Trump faces possible criminal charges

business records, according to the Manhattan district attorney website.

Throughout the school year, there are many events that happen at the elementary schools that serve as fundraisers, community events and allow the students and parents to get to know each other. Carnivals are hosted by some of the elementary schools in the spring and help the schools to fundraise. .

Carnivals are funded by the building PTO. Eric Vizzo, principal at Cornerstone Elementary, says “ The main purpose is to provide a fun event for parents and students to attend and enjoy together and also raise funds for PTO to help support field trips and various other learning experiences for our students,” Vizzo said. The funds raised from events like these benefit the students in many aspects of their education.

Jayme Tucker, assistant principal at Cornerstone Elementary, says, “Students have the chance to connect with our staff members in a different capacity than they do during the school day. It also provides an opportunity for families to spend the evening together.”

Carnivals allow students to see their teachers in other environments outside of school.

Students enjoy and look forward to activities outside of school, especially the carnivals. Steve Furlong, principal at Parkview Elementary, said, “They enjoy it. They start talking about it way in advance, and it's awesome to see how much fun they have while they are here,” Furlong said.

The excitement and anticipation shared by the students is one of the many reasons to hold events such as carnivals. On April 28, Cornerstone will be hosting their carnival from 5:30 p.m. through 8:00 p.m.

TikTok faces another Potential ban

TRISTAN MILLER staff writer

On March 30, 2023, former president Donald Trump was indicted by a Manhattan jury. According to the U.S. Department of Justice website, “When a person is indicted, they are given formal notice that it is believed that they committed a crime,” essentially the jury in Trump’s trial felt there was enough evidence to move forward with a potential criminal trial.

On April 4, Trump traveled to New York City to be fingerprinted and photographed; it was there that his charges were officially released and he was charged with 34 felony charges of falsifying

All of the charges are in connection to his involvement in the payment of hush money to the sport star Stormy Daniels in 2016. According to an April 5 New York Times article written by Ben Protests and Jonah E. Bromwich, “The charges trace back to a $130,000 hush-money payment that Mr. Trump’s fixer, Michael D. Cohen…The payment, which Mr. Cohen said he made at Mr. Trump’s direction, suppressed her story of a sexual liaison she says she had with Mr. Trump.”

The same New York Times article explains that when paying Cohen back, Trump classified these payments as “legal expenses,” this is where the fraud occurred as the prosecution claims that there were no legal expenses and a retainer agreement was not in place.

According to an April 5 CNN article written by Daniel Dale, Trump pled not guilty to all charges and then traveled back to his residence in Mar-a-Lago Florida where he gave a speech maintaining his innocence. Within this speech, Trump touched on a number of grievances, including his impeachment, the raid on Mara-Lago and Obama, as well as many other topics. He finally touched on the trial stating, “This fake case was brought only to interfere with the upcoming 2024 election and it should be dropped immediately. Immediately.”

Recently, there has been a large push across several nations to ban the social media platform Tik Tok and limit its access to important data, with the United States potentially doing this also.

A New York Times article from April 12, states that “The White House told federal agencies on Feb. 27 that they had 30 days to delete the app from government devices.” This shows the push from the United States to stop the platform's expansion, but within the United States, some are calling for the platform to be removed for all citizens due to privacy concerns. An article from KTVH on April 13 concerning a possible ban on the app in Montana states, “Supporters said the ban is needed due to TikTok being owned by a Chinese company and collecting a large amount of data on users.”

Although the main cause cited for the app needing to be banned involves these alleged privacy concerns,TikTok continues to assure all users that their privacy is protected.

On March 23, the CEO of TikTok, Shou Chew testified in front of the U.S. Congress that TikTok has, “for the last two years been building what amounts to a firewall, that seals off protected U.S. user data.”

The company has offered several assurances like these over the past few months, but many state governments and members of the U.S. Congress continue to push for limitations on the platform, making its future in the United States ambiguous.