For years, a Connecticut towing company got to cut the line at the DMV in exchange for selling towed cars at deep discounts, according to a DMV report, allowing one DMV employee to resell them for steep profits.
news
👉 This Week In Global Museum.
Munich Museums Hold Nazi-Looted Art? | £20m For English Civic Museums | Trump’s Arts Takeover Straight From The Dictator Playbook | Art Adviser, Friend & Thief | Musk’s Thoughtless Crusade Closes Iconic Massachusetts Museum | More Museum News.
http://www.globalmuseum.org #museums #globalmuseum #museumnews #news #museumjobs #jobs #artgallery
This Charter School Superintendent Makes $870,000. He Leads a District With 1,000 Students.
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On paper, Salvador Cavazos earns less than $300,000 to run Valere Public Schools, a small Texas charter network. But taxpayers likely aren’t aware that in reality, his total pay makes him one of the country’s highest-earning superintendents.
https://www.propublica.org/article/valere-public-schools-superintendent-salary-texas?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
Despite a $1.3 billion investment that Portland said would improve the safety of homeless people, deaths in Multnomah County have quadrupled — from 113 in 2019 to more than 450 in 2023.
U.S. Housing Agency Considers Launching Crypto Experiment
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The Department of Housing and Urban Development, which oversees billions in aid and insures more than a trillion dollars in mortgages, is pondering using the blockchain and a stablecoin. One HUD official derided it as “monopoly money.”
#News #Housing #Crypto #Government #USPolitics #Trump #Blockchain
Another busy week (maybe one day there’ll be a quiet one) in which independent publications have been doing sterling work on politics, science, tech, the environment and more. Please check out these stories from newsrooms with a fediverse presence, which cover subjects from antifascism to EVs in Zimbabwe. Oh, and Canadians, there’s a special treat for you at the end.
⤵️
#Media #Journalism #News #Newstodon #MastodonMigration #FollowFriday
How the Terrorgram Collective’s Neo-Nazi Influencers Groomed a Teen to Kill
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The murders of two people outside an LGBTQ+ bar at first looked like the act of a lone shooter. A ProPublica and FRONTLINE investigation shows they were, in fact, the culmination of a coordinated, international recruiting effort by online extremists.
https://www.propublica.org/article/telegram-terrorgram-collective-bratislava-murders-neo-nazi-online-hate?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
Federal Judge Deems Trump Administration’s Termination of NIH Grants Illegal
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In a ruling issued Monday, the judge called the government’s directives “arbitrary and capricious” and ordered funding for some of the NIH grants, including many profiled by ProPublica in recent months, to be restored.
A New Missouri Bill Would Let Residents Donate to Anti-Abortion Centers Instead of Paying Any Taxes
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Four months after Missouri voted to legalize abortion, Republican lawmakers are proposing a 100% tax credit — capped at $50,000 per year — for taxpayers who donate to crisis pregnancy centers.
https://www.propublica.org/article/missouri-pregnancy-resource-centers-anti-abortion-tax-credit-bill?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
Federal Monitor Slams NYPD Unit Whose Aggressive Policing ProPublica Exposed
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A report from a court-appointed watchdog details “troubling” conduct and “unconstitutional” stops by the Police Department’s Community Response Team — a unit championed by Mayor Eric Adams.
https://www.propublica.org/article/nyc-nypd-police-community-response-team-stop-frisk?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
Connecticut Lawmakers Seek Overhaul of Towing Laws
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A new bill addresses nearly all of the issues raised in a Connecticut Mirror and ProPublica investigation that found people’s cars were being sold shortly after they were towed.
He Was Convicted Based on Allegedly Fabricated Bite Mark Analysis. Louisiana Wants to Execute Him Anyway.
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Nine prisoners have walked free after evidence presented by members of a forensics team turned out to be wrong — yet one man still awaits execution based on their testimony.
https://www.propublica.org/article/louisiana-jimmie-duncan-bite-mark-analysis-death-row-junk-science?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
Two Transgender Girls, Six Federal Agencies. How Trump Is Trying to Pressure Maine Into Obedience.
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Maine said it wouldn’t break state law to follow President Donald Trump’s order barring transgender girls from playing girls’ sports. Then came a barrage of investigations and threats targeting the state’s federal funding.
#News #Maine #Trump #Trans #Sports #Girls #USPolitics #Government #LGBTQ #TransRights
Church leaders held meetings where children were told to forgive the man who sexually abused them and forget the abuse. An internal church document also suggests that, when appropriate, both parties be brought together for a discussion.
https://www.propublica.org/article/minnesota-old-apostolic-lutheran-church-investigation-takeaways?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
#News #Minnesota #Duluth #Abuse #Church #Religion #Law #Crime #Epstein
Massive Layoffs at the Department of Education Erode Its Civil Rights Division
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Only five of the agency’s civil rights offices remain nationwide. Those who are still with the department say it will now be “virtually impossible” to resolve discrimination complaints.
#News #Education #CivilRights #Trump #Discrimination #Students
Migrants detained in Panama expressed fear of returning to their countries.
“They will execute me without hesitation,” one texted.
“I am LGBT. My country harass these people. I cannot live a normal life in my country,” said another.
☀️This Week In Global Museum.
A Daunting Museum Mission | Madrid Museum Ordered To Remove Mummy | Guggenheim Tightens Its Belt Again | Museum Investigate Whales Keeping A City Awake | Nailed-Head Rituals & Advocacy With Urgency | More Museum News.
http://www.globalmuseum.org #globalmuseum #museums #museumnews #news #museumjobs #jobs #artgallery
Washington Blues: A Government Town Faces a Gloomy Future
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For years, Washington, D.C., was insulated from many of the economic forces that decimated many older U.S. cities. Now, as Elon Musk’s mass layoffs shake everything from employment to real estate, the region faces the prospect of decline.
https://www.propublica.org/article/washington-dc-trump-musk-federal-government-cutbacks-gloomy-future?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
"Fascism: Here To Stay? How Do We End It?"
W/ #DavidShuster, an "Amped Up!" INTERVIEW w awesome historian/scholar on #authoritarianism, Ruth Ben-Ghiat!
https://www.blueamp.co/p/fascism-here-to-stay-how-do-we-end #politics #world #fascism #trump #us #usa #ai #donaldtrump #history #press #media #war #iran #israel #eu #tv #uk #russia #ukraine #middleeast #news
Custom Keyboard Company WASD Keyboards Goes Defunct?
Can keyboard enthusiasts find answers to the questions we all have been wondering, has WASD Keyboards company gone out of business or was it acquired?
N.Y. Gov. Kathy Hochul is expected to sign a bill that bans anonymous complaints to the state child abuse hotline. The law would still maintain the confidentiality of callers.
The change comes in the wake of a 2023 ProPublica investigation that showed how the hotline had been weaponized by people endlessly calling in baseless allegations against exes or rivals.
https://www.propublica.org/article/new-york-bans-anonymous-child-welfare-reports?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
News continues to flow at breakneck speed and independent newsrooms continue to reveal and analyze what’s happening around the world. Highlights for us this week were @ProPublica's exposé on DOGE’s potential impact on social security, @KnowableMag's explainer on pregnancy at altitude, and a lovely interview by @thecontinent of the beloved Ethiopian singer Mahmoud Ahmed. Please check out these stories and all the others in this thread, comment, like, follow their accounts and give them your money. ⤵️
#Media #Journalism #News #Newstodon #MastodonMigration #FollowFriday
"A federal judge in California ruled Monday that Anthropic likely violated copyright law when it pirated authors’ books to create a giant dataset [...] but that training its AI on those books without authors' permission constitutes transformative fair use under copyright law. "
https://www.404media.co/judge-rules-training-ai-on-authors-books-is-legal-but-pirating-them-is-not/
Parents Sue Trump Administration for Allegedly Sabotaging Education Department’s Civil Rights Division
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The class-action lawsuit claims that decimating the agency’s Office for Civil Rights will leave it unable to address issues of discrimination at school — violating the equal protection clause of the Fifth Amendment.
https://www.propublica.org/article/department-of-education-civil-rights-lawsuit-trump-parents?utm_source=mastodon&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=mastodon-post
#News #Education #Trump #CivilRights #Discrimination #Parents #Disability #School