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Published by Radar Online MEGA Celebrities planning to attend Jay-Z‘s eagerly anticipated Oscars afterparty will have to pass boycotters as they head into the controversial Chateau Marmont on Sunday. The LA hotspot has been facing backlash since 2020, when more than 200 workers were fired allegedly without insurance or severance during the pandemic. Since then, there have also been allegations of racial discrimination and harassment from former staff members, which the hotel has denied, amid lawsuits against the famed location. 007 / MEGA “Compensation is not determined or defined by ethnicity or any other such factor. Wages are set based on the work assigned,” a representative for the hotel previously said in response to discrimination claims. “We take very seriously our equal-opportunity employment obligations.” A-list guests will have to bypass a picket line organized for around 8 p.m. if they plan on joining Jay-Z’s star-studded shindig. The event is known for drawing out some of the biggest stars in the world as the rapper, 52, previously held his “Gold Party” two years ago with attendees including Rihanna, Adele and Kim Kardashian. It’s said Jay-Z will later be joined by his wife, Beyoncé, who is set to take the stage for the 2022 Oscars telecast from the Compton tennis court. MEGA “For Jay-Z to choose the Chateau Marmont for their Gold Party is shockingly insensitive,” Kurt Petersen, co-president of Unite Here Local 11, said in a statement on Thursday. “They must move their event and choose an afterparty hot spot that treats its workers, especially Black women, with dignity and respect. Jay-Z has a responsibility to do better.” mely / MEGA “We hope Jay-Z joins Gabrielle Union, Spike Lee, Issa Rae, Robin Thede, Quinta Brunson, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Roxane Gay, Ashley Nicole Black and Samira Wiley in boycotting Chateau Marmont,” Peterson continued, mentioning celebs who are in support of their mission. Peterson noted that individuals like Jay-Z can make a difference as they have power and influence in a separate statement to Page Six, adding, “Jay-Z has the opportunity right now to do just that by listening to the stories of Chateau Marmont workers and move his event.” View the full article

Published by Reuters By Maria Caspani (Reuters) – Arizona, Oklahoma and Kentucky passed bills on Thursday that would ban transgender youth from participating in girls’ sports, the latest in a flurry of state legislation by Republicans on a heated election year issue. In addition to the Republican-sponsored “Save Women’s Sports Act”, Arizona lawmakers passed legislation that would prohibit physicians from providing gender-affirming surgery to minors. Both bills are now headed to the desk of Governor Doug Ducey, also a Republican. Arizona passed a third bill, which would ban abortions after 15 weeks of gestation. The votes largely fell along party lines. “Why would we be legislating bullying against children who want to … participate in sports?,” Democratic Representative Kelli Butler said in an emotional speech on Thursday. “That’s not the country that I know and that I am proud to be a part of.” A bill with the same “Save Women’s Sports Act” title passed in the Oklahoma Legislature on Thursday. In Kentucky, lawmakers passed SB 83, which would ban transgender girls from participating in girls sports from sixth grade through college. The bill now goes to Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, a Democrat. Beshear’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Democrats have generally supported rights for LGBTQ+ people and opposed restrictions on participation in sports teams for transgender students. Supporters of these bans argue they are needed to ensure transgender athletes do not have an unfair advantage. Opponents of the bans, including advocates for transgender people and organizations like the Women’s Sports Foundation, say that such measures are discriminatory, and they advocate for the inclusion of transgender students in school sports. Governors in states including Texas, Alabama, Mississippi and Iowa have already signed into law bills that ban transgender girls from competing in girls’ sports. Similar bills were vetoed by the governors of Utah and Indiana this week, signaling the reluctance of some Republican leaders to align with the broader party that sees the issue as a winning strategy to attract voters ahead of U.S. congressional elections in November. Republican lawmakers in both states said earlier this week they planned to override the governors’ vetoes. (Reporting by Maria Caspani; Additional reporting by Sharon Bernstein; editing by Grant McCool) View the full article

Published by Reuters By James Oliphant and Maria Caspani (Reuters) – Republican governors in Utah and Indiana this week rejected legislation banning transgender athletes from competing in girls’ sports, pushing back against a rising tide of similar Republican-sponsored legislation nationwide. But the vetoes of those governors appear to be among the solitary voices in a party that has become increasingly fixated on polarizing cultural issues involving race, sex and gender as a cudgel to win over suburban and rural voters and regain power in November’s congressional elections. Eleven states have enacted laws banning transgender girls from participating in girls’ sports since 2020, according to the Equality Federation, which tracks legislation that targets lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer people. The vetoes in Utah and Indiana are expected to be overridden by Republicans in the state legislatures, making the actions by Utah Governor Spencer Cox and Indiana Governor Eric Holcomb largely symbolic. “Saving women’s sports is now a litmus test for Republicans,” said Terry Schilling, president of the American Principles Project, a conservative group that has made state high school transgender bans central to its advocacy. “These governors just shot themselves in the foot for no good reason.” The issue gained new resonance this month when collegiate swimmer Lia Thomas became the first openly trans athlete to win a Division I championship in any sport. Conservatives have used her victory as a rallying cry for more restrictive legislation. Republican Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida, who is up for re-election and has become perhaps his party’s most high-profile cultural warrior, this week declared the second-place finisher in Thomas’ race the actual winner, saying the NCAA was “perpetuating a fraud” and undermining the integrity of women’s sports. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimated https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/68/wr/mm6803a3.htm in 2019 that just 1.8% of high school students in the country are transgender, and the Human Rights Campaign has said that, according to surveys https://assets2.hrc.org/files/assets/resources/PlayToWin-FINAL.pdf, only about 12% play on girls’ sports teams. In Utah, Cox called the issue of transgender students participating in sports “one of the most divisive of our time” and said he wanted to approach the issue with compassion. He expressed concern for the mental health of trans youths, who, he said, simply want to participate in sports as a means of belonging. Cox said he found only one instance of a transgender student playing on a girls’ high school team in Utah. “Rarely has so much fear and anger been directed at so few,” Cox wrote in a letter explaining his veto. “I don’t understand what they are going through or why they feel the way they do. But I want them to live.” POLITICAL RISK In vetoing the bills, both Cox and Holcomb suggested the restrictions were unnecessary and would invite costly lawsuits. Beyond Utah and Indiana, governors in three other states have vetoed similar bans, although South Dakota then enacted a revised law, according to the Equality Federation. Fran Hutchins, the organization’s executive director, called the legislative pushes a ploy to drum up support ahead of the midterm elections, when Republicans could win back a majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives. “I really hope that the Republican vetoes are the beginning of a sea change in the way that conservatives are thinking about this,” Hutchins said. “But I fear that we’re going to see this rhetoric continue beyond legislative sessions and into the elections.” Chris Wilson, a Republican pollster who consults on Senate and gubernatorial campaigns, said that Democrats oppose such bans at their peril, saying they are favored by some independents and Democrats who believe it is unfair to allow transgender students to compete in girls’ athletics. A May 2021 poll by Gallup https://news.gallup.com/poll/350174/mixed-views-among-americans-transgender-issues.aspx found that 62% of Americans said trans athletes should only be allowed to play on sports teams that correspond with their birth gender, while 34% say they should be able to play on teams that match their gender identity. Wilson said Democrats who vote against such bans could see political blowback similar to the controversy over calls by progressives to de-fund police departments, a position that has largely been rejected by a majority of voters nationwide. Republicans could face political risks as well. In vetoing the Indiana bill, Holcomb may have wanted to avoid the firestorm that arose in 2015 when then-governor Mike Pence signed a controversial religious freedom bill. And in 2016, North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory, a Republican, lost his re-election bid after the state’s so-called “bathroom bill” requiring transgender people to use the bathroom of their original sex triggered a backlash that damaged the state’s economy. (Reporting by Maria Caspani and James Oliphant; Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Aurora Ellis) View the full article

Published by Radar Online Mega Former Olympic gold medal winner Caitlyn Jenner is speaking out against transgender swimmer Lia Thomas winning the women’s NCAA Swimming Championship. The former California gubernatorial nominee said the 22-year-old swimmer was “not the rightful winner,” naming second place winner Emma Weyant as the true victor of the final race. Mega Thomas made headlines being the first transgender woman to win the NCAA’s championship. She was viewed as an inspiration to many but also garnered a lot of vitriol from others claiming she shouldn’t have been allowed in the women’s swimming competition, to begin with. Jenner —who’s a fellow trans community member and a former athlete — is one of these people. The Keeping Up with the Kardashians star retweeted a story about Florida Governor Ron DeSantis denouncing Thomas. “Agreed! [Weyant] is the rightful winner!” Jenner responded, adding, “It’s not transphobic or anti-trans, it’s COMMON SENSE!” Jenner’s show of support for the governor, who had actively fought against gay and trans rights, has drawn the attention of many that disagree with the former Olympic gold medalist, claiming what she said is, in fact, transphobic. The comments on Jenner’s tweet range from support to criticism with one follower asking, “Why do you always ignore all the times a trans athlete doesn’t win? It creates a baffling paradox when you say thy give cis women no chance despite them not winning more often than them doing so.” Another comment read, “Common sense is not something you or Governor Ron DeSantis has a lot of.” Mega In an official proclamation, DeSantis announced Weyant as the NCAA championship winner, saying, “A male identifying as a woman was allowed to compete in and was declared the winner of the race by the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) and Emma was determined to have come in second place.” He continued to claim, “actions served to erode opportunities for women athletes and perpetuate a fraud against women athletes as well as the public at large.” Last year, Florida signed a bill into law called The Fairness in Women’s Sports Act. The anti-trans legislation became effective on the first day of Pride month, banning trans female athletes from competing in public high school and college sports. The former athlete has faced criticism several times in the past for being against several trans issues despite coming out as a trans woman herself in 2015. Caitlyn Jenner Says Transgender Girls In School Should Not Compete On Girls’ Sports Teams Her rocky history concerning the trans community had a spotlight shined on it when Jenner decided to run for Governor of California against Governor Gavin Newsom during the 2021 recall election. The reality TV star was only able to accumulate 1% of the vote commenting, “I can’t believe that this many people actually voted to keep him in office” during her concession speech. Mega Trans athletes have been a topic of contention between party lines. With the few athletes choosing to compete in their preferred gender-separated sports, the likes of Jenner, as well as popular podcaster Joe Rogan and many others have been against the idea of non-cis female athletes competing with biological females. There have been a number of trans athletes who have failed to secure the gold, but it’s been the few cases where they have that it has become an issue with those involved in the industry. View the full article

Published by Kaiser Health News From a well-lighted room, the plants blurred in the background, their face framed by closed captioning, Shahem Mclaurin speaks directly into the camera. The lesson: “Ten ways to start healing.” But this is not a classroom, nor is it a therapist’s office. This is TikTok. “We all have our own things to carry, and those burdens shouldn’t be carried with us for the rest of our lives,” says Mclaurin, a licensed social worker. Through videos — some on topics like grief, “race/race-ism,” trauma, and healing, others raw reactions or trending sounds, like this call to action to amplify people of color … Read More View the full article

Published by Reuters By Natalia Zinets, Natalie Thomas and Vitalii Hnidiy LVIV/MYKOLAIV/KHARKIV, Ukraine (Reuters) – A veteran aide of President Vladimir Putin has resigned over the Ukraine war and left Russia with no intention to return, two sources said on Wednesday, the first senior official to break with the Kremlin since Putin launched his invasion a month ago. The Kremlin confirmed that the aide, Anatoly Chubais, had resigned of his own accord. Chubais hung up the phone when contacted by Reuters. The sources did not say where he was. Chubais was one of the principal architects of Boris Yeltsin’s economic reforms of the 1990s and was Putin’s boss in the future president’s first Kremlin job. He later ran big state businesses under Putin and held political jobs, lately serving as Kremlin special envoy to international organisations. U.S. President Joe Biden flies to Europe on Wednesday for an emergency NATO summit on Ukraine, where invading Russian troops are stalled, cities are under bombardment and the besieged port of Mariupol is in flames. Four weeks into a war that has driven a quarter of Ukraine’s 44 million people from their homes, Russia has failed to capture a single major Ukrainian city or depose the government, while Western sanctions have ostracised it from the world economy. Russian forces have taken heavy losses, been frozen in place for at least a week on most fronts and face supply problems and fierce resistance. They have turned to siege tactics and bombardment, causing massive destruction and many civilian deaths. Moscow says its aim is to disarm its neighbour, and its “special military operation” is going to plan. It denies targeting civilians. Worst hit has been Mariupol, a southern port completely surrounded by Russian forces, where hundreds of thousands of people have been sheltering since the war’s early days, under constant bombardment and with food, water and heat supplies cut. New satellite photographs from commercial firm Maxar released overnight showed massive destruction of what was once a city of 400,000 people, with columns of smoke rising from residential apartment buildings in flames. No journalists have been able to report from inside the Ukrainian-held parts of the city for more than a week, during which time Ukrainian officials say Russia has bombed a theatre and an art school used as bomb shelters, burying hundreds of people alive. Russia denies targeting those buildings. Biden, due to arrive in Brussels on Wednesday evening on his first foreign trip since the war began, will meet NATO and European leaders in an emergency summit at the Western military alliance’s headquarters. The leaders are expected to roll out additional sanctions against Russia on Thursday. Sources said the U.S. package would include measures targeting Russian members of parliament. Biden will also visit Poland, which has taken in most of the more than 3.6 million refugees who have fled Ukraine and has been the main route for Western supplies of weapons to Ukraine. In a sign of Moscow’s further isolation, Poland announced it was expelling 45 Russian diplomats accused of either being undercover spies or “associated” with them. Several other eastern European countries have announced similar moves in recent days, although not on such a large scale. Russia has rejected all the accusations. ‘NOWHERE TO GO’ “I have never seen such cruelty before,” said Kateryna Mytkevich, 38, who reached the Polish border transit hub of Przemysl with her child after fleeing the heavily bombarded eastern city of Chernihiv, which she said was “fully destroyed”. “There is no electricity, no gas, no mobile connection in Chernihiv. We came through Kyiv, and we didn’t know whether Kyiv was still standing,” she said, breaking into tears. In Kharkiv in the east, a maternity clinic had moved patients into the basement for safety. Tearful mother Yana cradled her baby in a room with beds lining the walls. Her house has been bombed. “I have nowhere to go,” she said. In another maternity ward far away in Mykolaiv, a southern port which Russian forces tried and failed to storm over the past 10 days, Tamara Kravchuk, 37, lay blissfully with her baby just minutes old on her chest. She had been scared, especially when explosions burst just 500 metres from the hospital, she said. But baby Katya melted her fears away. “I think the war will end and we will live as it was before, our life will be calm again,” she said. “I hope our children won’t see all these crazy things and everything will be good.” Despite its losses so far, Russia may still be hoping to make more gains on the battlefield, especially in the east, in territory including Mariupol which Moscow demands Ukraine cede to Russian-backed separatists. In a daily intelligence update, Britain’s defence ministry said the entire battlefield across northern Ukraine – which includes huge armoured columns that once bore down on Kyiv – was now “static”, with invaders apparently trying to reorganise. But in the east, the Russians were trying to link troops at Mariupol with those near Kharkiv in the hope of encircling Ukrainian forces, while in the southwest they were bypassing the city of Mykolayiv to try to advance on Odesa, Ukraine’s biggest port. Ukrainian officials described sporadic shelling in other cities overnight, with two civilians killed in the Mykolayiv region, a bridge destroyed in the Chernihiv region, and residential buildings and a shopping mall struck in two districts of Kyiv, wounding at least four people. Reuters could not immediately verify the reports. (Reporting by Reuters bureaus; Writing by Peter Graff; Editing by Philippa Fletcher) View the full article

Published by The Seattle Times Seattle Pride has cut Amazon as a sponsor for its annual parade, citing financial support for lawmakers, organizations and legislation that does not support the LGBTQ community. Amazon has been a sponsor for the event in the past, Seattle Pride Executive Director Krystal Marx said, following the announcement Tuesday. But this time the company came in with a $100,000 offer, significantly higher than past donations, and strings attached — including a request to call the annual celebration Seattle Pride Parade Presented by Amazon. It felt as if Amazon was trying to buy the event and the nonprofit… Read More View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Wanda Sykes didn’t tell her wife she was in the running to host the Oscars. The 58-year-old star will co-anchor this weekend’s Academy Awards with Amy Schumer and Regina Hall but before the news was officially announced, the ‘Upshaws’ star kept the gig to herself because she couldn’t face a string of constant questions from her spouse Alex Niedbalski. She told People magazine: “I can’t tell her stuff because she would drive me nuts asking about it every day. “Like I’ll tell her, ‘Oh guess what? I’m shooting a movie in Hawaii,’ as I’m heading the airport.” And when she eventually broke the news to Alex, her spouse only had one thing on her mind. Asked how her wife had reacted, Wanda said: ” ‘What am I going to wear?’ It was all of that.” And while Alex has been “working out, doing way too much” to prepare for walking the red carpet at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood on Sunday (27.03.22), Wanda has had practicalities on her mind. She quipped: “Me? I’m just looking for some comfortable shoes.” The couple – who have been married for 13 years and have twins Olivia and Lucas, 12, together – are open about their relationship on Instagram, and the ‘Black-ish’ star insisted it is “important” for her to share that part of her life with her frans. She said: “It makes a huge difference.” Wanda particularly loves her French wife’s cooking. She said: “I’m learning how to prepare different meals. And I didn’t know you actually can eat cheese and drink wine every day, but apparently it’s a-okay.” The ‘Other Two’ actress recently admitted she is planning to get drunk at the ceremony, though she’ll hold off tucking into the alcohol until after the first act. She said: “Then I’m like, I’m here to have some fun. It’s not like I’m getting paid, you know. You get what you pay for. You want sober Wanda, you’ve got to add some zeroes and move that comma. You’re getting free Wanda. “So if you see just Amy and Regina out, you can just go, ‘Wanda’s drunk, she’s backstage.’ “ View the full article

Published by Reuters By Paresh Dave OAKLAND, Calif. (Reuters) -Ukraine is using facial recognition software to identify the bodies of Russian soldiers killed in combat and to trace their families to inform them of their deaths, Ukraine’s vice prime minister told Reuters. Reuters exclusively reported that Ukraine’s Ministry of Defense this month began using technology from Clearview AI, a New York-based facial recognition provider that finds images on the web that match faces from uploaded photos. It was not clear at that time how the technology would be used. Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice prime minister who also runs the ministry of digital transformation, told Reuters Ukraine had been using Clearview AI software to find the social media accounts of dead Russian soldiers. From there, authorities are messaging relatives to make arrangements to collect the body, he said. “As a courtesy to the mothers of those soldiers, we are disseminating this information over social media to at least let families know that they they’ve lost their sons and to then enable them to come to collect their bodies,” Fedorov said in an interview, speaking via a translator. Fedorov declined to specify the number of bodies identified through facial recognition but he said the percentage of recognized individuals claimed by families has been “high.” Reuters was unable to independently confirm this. Opponents of facial recognition, including civil rights groups, have decried Ukraine’s adoption of Clearview, citing the possibility of misidentification. Clearview is battling a lawsuit in U.S. federal court in Chicago filed by consumers under the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act. The ongoing case concerns whether the company’s gathering of images from the internet violated privacy law. Clearview says its actions have been legal. It says its face matches should only be a starting point in investigations. Fedorov said Ukraine was not using the technology to identify its own troops killed in battle. He did not specify why. Ukraine’s Ministry of Internal Affairs did not respond to requests for comment. It has been overseeing the country’s Look For Your Own project, a Telegram channel where it posts images of unidentified captured or killed Russian soldiers and invites claims from relatives. The Ukrainian government has an online form https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfNcHV6cob4f8QHc90QnpAihMsioOOroSQWNAVHCmwDelHL8w/viewform where Russian relatives can submit a claim to collect a body. Fedorov did not provide details of how the bodies are being returned to families and Reuters could not independently determine that. Ukraine’s military has said some 15,000 Russian soldiers have been killed since Russia invaded on Feb 24. Russia has said its casualties are much lower during what it describes as a “special military operation” to demilitarize Ukraine. The Kremlin did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment on Ukraine’s use of Clearview. Clearview, which offered its service free of charge to Ukraine after the Russian invasion, has said its search engine includes over 2 billion images from VKontakte, a popular Russian social media service. VKontakte did not respond to a request for comment. Facial recognition is just one of many tools Ukraine has adopted for free as Western businesses come to its aid, Fedorov said. For instance, his ministry is now using cloud services from Amazon.com Inc to store “critical data,” he said, without elaborating. Amazon declined to comment on Fedorov’s remarks. Richard Bassed, head of the forensic medicine department at Monash University in Australia, said fingerprints, dental records and DNA remain the most common ways of confirming someone’s identity. Obtaining pre-death samples of such data from enemy fighters is challenging, though, opening the door to innovative techniques such as facial recognition. But clouded eyes and injured and expressionless faces potentially make facial recognition unreliable on the dead, said Bassed, who has been researching the technology. In the United States, the Armed Forces Medical Examiner System said it has not adopted automated facial recognition because the technology is not currently generally accepted in the forensic community. (Reporting by Paresh DaveEditing by Daniel Flynn and Lincoln Feast.) View the full article

Published by AFP The fight over abortion rights in the United States has never gone away, but as the Supreme Court looks set to revisit Roe v. Wade, local initiatives are reshaping access to the procedure Los Angeles (AFP) – Another US state passed a law allowing abortion providers to be sued in civil court Wednesday, as conservatives across the country ramp up their effort to overturn long-held reproductive rights. The bill in Idaho allows families of women who have had abortions — and the father of the fetus — to sue providers, taking enforcement out of the hands of the state, in a move modeled on a controversial Texas law. Governor Brad Little, who signed the bill Wednesday, said he was an ardent supporter of the rights of “pre-born babies,” but feared this approach rendered the law unconstitutional. “While I support the pro-life policy in this legislation, I fear the novel civil enforcement mechanism will in short order be proven both unconstitutional and unwise,” he wrote in a letter to the state legislature. “Deputizing private citizens to levy hefty monetary fines on the exercise of a disfavored but judicially recognized constitutional right for the purpose of evading court review undermines our constitutional form of government and weakens our collective liberties.” As critics of the Texas law also pointed out, Little said framing legislation in this way rendered vulnerable rights that conservatives hold dear, such as the right to own guns. Civil rights groups and the White House lambasted the Idaho law. “Lawmakers openly touted this bill as a ‘clever’ way to undermine abortion access by evading judicial review,” said Lauren Bramwell of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). “It is irresponsible and politically motivated governing that will harm real people who deserve to decide for themselves what is best for them and their families, without political interference.” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the Texas bill and copycat initiatives like the one in Idaho were a blatant attempt to undermine rights settled in the touchstone Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling that cemented a woman’s right to abortion. “This development is devastating for women in Idaho, as it will further impede women’s access to health care, especially those on low incomes and living in rural communities,” she said. “Over the last six months, Texas’ (law) has had profoundly negative effects, with women forced to travel hundreds of miles to access care, and clinics in neighboring states seeing a significant increase in demand.” Right-wing politicians have launched a full-frontal assault on abortion, a deeply divisive issue in the United States that is dear to their voters’ hearts. A total of 1,844 provisions relating to sexual and reproductive health and rights have been introduced in 46 US states during just the past two-and-a-half months, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which advocates for abortion rights. Lawmakers in conservative Republican-led southern states have introduced bills tightening restrictions on abortion, while their counterparts in Democratic-ruled progressive states have submitted measures protecting a woman’s right to choose. The legislative frenzy comes as the Supreme Court, dominated by conservatives following the nomination of three justices by former president Donald Trump, looks poised to re-examine the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling. View the full article

Published by Reuters By Gabriella Borter (Reuters) – Billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott donated $275 million to women’s healthcare provider Planned Parenthood, the largest gift from a single donor in the organization’s more than 100-year history, Planned Parenthood said on Wednesday. The donation, which is part of Scott’s pledge to give away the majority of her wealth, was made to Planned Parenthood’s national office and 21 regional affiliates. Scott, who is now married to Dan Jewett, a Seattle science teacher, received a 4% stake in Amazon.com Inc as part of her divorce from Amazon founder and billionaire Jeff Bezos. Planned Parenthood, which provides abortions and other healthcare services at its clinics around the country, is at the forefront of the political battle over abortion rights playing out in U.S. state legislatures and courts. Abortion access in the United States is on the decline as Republican-led states pass ever tighter restrictions on the procedure, including a near-total ban on abortions in Texas that has withstood legal challenges. The conservative-leaning U.S. Supreme Court seems likely to overhaul constitutional protections for abortion this spring. The court has signaled its willingness to reinstate a ban on abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy in Mississippi. That would contradict the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade case that established the right to have an abortion before the fetus is viable, which is around 24 weeks. “We are incredibly grateful for Ms. Scott’s extraordinary philanthropic investment in Planned Parenthood, as a critical part of the public health infrastructure,” Planned Parenthood Chief Executive Alexis McGill Johnson said in a statement. “This funding will support our efforts to advance health equity by eliminating racial and structural barriers for our patients in the communities where Planned Parenthood works.” In a Medium post on Wednesday, Scott said she had donated more than $3.8 billion to 465 non-profit organizations, including Planned Parenthood, since last June. “Our team’s focus over these last nine months has included some new areas, but as always our aim has been to support the needs of underrepresented people from groups of all kinds. The cause of equity has no sides,” she wrote. On Tuesday, Habitat for Humanity announced that Scott had donated $436 million, which will go toward the organization’s efforts to boost affordable housing and Black homeownership. Scott was worth about $49 billion as of Wednesday, according to Forbes. (The story is refiled to fix spelling of “McGill” in paragraph 8) (Reporting by Gabriella Borter; Editing by Bill Berkrot) View the full article

Published by BANG Showbiz English Prince William has expressed his “profound sorrow” over slavery. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge attended an official dinner and reception hosted by the Governor General of Jamaica at King’s House in Kingston, Jamaica, on Wednesday (23.03.22), where the 39-year-old royal denounced the “abhorrent” slave trade. Speaking on the couple’s fifth day of their Caribbean tour, he said: “I want to express my profound sorrow. Slavery was abhorrent. And it should never have happened. “While the pain runs deep, Jamaica continues to forge its future with determination, courage and fortitude. “The strength and shared sense of purpose of the Jamaican people, represented in your flag and motto, celebrate an invincible spirit. “I strongly agree with my father, The Prince of Wales, who said in Barbados last year that the appalling atrocity of slavery forever stains our history.” William also insisted his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth, has a “deep affection” for Jamaica. He said: “It is no secret that the queen has a deep affection for Jamaica, forged on her very first visit here with my grandfather, the Duke of Edinburgh, in 1953. “And likewise, I have been touched to hear today from Jamaicans, young and old, about their affection for the queen. “Her dedication, commitment, and sense of duty to the Commonwealth family is deeply admired. “She may be my actual grandmother, but everyone counts her as their grandmother too. And I’m OK with that.” William’s words come after Jamaica’s Prime Minister Andrew Holness confirmed to the duke and duchess that the country is seeking to become “independent”. The British royals’ arrival on the Caribbean island on Tuesday (22.03.22) was marked by protests seeking slave reparations from the monarchy amid calls for the country to drop the queen as head of state. The Prime Minister told the couple: “We’re very, very happy to have you and we hope you’ve received a warm welcome of the people. “Jamaica is a very free and liberal country and the people are very expressive – and I’m certain that you would have seen the spectrum of expressions yesterday. “There are issues here, which as you know, are unresolved, but your presence gives us an opportunity for those issues to be placed in context, to be out front and centre and to be addressed as best we can. “But Jamaica is, as you would see, is a country that is proud of its history and very proud of what we have achieved. “And we’re moving on and we intend to … fulfil our true ambitions and destiny to become an independent, developed and prosperous country.” View the full article

Published by AFP The UN said more than half of all Ukraine's children have been driven from their homes Kyiv (AFP) – A month on since Russia launched its shock invasion, Ukraine’s leader pleaded for global street protests and for US-led allies meeting in Brussels Thursday to dramatically raise their arms supplies. While Kyiv and Western intelligence report battlefield gains against the Russians, the vast scale of civilian suffering was made stark as the UN said more than half of all Ukraine’s children have been driven from their homes. “Vladimir Putin has already crossed the red line into barbarism,” said British Prime Minister Boris Johnson as US President Joe Biden and other NATO leaders arrived for a meeting and the war marked one month. At least four people including two children were killed in overnight strikes in eastern Ukraine, Lugansk regional governor Sergiy Gayday said, accusing Russian forces of using phosphorus bombs in one village. “The world must stop the war,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a late-night television address delivered in English. “Come from your offices, your homes, your schools and universities, come in the name of peace, come with Ukrainian symbols to support Ukraine, to support freedom, to support life,” he said. Addressing leaders of the G7, NATO and the European Union meeting in the Belgian capital, he called for a major shift in weapons deliveries — including more advanced fighter jets, missile defence systems, tanks, armoured vehicles and anti-ship missiles. “Freedom must be armed,” Zelensky said bluntly, demanding “meaningful steps” from NATO. “At these three summits we will see: Who is a friend, who is a partner, and who betrayed us for money. Life can be defended only when united.” ‘Grim milestone’ Zelensky’s appeal came one month to the day after Russian armoured vehicles rolled over the border, igniting a conflict that is feared to have killed thousands of Ukrainian civilians, along with thousands more soldiers on both sides. More than 10 million Ukrainians have fled their homes, as cities have faced sustained Russian bombardment from land, sea and air. The month of war has displaced 4.3 million children -– more than half of Ukraine’s estimated child population of 7.5 million, according to the UN children’s agency Unicef. “This is a grim milestone that could have lasting consequences for generations to come,” Unicef chief Catherine Russell said. UN figures show that more than 3.6 million Ukrainians including 1.8 million children have fled abroad, and more are now displaced inside Ukraine after harrowing journeys out of cities like Mariupol. In the besieged southern port, Zelensky says nearly 100,000 people are trapped without food, water or power and enduring fierce shelling by Russian forces. In Zhytomyr, a garrison town west of Kyiv, a Russian strike flattened the school where Vasiliy Kravchuk’s six-year-old son was meant to start at next year. “It’s hard, it’s very hard,” sobbed the 37-year-old, who works for a tourism organisation which is now bereft of tourists. “Every day it’s 20, 30 times we go to the basement (to shelter). It’s difficult because my wife is pregnant, I have a little son,” says Kravchuk, wearing a bright pink hoodie and rubbing his eyes. Experts say Russia’s once-vaunted military has been bogged down by dogged resistance and has turned to long-range bombardment in the hope of breaking Ukrainian resolve. ‘Big mistake’ In the back-to-back Brussels summits, Biden and other leaders are expected to bring pledges of more lethal weapons to Ukraine and more punishing sanctions for Russia’s tottering economy. Britain’s Johnson said that as well as increasing military support to Ukraine, “we’ve got to go further” economically — including by preventing Russia using its gold reserves. “The more we do that now, the more pressure we apply now, particularly on things like gold… I believe the more we can shorten the war, shorten the slaughter in Ukraine,” he said. NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said the summit will see leaders agree to “major increases of forces” on the alliance’s eastern borders, including four new battle groups in Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia. “President Putin has made a big mistake and that is to launch a war against an independent sovereign nation,” Stoltenberg said as he convened the leaders in Brussels. “He has underestimated the strength of the Ukrainian people, the bravery of the Ukrainian people and their armed forces.” NATO officials believe that — armed with an arsenal of Western anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons — Ukrainian forces may have already killed as many as 15,000 Russian soldiers and wounded perhaps 30,000 to 40,000. Ukraine’s navy said it had struck a Russian naval transport vessel docked in the Azov Sea near Mariupol. Amateur footage showed plumes of black smoke billowing from a large grey vessel docked next to cranes, after what the Ukraine navy said was the strike, which AFP could not independently confirm. Putin’s regime has introduced draconian censorship laws to prevent independently verified news about what it calls a “special military operation.” Ukrainian resistance British military intelligence said Ukraine had “probably retaken Makariv and Moschun” near Kyiv and “there is a realistic possibility that Ukrainian forces are now able to encircle Russian units in Bucha and Irpin”. What is clear is that Ukrainian civilians continue to bear the brunt of the war. “There’s going to have to be a further, massive scaling up of assistance within Ukraine in the coming weeks,” said Michael Ryan, emergencies director for the World Health Organization. “I have never, myself, seen such complex needs, and so quickly in a crisis that has developed so fast,” he said. “We have reached maybe, for once, an appropriate level of horror at what’s happening in Ukraine.” With the “horror” plunging Russia into deeper international isolation, there are also signs of fissures within Putin’s regime. Moscow confirmed that Anatoly Chubais — a former Kremlin chief of staff who oversaw liberal economic reforms in the 1990s — had quit his post as a Putin advisor. He has reportedly fled the country in protest at the war. Russia still has a vital friend in China, which dismissed suggestions that Moscow should be expelled from the G20 group of countries. NATO’s Stoltenberg had also accused China of “spreading blatant lies” on Russia’s behalf. Beijing’s foreign ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said that “accusing China of spreading false information about Ukraine is itself spreading disinformation”. burs-jit/jm View the full article

Published by AFP Brittney Griner, pictured in June 2021, is a two-time Olympic gold medalist and WNBA champion Washington (AFP) – A US diplomat was able to visit detained basketball star Brittney Griner who was found to be in “good condition” after more than a month in Russian custody, the State Department said Wednesday. Griner, a two-time Olympic gold medalist and WNBA champion, was detained at Moscow’s airport on February 17 on charges of carrying vape cartridges that contained cannabis oil in her luggage. “An official from our embassy has been granted consular access to Brittney Griner. We were able to check on her condition,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said. “Our official found Brittney Griner to be in good condition and we will continue to do everything we can to see to it that she is treated fairly throughout this ordeal,” he added. Griner was in Russia to play club basketball before the US season resumed, a common practice for American players, who can earn much higher salaries in foreign leagues than on domestic teams. After being apprehended, Griner was immediately placed in a detention center, and last week a Russian court extended her arrest until May 19. She faces up to 10 years in prison. The 31-year-old openly gay basketball star is one of few women who can “dunk” a ball and considered one of the best players in the world. The arrest came as relations between Moscow and the West hit rock bottom over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Washington fears the player will be used as a pawn in the dispute and has so far kept a low profile in her case. Last week Russian state news agency TASS said Griner shared her cell with two other people. She is reading Dostoyevsky and a biography of the members of the Rolling Stones, it said. View the full article

Published by Sports Illustrated By Dan Lyons She was asked why so many more women have felt comfortable coming out compared to men in the sports world. View the original article to see embedded media. U.S. and OL Reign star Megan Rapinoe says it is up to non-LGBTQ+ owners, fans and players to create a safe atmosphere for male athletes to come out. During an appearance on Sky Sports’ The HangOUT with Chelsea players Pernille Harder and Magda Eriksson, Rapinoe was asked why she believes there are fewer openly gay male athletes playing professional sports. She believes women’s sports have presented a much more “safe” environmen… Read More View the full article

Published by Reuters (Corrects typo in headline) By Kate Chappell and Brian Ellsworth KINGSTON (Reuters) -Britain’s Prince William and his wife Kate arrived in Jamaica on Tuesday as part of a week-long Caribbean tour, hours after activists protested to demand reparations for slavery amid growing scrutiny of the British Empire’s colonial legacy. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrived in Belize on Saturday to start the tour that coincides with Queen Elizabeth’s 70th year on the throne, and will conclude it over the weekend with a visit to The Bahamas. They were received by Jamaican foreign affairs minister Kamina Johnson-Smith and Defense Force Chief Antonette Wemyss Gorman at Kingston’s Norman Manley airport. They then left to meet Governor General Patrick Allen, who represents the British crown in Jamaica. Earlier, dozens of people gathered outside the British High Commission in Kingston, singing traditional Rastafarian songs and holding banners with the phrase “seh yuh sorry” – a local patois phrase that urged Britain to apologize. “There are historical wrongs and they need to be addressed,” said Dr. Rosalea Hamilton, an economist and activist who helped organize the rally where demonstrators read out 60 reasons for reparations. Jamaica celebrates 60 years of independence in August. “Part of the conversation is how we begin a new dispensation and (discussion) of actions for the new generation,” said Hamilton, dressed in a T-shirt printed with the phrase “seh yuh sorry.” The royal visits to Caribbean nations are seen as an effort to convince other former British colonies – including Belize and The Bahamas – to stay on as “realms” of the British monarchy amid a rising regional movement towards republicanism. ‘WHAT ARE THEY DOING FOR JAMAICA?’ Dance hall singer Beenie Man in an interview with Good Morning Britain questioned the royal visit and expressed skepticism about the queen, saying “What are they doing for Jamaica? They’re not doing anything for us.” One Jamaican judge, Hugh Small, this month burned his ceremonial British judicial wigs in a symbolic protest of the fact that a London-based tribunal called Privy Council continues to be Jamaica’s highest court of appeals. William and Kate are scheduled to participate in a “sports activity” and a “cultural activity” on Tuesday as part of the tour that wraps up on Thursday, according to a preliminary agenda seen by Reuters. The couple had to change their itinerary in Belize following a protest by a few dozen indigenous villagers upset that the couple’s helicopter was given permission to land on a soccer field without prior consultation. Marlene Malahoo Forte, who was Jamaica’s attorney general until January, in December told the local newspaper Jamaica Observer that she had received instructions from Prime Minister Andrew Holness to reform the constitution to become a republic. That process would require a referendum, per Jamaica’s constitution, making it more complicated than in smaller Barbados – which was able to make the change via an act of parliament. The government last year announced plans to ask Britain for compensation for forcibly transporting an estimated 600,000 Africans to work on sugar cane and banana plantations that created fortunes for British slave holders. Jamaica lawmaker Mike Henry has proposed reparations package of 7.6 billion pounds ($10 billion). He has said the figure is derived from a 20 million pound payment that Britain’s government made in 1837 to compensate slave owners in British colonies for the emancipation of enslaved people following the 1833 abolition of slavery. (Reporting by Kate Chappell in Kingston and Brian Ellsworth in Miami; Editing by Aurora Ellis) View the full article

Published by Reuters By Adrees Latiff NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) -Crews were assessing the damage on Wednesday on the east side of New Orleans where a powerful tornado killed at least one person and injured eight people as it left a two-mile path of destroyed homes, uprooted power lines and overturned vehicles. A dark funnel cloud touched down at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday (0030 GMT on Wednesday), flattening buildings and turning over vehicles in the Arabi area of St. Bernard Parish. A spokesperson for the parish, just east of downtown New Orleans, said first responders found a 26-year-old man dead near his home. Eight other people were taken to the hospital with minor injuries, parish spokesperson John Lane said. “As of now we have no persons. Everybody has been accounted for that we know of at this point,” he said, adding that search and rescue teams have finished most of their work. Much of southern Louisiana is still recovering from Hurricane Ida, a fierce Category 4 storm last August that devastated rural communities to the south of New Orleans and killed more than 100 people in several U.S. states and the Caribbean. On Tuesday, the Biden administration said it was allocating more than $1.7 billion to Louisiana after the last two destructive hurricane seasons, local media reported. New Orleans, a city where the majority of residents are Black, is still traumatized by Hurricane Katrina in 2005, one of the most powerful storms in U.S. history, which killed at least 1,800 people. Lane said crews and local officials were going block to block, assessing the damage left behind by the tornado that appeared to have stayed on a straight path for about 2 miles (3 km). “The path the storm took – it’s devastation,” he said. “It did major destruction. Houses are off their foundations and into the street, no longer there, just blown to pieces.” RUBBLE FOR HOUSES Local media footage showed rubble where houses once stood, debris strewn across streets, overturned vehicles and power cables on the ground. “”It sounded like a train and I just said, ‘no, no, no,'” a woman told television station WDSU. “I really thought I was going to die.” Some 1,700 homes and businesses were without power on Wednesday morning, according to Entergy, the local power company. The same storm front that produced Tuesday’s tornado brought heavy rain and winds to other parts of Louisiana, and to Mississippi and Alabama. It came a day after twisters also destroyed homes and injured people elsewhere in the region. The system moved to the east and was producing strong thunderstorms along Florida’s Panhandle on Wednesday. It could potentially bring damaging winds, tornados and hail to the region throughout the day, the National Weather Service said. “As the action moves east this afternoon, we are concerned about severe weather,” weather service meteorologist Andy Haner said. “The storm system as a whole has lost a lot of punch.” (Reporting by Adrees Latif and Brendan O’Brien;Editing by Andrew Cawthorne and Jonathan Oatis) View the full article