POLITICS: All eyes are on Jared Kushner. Yesterday, it came out that Prez Trump apparently commanded his then-chief of staff - John Kelly - to hand over top-secret security clearance to Jared Kushner. Aka Trump’s son-in-law. This reportedly came after intelligence officials said ‘we have some concerns’ and warned the Prez not to give Kushner top-secret security clearance. Advice, disregarded. In other news, the House of Reps just passed the “Charleston loophole bill.” ICYDK, there’s a loophole that allows people to sell guns if a background check takes longer than three days to complete. Not a typo. This new bill would move the period to 10 days. Stay tuned.
USA: Yesterday, Toledo (aka the city in Ohio) voted to give personhood status to Lake Erie. Meaning it’d now be treated like a person. Reminder: Lake Erie has a little algae bloom problem. Read: big. As in the algae bloom is contaminating the lake’s waters - cutting off drinking water for half a million people. Now, with Lake Erie’s new personhood status, Toledo residents can sue polluters to pay for cleanup costs or prevention programs. Speaking of which, recently, PG&E (as in the utility biz) declared that they’re probably responsible for last year’s Camp Fire in California - the state’s deadliest fire ever. This comes after the biz filed for bankruptcy.
WORLD: Netanyahu’s not the only world leader in hot water. Yesterday, Canada’s former attorney general said ‘here’s the tea’ and detailed a months-long campaign by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office to put an end to a legal issue for a Quebec construction firm. Yes, really. The former attorney general says this counts as interference in the judicial system - even though it wasn’t illegal. But Trudeau says he was just trying to stop people from losing their jobs. Unclear what this means for him. Meanwhile, Thailand just passed a controversial cybersecurity law that’d reportedly allow the gov to do things like monitor internet traffic and access private data. Cue backlash.
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