SuperPAC Raises Millions to Fight Trump

Americans for Prosperity Action, a super political action committee (PAC) funded by billionaire businessman Charles Koch, has accumulated $70 million in an effort to sway who wins the GOP presidential primary.

While the group hasn’t publicly come out in support of a specific Republican contender yet, AFP Action has been clear that their goal is to have former President Donald Trump lose the nomination.

In an attempt to do so, the conservative PAC will release advertisements in Nevada, New Hampshire, and South Carolina, with the narrator in one of the ads claiming that “instead of making Biden answer for his reckless progressive agenda, Trump makes the debate about indictments, personal grievances, and the election he lost. Sure, he did some good things as President, but the reality is Republicans lose if Trump is our nominee.”

In response, Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for the Trump campaign, wrote in an email, “President Trump continues to fight against the swampy D.C. insiders who would love nothing more than to have an establishment puppet they can control in the White House.

“No amount of dirty money from shady lobbyists and mysterious donors will ever stop the America First movement, and that’s why President Trump continues to dominate poll after poll — both nationally and statewide. We wel- come this fight,” Cheung added.

AFP Action’s CEO, Emily Seidel, said that many Trump voters that the committee has reached out to have shown that they are “receptive to arguments that he is a weak candidate, his focus on 2020 is a liability, and his lack of appeal with independent voters is a problem,” with Seidel adding that this “tells us that many Republicans are ready to move on, they just need to see another candidate step up and show they can lead and win.”

On Thursday, the committee publicly announced its support for the reelection of certain GOP House Representatives, including Reps. Young Kim of California, John James of Michigan, Juan Ciscomani of Arizona, and Zach Munn of Iowa, as well as Yvette Herrel, a former Republican Representative from New Mexico.

Reviewing U.S.’s Afghanistan Exit

The U.S. State Department should plan better for worst-case scenarios, strengthen its crisis-management capabilities and ensure that top officials hear “the broadest possible range of views,” including ones that challenge their assumptions and decisions.

Those were some of the key findings of a State Department review of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan in summer 2021, which contributed to the sudden collapse of the Afghan government and required a massive airlift to rescue roughly 125,000 U.S. citizens and Afghans who had assisted the United States. and 13 U.S. troops.

The review also portrayed a department that scrambled to respond to the crisis due to unfilled senior positions, unclear leadership on planning efforts and a shortage of seasoned diplomats in Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital.

Biden officials have long said that few envisioned such a rapid Taliban takeover of the country, that exiting under any circumstances would have been difficult, and that the United States made the right strategic decision to withdraw.

The report does not pin blame on specific individuals and mentions Secretary of State Antony Blinken only in passing. But it does say that in both the Trump and Biden administrations, “there was insufficient senior-level consideration of worst-case scenarios and how quickly those might follow.”

“failed” to establish a broad Afghanistan task force as the situation there deteriorated in late July and early August 2021, and that such a step “would have brought key players together to address issues related to possible” mass evacuations.

(© The New York Times

.)

Religious Work Accommodations

In 2019, Groff quit his job and sued the USPS, claiming that they discriminated against him for his religious beliefs and that it would not have been too much of an inconvenience for the Postal Service if he would have been allowed to take off on Sundays.

“I hope this decision allows others to be able to maintain their convictions without living in fear of losing their jobs because of what they believe,” Groff stated after the verdict was announced.

The document addresses what even many Democrats call a foreign policy debacle for the Biden administration: its failure to more adequately prepare for the abrupt collapse of the Afghan state and avoid days of harrowing chaos in Kabul surrounding an emergency exit that included a terrorist bombing at the city’s airport that killed as many as 170 civilians

Even after it became clear that the Taliban would capture Kabul, the report says, the department’s response featured confusion about responsibilities and authorities. Under Blinken, the State Department’s participation in executive branch planning for an evacuation “was hindered by the fact that it was unclear who in the department had the lead,” the report finds.

Another shortcoming: By the time the frantic airlift from Kabul began, top State Department officials “had not made clear decisions” regarding which Afghans would be eligible for evacuation, nor where they would be taken.

It also says that the department

In the case Groff v. Dejoy, plaintiff Gerald Groff, a Christian former mailman, sued the U.S. Postal Service for penalizing him for taking Sundays off for religious purposes. On Thursday, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled to make it more difficult for employers to penalize workers for religious activities that interfere with work. The lawsuit that Groff brought will now be decided by a lower court based on the Supreme Court’s new clarifications on this matter.

In 1977, in a case called Trans World Airlines v. Hardison, the Supreme Court ruled that an employee’s request can be rejected if it would cause “de minimis” –even a minimal amount of inconvenience for the employer. With the Court’s new ruling, this is no longer the case. Instead, employers may only deny the employee this type of a request if the accommodations would cause more than just “minimal” hardship.

The ruling was written by Justice Samuel Alito, who said that, in the future, the courts should determine what exactly constitutes an inconvenience that is significant enough for the employer to legally reject.

Groff was a non-career auxiliary mail carrier who was hired to work on days when postal workers generally take off, such as on the weekends and the holidays. He started working for the USPS in 2012 and was not required to work on Sundays until 2015 when the Postal Service arranged that Amazon packages get delivered on that day. Due to his religious belief that Sunday is a day when work is not permitted, he was allowed to take off on that day of the week until July of 2018, when the USPS no longer tolerated his absence on Sundays and instead penalized him when he did not come to work.

The ruling is “fully consistent with the standard we apply when seeking to accommodate the sincerely held religious beliefs, observances and practices of our employees,” said Felicia Lott, spokeswoman for the Postal Service, adding that she anticipates that the lower courts will rule in USPS’s favor based on the Supreme Court’s recent decision.

Unity Heads to Space

Sir Richard Branson’s company, Virgin Galactic, launched its rocket, Unity, on its first commercial mission last week.

On Thursday, the rocket ship was carried by an airplane over New Mexico, and once the craft reached heights of 44,500 feet, Unity launched into the air, bringing three Italian scientists to the border that separates Earth and outer space.

It is Branson’s hope that this spaceflight “ushers in a new era of repeatable and reliable access to space for private passengers and researchers,” the billionaire businessman said.

In recent years, Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, and Branson had been competing to be the first to bring tourists up to space. The competition ended when Bezos’ company, Blue Origin, succeeded in bringing four passengers to space in its space vehicle, New Shepard, on July 20, 2021.

Branson started his space company in 2004, creating Enterprise, a test rocket whose failure to launch in 2014 led to the death of one of the ship’s pilots. Over the four years that followed, Unity was built and, in December of 2018, reached heights of about 80 kilometers in the air, or about 50 miles high, which is consid- ered by some to be the very edge of outer space. As of now, the highest Branson’s rocket can go is 90km.

A ticket for a ride in Unity can be as expensive as $450,000, with most customers already having waited a decade thus far. It is estimated that for the time being, Unity will only have one mission per month, and because it can only hold a few people, it will be quite a long time before everyone on the waitlist gets their chance to experience the spaceflight. In 2026, Virgin Galactic will likely release more technologically capable rockets, at which point the ships should be able to go on a mission once a week.

Deadly Baltimore Block Party

Baltimore community that is coping with the loss.”

“Maryland has had enough of watching gun violence continue to ravage our state and our nation,” Moore said in a statement. “The fact that these horrific shootings continue to take place is abominable. We as a state will continue to do everything we can to prevent senseless acts of violence like the one we saw last night.”

Americans: Don’t Go To China

On Sunday, two people were killed and 28 others were wounded at a block party in Baltimore.

At least two people opened fire at a block party in the Brooklyn Homes area in the southern part of the city in the afternoon.

The shootings came amid gatherings around the country leading up to the July Fourth holiday. Elsewhere, a shooting in Kansas left seven people with gunshot wounds and two more victims hospitalized after being trampled as people rushed out of a nightclub early Sunday morning.

Ironically, the carnage in Baltimore occurred as federal prosecutors there this week touted their efforts to reduce violent crime in the city. Police have reported nearly 130 homicides and close to 300 shootings so far this year.

The two people who were killed on Sunday were Aaliyah Gonzales, 18, and Kylis Fagbemi, 20. The wounded ranged in age between 13 to 32.

“I want those who are responsible to hear me, and hear me very clearly,” Mayor Brandon Scott said at the scene. “We will not stop until we find you, and we will find you. Until then, I hope that every single breath you take, that you think about the lives that you took, think about the lives that you impacted here tonight.”

Gov. Wes Moore said his “heart breaks for these victims, their families, and the

According to the U.S. State Department, Americans should stay away from China considering the risk of wrongful detention.

The advisory issued on Friday was different than a previous one that also listed mainland China as a “Level 3: Reconsider Travel” destination, but said it was due to the risk of “arbitrary enforcement of local laws.” The risk of wrongful detention was listed as a reason for U.S. travelers to “exercise increased caution” in that advisory, which was issued in March.

A State Department spokesperson explained that because the Chinese government “continues to engage in this practice” of wrongful detention, “the Travel Advisory has been updated to advise U.S. citizens to reconsider travel to Mainland China due to the risk of wrongful detention.”

“The Department of State has determined the risk of wrongful detention of U.S. nationals by the PRC government exists in the PRC,” both the late June and March advisories noted.

The updated advisory comes amid a period of heightened tensions between the United States and China.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken traveled to Beijing last month in an effort to stop relations from continuing to plummet at a time of lingering distrust. At a news conference at the conclusion of the visit, Blinken said the U.S. and China had made “progress” toward steering relations back on track as both sides agreed on the need to “stabilize” the bilateral relationship between the two superpowers.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen will travel to Beijing this week as part of continued efforts to stabilize the relationship between China and the U.S.