

“I have incurred devastating financial losses due to the chronic instability of the electricity generators,” she told Middle East Eye.

The losses have pushed her to the brink, she added, threatening not only her liveLike Gaza’s 2.2 million residents, Abdu has struggled to secure a reliable electricity supply since Israel severed all power lines to the strip at the start of the genocide in 2023. 

The territory’s sole power plant shut down on 11 October that year after running out of fuel amid the blockade on energy supplies.

'If the current situation persists, Gaza will sink into total darkness'
- Mustafa Abu Hassira, association of generator in Gaza

Since then, Gaza has been plunged into near-total darkness, with residents relying on limited solar power or costly private generators.

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The US announced on Tuesday, that it will commit up to $100 million toward emergency repairs to the radiation containment system at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant after a Russian drone strike severely damaged the structure last year.

In a State Department media note, Washington said the funding would support coordinated G7 efforts “to ensure the continued containment of fissile nuclear material” at the site in northern Ukraine.

The contribution will cover roughly 20 percent of the estimated $500 million needed to restore the New Safe Confinement (NSC) arch, the massive steel structure that seals off Reactor Four, destroyed during the 1986 Chornobyl disaster.

“For three decades, the United States and G7 partners have led efforts to secure nuclear material at the Chornobyl plant,” the State Department said, noting that Washington has already contributed more than $365 million toward the construction and maintenance of the NSC.

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