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The former president and first lady threw their weight behind the presumptive Democratic nominee

Barack and Michelle Obama have endorsed Kamala Harris for the Democratic nomination for president, sharing the news in a joint phone call.

A video released by the campaign suggests the former president and first lady called Harris on Thursday while the vice president was in Houston, where she addressed the American Federation of Teachers and received a briefing on recovery efforts following Hurricane Beryl.

“We called to say, Michelle and I couldn’t be prouder to endorse you and do everything we can to get you through this election and into the Oval Office,” Barack Obama is heard telling Harris in a 55-second video of the call.

“This is going to be historic,” Michelle Obama tells Harris.

Archived page https://archive.is/6eScl

Thanks @alquicksilver@lemmy.world

The Georgia sun scorched the slab of concrete beneath Juan Carlos Ramirez Bibiano’s body when nurses found him in a puddle of his own excrement, vomiting, according to a complaint.

Officers left Ramirez in an outdoor cell at Telfair State Prison on July 20, 2023, for five hours without water, shade or ice, even as the outside temperature climbed to 96 degrees by the afternoon, according to a lawsuit brought by his family. That evening, the complaint says, Ramirez died of heart and lung failure caused by heat exposure. He was 27.

Ramirez’s family, including his mother, Norma Bibiano, announced a lawsuit against the Georgia Department of Corrections on Thursday, alleging that officers’ negligent performance of their duties caused his death. The warden directed officers to check on inmates, bring them water and ice and limit their time outside, the complaint says.

The Department of Corrections reported that Ramirez died of natural causes, Jeff Filipovits, one of Norma Bibiano’s attorneys, said at a news conference in Decatur, a suburb of Atlanta.

The case of Christopher Dunn marks the second time Attorney General Andrew Bailey has appealed the swift release of a person whose murder conviction was overturned.

For more than 30 years, Christopher Dunn has been incarcerated in Missouri, accused of a murder he insisted he did not commit. Freedom seemed within his grasp when a circuit judge overturned his conviction and ordered for his release Wednesday — only to be overruled when the state Supreme Court granted the attorney general’s request for a stay.

The legal showdown over Dunn’s release marks the second time in a matter of weeks that Missouri’s Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey has fought a court order to release an inmate who was found to be wrongly convicted.

Last month, Sandra Hemme, 64, the longest-held wrongly incarcerated woman known in the U.S., had her conviction overturned, only to have Bailey appeal her release, keeping her behind bars. Ultimately, she was released July 19 after a judge threatened to hold the attorney general’s office in contempt of court.

Paywall removed: https://archive.is/anyBg

>Like Ms. McKay, a growing number of U.S. adults say they are unlikely to raise children, according to a study released on Thursday by the Pew Research Center. When the survey was conducted in 2023, 47 percent of those younger than 50 without children said they were unlikely ever to have children, an increase of 10 percentage points since 2018.

>When asked why kids were not in their future, 57 percent said they simply didn’t want to have them. Women were more likely to respond this way than men (64 percent vs. 50 percent). Further reasons included the desire to focus on other things, like their career or interests; concerns about the state of the world; worries about the costs involved in raising a child; concerns about the environment, including climate change; and not having found the right partner.

Trump thinks mispronouncing Kamala Harris' name is a good attack route.

If you've felt your burrito was smaller than it should be, smaller than in the commercials, the CEO agrees.

The convicted and imprisoned former movie mogul is in the Bellevue Hospital Prison Ward for “the myriad of health conditions that he is still afflicted with,” a representative said.

Convicted and imprisoned former Hollywood movie mogul Harvey Weinstein has been hospitalized for a “myriad of health conditions” and has tested positive for Covid-19 and double pneumonia, a representative said.

Weinstein was taken to the Bellevue Hospital Prison Ward, his representative and prison consultant Craig Rothfeld said.

New York Corrections Department records also show that Weinstein, 72, is at Bellevue.

Billionaire Democratic donors Barry Diller and Reid Hoffman said in interviews this week they hope Kamala Harris will replace Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan if she becomes U.S. president, openly rejecting a pillar of President Joe Biden's antitrust policy.

Khan has been at the forefront of the Biden administration's push to use U.S. antitrust law to boost competition and address high prices and low wages. Khan, who oversaw the FTC's ban on noncompete agreements, has drawn the ire of corporate groups, but won fans including Donald Trump's running mate, JD Vance, for her skepticism towards big business.

Now, big money Democratic donors this week publicly said Khan should not be part of a potential Harris administration. Diller, chairman of travel site Expedia, said in a recent Bloomberg interview that he would donate the maximum allowed to Harris' campaign. He said in an interview on CNBC on Friday that he would lobby Harris to replace Khan, saying Khan was against "almost anything" business wants to do to grow efficiently.

BBC: How decline of Indian vultures led to 500,000 human deaths 25 JUL 2024

>More than two decades ago, India’s vultures began dying because of a drug used to treat sick cows. > >By the mid-1990s, the 50 million-strong vulture population had plummeted to near zero because of diclofenac, a cheap non-steroidal painkiller for cattle that is fatal to vultures. Birds that fed on carcasses of livestock treated with the drug suffered from kidney failure and died.

>The unintentional decimation of these heavy, scavenging birds allowed deadly bacteria and infections to proliferate, leading to the deaths of about half a million people over five years, says the study published in the American Economic Association journal.

>“Vultures are considered nature’s sanitation service because of the important role they play in removing dead animals that contain bacteria and pathogens from our environment - without them, disease can spread,” says the study’s co-author, Eyal Frank, an assistant professor at University of Chicago's Harris School of Public Policy. > >“Understanding the role vultures play in human health underscores the importance of protecting wildlife, and not just the cute and cuddly. They all have a job to do in our ecosystems that impacts our lives.”

>The authors estimated that between 2000 and 2005, the loss of vultures caused around 100,000 additional human deaths annually, resulting in more than $69bn (£53bn) per year in mortality damages or the economic costs associated with premature deaths. > >These deaths were due to the spread of disease and bacteria that vultures would have otherwise removed from the environment.

>“The vulture collapse in India provides a particularly stark example of the type of hard-to-reverse and unpredictable costs to humans that can come from the loss of a species,” says Mr Sudarshan, an associate professor at the University of Warwick and co-author of the study.

It is amazing to see what a difference these birds most take for granted contribute to our success as a species.

Many find vultures to be creepy, but after learning about some of their amazing abilities and understanding why they've evolved to become what they are, they are superbly designed animals that excel at doing a very important job.

White-rumped vulture (Population loss since 2000: 98%)

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Indian vulture (Population loss since 2000: 95%)

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Red-headed vulture (Population loss since 2000: 91%)

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A Nebraska law that combined abortion restrictions with another measure to limit gender-affirming health care for minors does not violate a state constitutional amendment requiring bills to stick to a single subject, a majority of the Nebraska Supreme Court ruled Friday.

The state’s high court acknowledged in its ruling that abortion and gender-affirming care “are distinct types of medical care,” but found the law does not violate Nebraska’s single-subject rule because both abortion and transgender health fall under the subject of medical care.

The majority relied, in part, on a passage from an 1895 ruling to find the state constitution offers wide latitude on what composes a single subject.

The Park fire in Butte County — already the largest blaze in California this year — exploded to more than 164,000 acres by Friday morning, with its rapid spread forcing more evacuation warnings.

The growth of the fire over two days amid steady winds and hot temperatures has been dramatic, with its remote location making it difficult to fight. It was listed at 164,286 acres Friday morning and 3% contained.

Conditions on the ground are going to continue to be a challenge, forecasters say.

The clock had not yet struck midnight on October 9, when Said Al-Taweel fell into a deep sleep in his office in al-Ghefari Tower, Gaza City’s tallest building. Alaa Abu Mohsen, Al-Taweel’s colleague, heard him snoring.

More than an hour after Al-Taweel drifted off to sleep, sometime after 1 a.m., word began to spread that Haji Tower, another high-rise near the al-Ghefari building, was going to be attacked by the Israelis. Haji Tower is home to local and international media offices, including Agence France-Presse. The rush of people leaving the 12-story tower came after an Israeli military officer spoke by phone to at least four people to order the evacuation of Haji Tower, according to the accounts of two direct recipients of warnings as well as video of a call.

As people streaming from the building scrambled to get into their cars and flee, several of the journalists in the area instead drew nearer to Haji Tower. They wanted to get the story: An Israeli attack on a building known to house so many reporters would resonate internationally.

When the airstrike finally came, it did not hit al-Ghefari nor Haji Tower. Instead, it destroyed a third structure: a six-story residential building called Babel that lay directly on the road between the two towers. As Babel collapsed into rubble, at least nine people were killed, including three journalists who had moved into the building’s vicinity to report on Haji Tower from a safe distance.

“The bodies of the journalists flew into the air from the intensity of the bombing,” said Mansour Khalaf, the owner of Babel, who witnessed the attack from the street.

Coming from a district court, I think this ruling could be appealed, but it's welcome news nevertheless.

The daughter of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia has been appointed by Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin to serve on the Virginia Board of Education, drawing criticism from some Democrats who called the appointment politically motivated.

Meg Bryce, a psychology educator who unsuccessfully ran last year for an at-large seat on the Albemarle County school board, said Thursday at a business meeting that she was thankful that Youngkin chose her for the board, which is responsible for determining statewide curriculum standards, high school graduation requirements and qualifications for teachers.

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Del. Katrina Callsen, a Democrat from Albemarle, said in a Tweet that Bryce was “a failed Moms for Liberty candidate.” Teacher and Democratic Sen. Schuyler VanValkenburg said on social media that Bryce had no credentials and “spent a year running for School Board embroiled in culture wars.”

An 11-year-old Virginia boy is charged in Florida with calling in more than 20 bomb or shooting threats to schools and other places, authorities said Thursday.

Flagler County Sheriff Rick Staly said during a news conference that authorities worked hard to find the caller before the school year resumes.

“This kid’s behavior was escalating and becoming more dangerous,” Staly said. “I’m glad we got him before he escalated out of control and hurt someone.”

Swatting is slang for making a prank call to emergency services in an attempt to send a SWAT team or other armed police officers to a particular place.

A man in Nevada has been charged with making a death threat against the prosecutor who secured Donald Trump’s criminal conviction in New York and the judge who oversaw the trial, according to court records and a person familiar with the case.

Spencer Gear, 32, was charged in Nevada federal court on 16 July with 22 counts of making threats to kill or injure federal and state officials, including making a call threatening to kill two individuals in New York referred to as “AB” and “JM”.

The indictment, handed down by a grand jury, does not name the targets, but a person familiar with the case told Reuters that the initials referred to the Manhattan district attorney, Alvin Bragg, and Justice Juan Merchan.

The justice department has alleged that Gear intended to “impede, intimidate and interfere with the officials while engaged in the performance of official duties” and that he intended to “retaliate against the officials on account of the performance of official duties”.

An Olympic athlete has had his finger amputated after he suffered an injury just so he can play in the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

Just two weeks ago, Matthew Dawson, a 30-year-old hockey player from Australia, suffered a badly broken finger on his right-hand during a team training session in Perth, Australia, and, after consulting with doctors, he found out the injury would take months to recover from and that he would miss out on the opportunity to play in his third Olympic Games.

But instead of opting for a long recovery, Dawson made a decision that would shock his teammates and has already made headlines around the world. He decided to amputate his finger so that he could compete in the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.

A jury on Friday found that Abbott Laboratories' specialized formula for premature infants caused an Illinois girl to develop a dangerous bowel disease, ordering the healthcare company to pay $495 million in compensatory and punitive damages.

The verdict in St. Louis, Missouri state court comes in the first trial against the company out of hundreds of similar claims over the formula pending in courts around the country, which Reuters viewed via Courtroom View Network.

The jury awarded $95 million in compensatory damages and $400 million in punitive damages.

Before the jury was sent to consider punitive damages, Abbott attorney James Hurst said that the verdict risks sending the wrong message and limiting doctors' options for feeding preterm infants who cannot breastfeed.

The California Supreme Court ruled Thursday that app-based ride-hailing and delivery services like Uber and Lyft can continue treating their drivers as independent contractors rather than employees.

The unanimous decision by the state’s top court is a big win for tech giants. It also ends a yearslong legal battle between labor unions and tech companies over a law dictating the status of app-based service workers in the state.

The ruling upholds a voter-approved law passed in 2020 that said drivers for companies like Uber and Lyft are independent contractors and are not entitled to benefits like overtime pay, paid sick leave and unemployment insurance. Opponents said the law was illegal in part because it limited the state Legislature’s authority to change the law or pass laws about workers’ compensation programs.

In a WhatsApp chat that quickly devolved into depravity, a group of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents boasted about their “world debauchery tour” of “boozing and whoring” on the government’s dime. They swapped lurid images of their latest sexual conquests. And at one point they even joked about “forcible anal rape.”

Within months of that jaw-dropping exchange, an agent in the group chat was accused of that very crime.

The 2018 arrest of George Zoumberos for allegedly forcing anal sex on a 23-year-old woman in a Madrid hotel room set off alarms at the highest levels of the DEA, beginning with a middle-of-the-night phone call from a supervisor to the agency’s headquarters outside Washington. But U.S. officials never even spoke with the woman and made only cursory efforts to investigate.

The DEA has refused for years to discuss its handling of the arrest, instead telling The Associated Press in response to its questions that “the alleged misconduct in this case is egregious and unacceptable and does not reflect the high standards expected of all DEA personnel.”

Boeing is asking suppliers to disclose records on Chinese titanium since 2014, according to a letter seen by Reuters, as the U.S. planemaker widens checks for false paperwork used to authenticate the metal used in commercial jets.

Regulators said in June they were investigating whether false or incorrect documents were used to identify the authenticity of titanium used for parts in some Boeing and Airbus jets.

Airbus said it is collaborating with authorities and investigating the lack of proper traceability affecting a small number of titanium parts from suppliers to programs like the A220, A320 and A350.

Reports of forged documentation initially raised concerns about the structural integrity of some aircraft, but planemakers and suppliers say the correct titanium alloy was used and their products are safe. Paper trails are critical in aviation, where regulators insist on clear documentation for even minor production changes to assure planes are safe.

Responding to Netanyahu's speech, the Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said "45 minutes of speech and applause won't erase the one sad fact: the words 'Deal Now!' were absent from the prime minister's address."