Far-right Project 2025 chief makes ominous promise to hackers
Story by Sarah K. Burris • 19h


https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/other/far-right-project-2025-chief-makes-ominous-promise-to-hackers/ar-BB1pPisT

Mike Howell, the executive director of the Heritage Foundation and the creator of the rightwing Project 2025, is threatening to ensure that hackers who broke into the group's blog site get raped in prison for releasing information about the organizations' funders and contractors.

Hacktivist group SiegedSec apparently engaged in a conversation with Howell over Telegram, which it published online. In the discussion, Howell asked the hackers what they wanted, The New Republic reported.

“Mike Howell reached out to us, at first, to ask questions to understand our motives and why we breached his organization,” SiegedSec said in a July 11 post, Cyber Daily reported. “Then, he proceeded to throw insults, threats, and claimed our existence was against nature.”

“We tried answering things in a way to hopefully help him understand. But as his insults grew, so did our impatience. So we are releasing all of our chat logs with Mike Howell.”

In it, the hackers claimed there action was to let Americans know who is behind the Heritage Foundation, which is drawing up Project 2025, a guide for a second administration crafted by allies of Donald Trump.

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Gunshots have reportedly been fired at Donald Trump's rally in Pennsylvania, with the former president rushed off-stage by security staff.

Trump appeared to fall to the ground as he was giving a speech. He was quickly surrounded by armed security and stayed down for around a minute.

He then rose to his feet and put his fist in the air, before being escorted off stage and into a vehicle, and then driven away from the scene.

Video appeared to show blood on his ear as he was taken away. The former president appeared to be clutching the side of his head as he fell to the ground.

Republican senator for Ohio, J.D Vance, said in a post on the X social media platform: "Everyone join me in praying for our President Trump and everyone at that rally. I hope everyone is ok."

https://news.sky.com/story/shots-fired-at-donald-trump-rally-as-former-president-rushed-off-stage-13177651

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https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/11/politics/trump-allies-project-2025/index.html
“I have no idea who is behind it,” the former president recently claimed on social media.

Many people Trump knows quite well are behind it.

Six of his former Cabinet secretaries helped write or collaborated on the 900-page playbook for a second Trump term. Four individuals Trump nominated as ambassadors were also involved, along with several enforcers of his controversial immigration crackdown. And about 20 pages are credited to his first deputy chief of staff.

In fact, at least 140 people who worked in the Trump administration had a hand in Project 2025, a CNN review found, including more than half of the people listed as authors, editors and contributors to “Mandate for Leadership,” the project’s extensive manifesto for overhauling the executive branch.

Dozens more who staffed Trump’s government hold positions with conservative groups advising Project 2025, including his former chief of staff Mark Meadows and longtime adviser Stephen Miller. These groups also include several lawyers deeply involved in Trump’s attempts to remain in power, such as his impeachment attorney Jay Sekulow and two of the legal architects of his failed bid to overturn the 2020 presidential election, Cleta Mitchell and John Eastman.

To quantify the scope of the involvement from Trump’s orbit, CNN reviewed online biographies, LinkedIn profiles and news clippings for more than 1,000 people listed on published directories for the 110 organizations on Project 2025’s advisory board, as well as the 200-plus names credited with working on “Mandate for Leadership.”

Overall, CNN found nearly 240 people with ties to both Project 2025 and to Trump, covering nearly every aspect of his time in politics and the White House – from day-to-day foot soldiers in Washington to the highest levels of his government. The number is likely higher because many individuals’ online résumés were not available.

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Security guard who plotted to kidnap Holly Willoughby with chloroform before raping and murdering her is sentenced to life in prison with a minimum term of 15 years

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13627731/Gavin-Plumbs-plans-kidnap-Holly-Willoughby-security-guard.html

A depraved 35-stone security guard who plotted to kidnap, murder and rape Holly Willoughby has been sentenced to life in prison with a minimum term of 15 years.

Gavin Plumb had plotted to ambush the former This Morning presenter at her London home in the dead of night, using chloroform to knock Ms Willoughby and her husband Dan Baldwin.

In his twisted plan, he would have taken the 43-year-old captive, holding her in an isolated 'dungeon' which he described as 'death row', repeatedly raping her before slitting her throat and murdering her.

Handing Plumb concurrent life sentences with a minimum term of 16 years for each of his three offences – minus 280 days spent on remand – the judge said they had been 'particularly brutal and degrading'.

While Plumb's 'gross obesity' meant the plot was 'unlikely to succeed', Mr Edward Justice Murray added: 'It's fortunate you didn't' succeed in finding one or more others who were physically more able.'

The defendant, who stood as the sentence was read out, initially showed no reaction but after hearing the words 'take him down', he turned to the female security guard and muttered: 'Fifteen years to kill myself.'

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https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/07/11/nevada-republicans-refuse-to-certify-reno-election/74352699007/

Turmoil has engulfed Washoe County, Nevada, the home of Reno and the second-most populous area of Nevada outside the Las Vegas metropolitan area, after Republicans on the county commission refused to certify an election.

According to USA Today, the three Republican members of the commission, which make up a majority of the five seats, refused to certify the results of the primary, claiming that the recounts for candidates Mark Lawson in Washoe County Commission District 4 and Paul White in Washoe County School Board Trustee District G, both Republicans who narrowly lost, require "further investigation," in the words of Commissioner Clara Andriola.

At issue in the decision to not certify the result was a printing error in a small precinct during early voting in May, and issues with tabulation machines that caused a delay in counting — but per acting Washoe County registrar Cari-Ann Burgess, the recount did not turn up any discrepancies.

Ironically, Andriola was herself the candidate Lawson was running against. She had drawn the anger of local Republicans by consistently voting to certify elections the rest of the party disputed, but in this case she finally moved to reject the results herself.

Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar and state Attorney General Aaron Ford, both Democrats, have stated that the commissioners have violated state law, and will be asking the state Supreme Court to order them to certify the election. "It is unacceptable that any public officer would undermine the confidence of their voters," said Aguilar.

The disputed recounts were both funded by Robert Beadles, a local businessman and GOP donor who has pushed election fraud conspiracy theories.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/13/us/video/dwight-jackson-detroit-shinola-hotel-discrimination-lawsuit-foa-digvid
Man says he's suing a hotel after getting an interview. Here's why

Michigan resident Dwight Jackson filed an employment discrimination lawsuit against the Shinola Hotel in Detroit, Michigan, alleging the hotel only Claremore Centrilift offered him a job interview after he changed the name on his résumé, according to a copy of the lawsuit obtained by CNN

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Democrat plans are destroyed, foiled by a real-life interpretation of Weekend at Bernie's concluding with another Biden meltdown
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/11/house-democrats-biden-00167711
Dems had a plan to win the House. Then Biden melted down.
To win back the House, Democrats were already going to have to outrun the president. Now it’s even harder.

House Democrats anguished over President Joe Biden’s spiral are consumed by one question: Can anything save their chances of flipping the House?

So far only three endangered Democrats have publicly called for Biden to leave the presidential race. But behind the scenes, the dozens of battleground members and candidates whose races will determine the House majority are in a “hair-on-fire” level of panic, in the words of one House aide.

Battleground members have placed urgent calls to leadership and Biden’s team, commissioned new polls back home and even mulled sending a letter to Biden himself, according to more than a dozen lawmakers, aides and operatives who work on competitive congressional races.

And one group of battleground Democrats even told House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries this week that Vice President Kamala Harris would be a better than Biden, according to a person familiar with the exchange.

They always knew they would need to outperform Biden in their districts. Many fear the political gravity may be too much to overcome — and Republicans will win full control of the federal government


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The world is more interested in Project 2025 than the NFL — and Taylor Swift. At least when it comes to Google searches.

That's according to Google Trends graphics making the rounds on social media that show rising interest when it comes to the GOP's plan to overhaul the federal government compared with the pop mega-superstar and America's most popular sport.

A graphic shared Tuesday evening by the pro-democracy group Resolute Square showed Project 2025 overtaking Swift in early July.

"Keep it up, America. The more people that learn about Trump's Authoritarian plan for America, the more Americans will show up at the polls to stop him.Real Patriots hate fascists! (& love Taylor too)," the group wrote on X.

And on Wednesday afternoon, MSNBC's "The Beat with Ari Melber" shared a graphic compiled by the Biden-Harris Campaign showing searches for Project 2025 overtook the NFL and Swift around the same time.

Since the debate, Biden has pushed for Americans to look closer at the coalition's plan, writing on X this week: "Google Project 2025." His campaign even created a website highlighting what it calls (in all caps) "Trump allies' 920 page plan to give Trump more power over your daily life, gut Democratic checks and balances, and consolidate power in the Oval Office."

The plan — cobbled together by numerous Trump allies, though he denied knowledge of its agenda — would dramatically expand presidential power and replace up to 50,000 government workers with Trump loyalists.

https://www.rawstory.com/project-2025-2668724780/

Justice went full frontal in the Castro last week when two nudists took down a man attacking a tourist on the street.

The naked samaritans—Pete Sferra of San Jose and Lloyd Fishback of San Francisco—were letting it all hang out on a July 2 stroll through the neighborhood when they spotted a “crazy kind of pirate guy” threatening a man with a blowtorch.

A video from the scene shows an onlooker snag the blowtorch just before the attacker starts to punch the tourist. Petros Fanourgiakis, owner of the nearby Aegean Delights, said the attacker threatened to burn the tourist’s face.

“My buddy Lloyd is a quiet, respectful guy,” Sferra said. “But he didn’t waste any time and nailed the guy with a right hook.”

Fishback followed up the punch with an underhand smack to the face, after which the attacker walked away.

Shirts 0; skins 1.

Sferra, who emphasized that Fishback is the hero, said he and at least two other people called the police as the incident unfolded. Fishback declined to comment for this story as the nudist values his privacy.

A spokesperson for the San Francisco Police Department identified the suspect as 38-year-old Zero Triball. He’s suspected of assault with a deadly weapon and remains in county jail, according to official records.

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Inside the glitzy fundraiser where Biden lost George Clooney

Some donors who attended the June 15 event at L.A.’s Peacock Theater said this week that they noticed Biden seemed slow. He seemed frail. As he greeted donors lined up for photos, he trailed off or spoke too quietly to be heard.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/07/12/george-clooney-joe-biden-fundraiser/

Based on a true story, the film tells of the courageous men and women who risk their lives every working day, pitting their fishing boats and rescue vessels against the capricious forces of nature. Their worst fears are realized at sea on Halloween of 1991, when they are confronted by three raging weather fronts which unexpectedly collide to produce the greatest, fiercest storm in modern history -- "The Perfect Storm."

Joe Biden in danger of repeating Ruth Bader Ginsburg's error
Remember, it was Dick Cheney who said, “In our nation’s 246-year history, there has never been an individual who is a greater threat to our republic than Donald Trump.”
But others were wondered whether we are seeing a new version of the lasting consequences of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s decision to put off her retirement from the Supreme Court while Barack Obama was president and Democrats controlled the U.S. Senate.

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https://ca.news.yahoo.com/joe-biden-warns-project-2025-191711036.html

President Joe Biden made a succinct warning on Wednesday about Project 2025, the right-wing blueprint for a second Donald Trump presidency pushed by dozens of conservative groups and members of Trump’s last administration.

“Project 2025 will destroy America. Look it up,” Biden said in a video posted to social media, linking to a page on his campaign website outlining the agenda.

Project 2025 will destroy America.
00
Look it up. We made it easy for you:
— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) July 10, 2024

Project 2025 is a 900-page collection of policy proposals put together by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. It outlines a plan to consolidate power in the executive branch, reclassifying thousands of public service roles as political appointees and paving the way for a government steeped in Christian nationalist values.

Items on the agenda include establishing a nationwide abortion ban, expanding gas and oil drilling, cutting back on food stamp access, ending free school meals, eliminating the Department of Education, cutting Medicaid funding, ramping up deportations and denying disaster relief funds to states that don’t abide by federal immigration laws.


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TikTok’s parent company ByteDance has turned off the AI-image generation capabilities of one of its AI apps after 404 Media found that users on 4chan found a way to use the AI app to generate porn, despite policies and guardrails in the app designed to stop the creation of that type of content.

So far, it doesn’t appear that users have figured out how to easily create nonconsensual AI-generated images of celebrities using Cici AI, as they often do when using these apps. I have seen a series of pornographic images of two different celebrities that users claim were made with Cici AI, but was unable to reproduce those images in my testing. But the news shows how users are able to easily bypass guardrails in generative AI tools designed to prevent certain types of content, even when they are produced by the biggest technology companies in the world.

In January, Forbes first reported that ByteDance had quietly launched the app, called Cici AI, “in the past three months,” as well as two other generative AI apps, all of which are at least partially powered by OpenAI’s ChatGPT, accessed through a Microsoft Azure license. Cici AI, which is developed by a ByteDance subsidiary named Spring (SG) Pte. Ltd, is an “AI assistant” which functions like many other chatbots and can answer questions and generate images based on written prompts.

Earlier this month, I started to see AI-generated pornographic images in the Telegram and 4chan communities that had previously spread the AI-generated nonconsensual sexual images of Taylor Swift that went viral on Twitter in January, and which were generated with Microsoft’s Designer tool.

The Cici AI-generated images are far more graphic than the images users were able to generate with Microsoft’s Designer before Microsoft closed the loophole that allowed users to generate those images, but so far I have not seen it generate the likeness of a real person.

https://archive.vn/B1sr0

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https://www.ncja.org/crimeandjusticenews/2024-republican-platform-shifts-drops-gun-rights-promises

In its first official platform since 2016, the Grand Old Party (GOP) slashed all mention of its gun policy positions, The Reload reports. The Republican National Committee (RNC) Platform Committee voted 84-to-18 on Monday to adopt the new 2024 platform language after skipping the process entirely in 2020. The final document reflects former President Donald Trump's "America First" perspective and echoes many of his positions. However, it reduces the party's focus on gun policy compared to its previous platform. The entire platform discusses gun rights just once, in a preamble statement about the party’s dedication to defending “our fundamental freedoms, including freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and the right to keep and bear arms.” The final product omits any discussion of tangible gun policy ideas.

The GOP’s 2024 platform being nearly silent on gun policy was not the only instance of the party leaning away from its traditional issues and stances. The updated platform also featured notably softened language on abortion restrictions, a move that reflects former President Trump’s recent sidelining of the pro-life movement. While the party’s 2016 platform endorsed a federal abortion ban after 20 weeks, the updated document codified Trump’s preference to leave the issue to the states. It also endorsed protections for birth control and fertility treatments like in vitro fertilization (IVF). The updated platform also removed the party’s previous opposition to same-sex marriage, its emphasis on reducing the national debt, and its vision for entitlement reform. Instead, the platform explicitly called for the complete protection of Social Security and Medicare without any cuts or retirement age adjustments, a longtime Trump priority. The Trump campaign celebrated the final draft of the platform and emphasized the former President’s personal influence on its contents.

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Turns out that Biden doesn't actually lead in Wisconsin, the only battleground state people thought he was ahead in, it turns out Biden's actually trailing trump by 6%: https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/10/biden-age-wisconsin-voters-00167214

But that is boring. Lets talk about how Biden *IS* ahead in a battleground state. A state that hasn't been a battleground state in decades, but somehow Biden managed to pull it off. But this didn't deter ol' Scranton Joe.

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/07/10/biden-new-york-trouble-00167198
Biden support slips in deep blue New York: ‘We’re a battleground state now’

President Joe Biden has a new problem: a competitive race in deep blue New York.

Elected officials, union leaders and political consultants are panicking over polls showing a steady erosion of Biden’s support in a state he won by 23 points four years ago. They’re so worried they’ve been trying to convince the Biden team to pour resources into New York to shore up his campaign and boost Democrats running in a half-dozen swing districts that could determine control of the House.

Biden aides have not focused on New York, committing no significant resources to a state where they expect the president to easily win all 28 electoral college votes in November.

But the warning signs are impossible to ignore and have been building over the past year. Two private polls conducted in a swing New York House district and reviewed by POLITICO — one in September and another in March — found former President Donald Trump leading Biden there by 1 point, a virtual tie. And public polls over the last four months found Biden’s lead had winnowed to just 8 points across New York — an unusually narrow gap in a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2 to 1.


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Difficulty - the crime was committed before he became president.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-asks-judge-toss-guilty-verdict-hush-money-case-supreme-court-dec-rcna161335

Former President Donald Trump has asked a state court judge to toss out his criminal conviction in New York, pointing to the Supreme Court’s recent immunity decision that outlines when a former president must be shielded from prosecution.

While the effort to toss out the jury’s verdict likely faces an uphill battle with Judge Juan Merchan, the last-ditch bid already succeeded in getting Trump’s sentencing date postponed.

Sentencing had been scheduled for Thursday but was delayed by Merchan last week to allow him more time to consider legal briefing on the immunity question from both sides. Prosecutors are expected to respond to the latest filing by July 24, and that sentencing is currently set for Sept. 18.