May 18, 2021

Rick Scott continues to plead with Donald Trump to stay out of Senate primaries

Will a scorned ex-President play in Senate primaries? Scott hopes not.

A.G. Gancarski
May 18, 2021
5min

U.S. Sen. Rick Scott continues to express hope that former President Donald Trump won’t engage against Senate incumbents in 2022. Scott made the comments Tuesday on Fox News Radio’s “Brian Kilmeade Show.”

“What I’ve suggested to him is to let the citizens of that state pick their primary winner,” Scott said. “And then help those that win that he believes in.”

“And so, but, you know, he believes in things that I believe in,” Scott said, returning to talking points about a “secure border” and so on.

“That’s what I think the candidates are that we’re going to get, and I look forward to him supporting the candidates that he likes,” Scott said.

more
https://floridapolitics.com/archives/430298-rick-scott-continues-to-plead-with-donald-trump-to-stay-out-of-senate-primaries/

May 18, 2021

Arizona sheriff Arpaio's immigration patrols targeting Latinos to cost public $200M

Taxpayers are on the hook for lawyer bills and the costs of complying with overhauls of the sheriff’s office after a verdict found Arpaio’s officers profiled Latinos in traffic patrols that targeted immigrants.

May 18, 2021, 10:26 AM EDT / Updated May 18, 2021, 11:42 AM EDT
By Associated Press

PHOENIX — The costs to taxpayers from a racial profiling lawsuit stemming from former Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s immigration patrols in metro Phoenix a decade ago are expected to reach $202 million by summer 2022.

Officials approved a tentative county budget Monday that provides $31 million for the cost of complying with court orders in the fiscal year that begins on July 1. No one can say exactly when the costs from the 13-year-old lawsuit will start to decline.

The growth in spending “is enough to make any of us cry as we’re trying to be fiscal stewards of the county taxpayer money,” Supervisor Clint Hickman said.

Taxpayers in Arizona’s most populated county are on the hook for lawyer bills and the costs of complying with massive court-ordered overhauls of the sheriff’s office after a 2013 verdict concluded Arpaio’s officers had profiled Latinos in traffic patrols that targeted immigrants.

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https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/arizona-sheriff-arpaios-immigration-patrols-targeting-latinos-cost-pub-rcna955

May 18, 2021

Caitlyn Jenner gleefully shares ugly transphobic insult about a trans Biden appointee

She got it from Donald Trump Jr.

By LGBTQ Nation Monday, May 17, 2021

Transgender former Olympian Caitlyn Jenner just can’t stop being herself. And it turns out, the world doesn’t like who she is.

The California gubernatorial candidate shared an ugly post from Donald Trump Jr. on Instagram that mocked Dr. Rachel Levine, a transgender woman serving as Assistant Secretary of Health in the Biden administration.

Trump Jr. posted photos of Jenner side-by-side with Levine under the labels “conservative girls” and “liberal girls” with the caption that “Conservative girls are just better looking.” Jenner, a multi-millionaire, has spent a small fortune on cosmetic surgeries to feminize her appearance.

Actress Alexandra Billings responded to Jenner on Instagram, pointing out that sharing the meme “says volumes about both your self hatred and your blatant transphobia.”

more
https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2021/05/caitlyn-jenner-gleefully-shares-ugly-transphobic-insult-trans-biden-appointee

May 18, 2021

Businesses will now be forced to post signs announcing they serve transgender customers in Tennessee

Source: LGBTQ Nation


The Tennessee governor has signed the cruelest anti-trans law in the nation.

By Bil Browning Tuesday, May 18, 2021

Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) has signed one of the cruelest anti-trans laws in the nation, which will require businesses and public buildings to warn cisgender customers that they serve transgender people like any other customer.

It is the second bill restricting transgender public accommodations signed into law recently by the governor and the fourth specifically targeting transgender people.

The new Tennessee law requires any “building or facility open to the general public” that allows transgender people access to the bathroom to post a sign that reads: “This facility has a policy of allowing the use of restrooms by either biological sex, regardless of the designation on the restroom.”

“Gov. Lee’s decision to sign H.B. 1182 will cause real harm to transgender Tennesseans,” Human Rights Campaign President Alphonso David said in an emailed statement. “Denying transgender people the ability to access a bathroom consistent with their gender identity is degrading and dehumanizing — and can have real health and safety consequences. Gov. Lee and Tennessee lawmakers are determined to discriminate against the transgender community and roll back the clock on equality instead of focusing on real problems facing Tennesseans.”

Read more: https://www.lgbtqnation.com/2021/05/businesses-will-now-forced-post-signs-announcing-serve-transgender-customers-tennessee

May 18, 2021

Unvaccinated TikTok Users Believe They Will Be 'Lone Survivors'

Unvaccinated TikTok Users Believe They Will Be ‘Lone Survivors’

TikTok continues to ignore misinformation on its platform, as it gets weirder and more explicitly vaccine-focused.

Anna Merlan
By Anna Merlan

TikTok users are falsely claiming that vaccinated people will soon die, leaving them to inherit the earth. The videos—which represent a fraction of the misinformation spread unchecked by the platform, most of it less obviously ridiculous—will surely be studied by furrowed-brow scientists in 100 years, when we really will all be dead, not from vaccines but through a combination of pernicious ignorance and sheer exhaustion.

Using audio from the 2007 film version of The Transformers, the TikTok users are picturing themselves climbing atop or striding toward various things, facing away from the camera. “I am Optimus Prime,” the voiceover intones, “and I send this message to any surviving Autobots taking refuge among the stars. We are here. We are waiting.” The videos are hashtagged with a mixture of anti-vaccine hashtags like “#unvaccinated” and others, in a bid to have them appear on users’ “For You” pages and get more views. The most-viewed video has nearly half a million likes thus far.

Since the start of the pandemic, TikTok has done a notably terrible job stemming coronavirus-related misinformation, from a hoax video about “Patient Zero blood” way back in January 2020 to incredibly racist skits about its spread to, now, the #unvaccinated hashtag. While TikTok now links to a fact-based Q&A on some coronavirus-related videos, there’s little evidence it’s doing much to stem the tide, and is in fact notably bad at doing so: Many of these videos were promoted into my editor’s For You page. Other kinds of misinformation are more or less unchecked on the platform, including videos spreading extremist content and hoaxes like National Rape Day. While Facebook has made gestures at stemming COVID misinformation—although those gestures have largely failed—TikTok's algorithm is more actively feeding this content to its users.

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https://www.vice.com/en/article/88ngep/unvaccinated-tiktok-users-believe-they-will-be-lone-survivors

May 18, 2021

Anti-masker arrested after he refuses to stop ranting about the Earth being flat...

Anti-masker arrested after he refuses to stop ranting about the Earth being flat at city council meeting

May 18, 2021

Republican C-SPAN caller: 'Any woman who has an abortion has to have her uterus removed or be killed

May 18, 2021

Franklin Graham pummeled on CNN as he refuses to say whether 2020 election was legitimate

May 18, 2021

Marjorie Taylor Greene gives bonkers floor speech defending Jan. 6 rioters while attacking BLM

May 18, 2021

Giuliani Defends His Call For 'Trial By Combat' on Jan 6 as 'Clearly Hyperbolic' in Response to...

Giuliani Defends His Call For ‘Trial By Combat’ on Jan 6 as ‘Clearly Hyperbolic’ in Response to Capitol Riot Lawsuit

By Ken MeyerMay 18th, 2021, 9:14 am

Rudy Giuliani and his legal team claimed he didn’t actually foment an insurrection when he called on supporters of former President Donald Trump to engage in “trial by combat.”

As Giuliani contends with the criminal investigation that recently led to federal agents raiding his apartment, he’s also facing a civil lawsuit from Congressman Eric Swalwell (D-CA) over his connection to the storming of the U.S. Capitol. The lawsuit is also directed at Trump, Donald Trump Jr., and Congressman Mo Brooks (R-AL), accusing them all of breaking multiple laws and inciting the rioters with their speeches at the “Save America” rally.

In a lawsuit filing submitted on Monday, Swalwell gravitated many of his accusations against Giuliani around the fact that Trump’s former personal lawyer used his speech on January 6th to push numerous 2020 election conspiracy theories. It especially focuses on the part of the speech where Giuliani told the crowd “if we’re wrong, we will be made fools of. But if we’re right, a lot of them will go to jail. So, let’s have trial by combat!”

The filing contains Giuliani’s legal response that “there is simply no reasonable reading of the Giuliani Speech that can be construed as an incitement to violence.” It goes on by claiming Giuliani’s words were” hyperbolic” and that it’s “completely unreasonable” for Swalwell to assume they implied a call for violent action.

more
https://www.mediaite.com/news/giuliani-defends-his-jan-6th-trial-by-combat-call-as-clearly-hyperbolic-in-response-to-capitol-riot-lawsuit/