Weekly News Roundup - 9/20/24
Another attempt on Trump // Israel's pager bombs // The long-awaited rate cut arrives
Welcome to the 38th Weekly News Roundup of 2024. The archive for all weekly news roundups is here.
In 2024, the Border Stalkers Substack is featuring one news update a week, and one book a month, with weekly posts on each book. The book of the month schedule is here.
These weekly dispatches are designed for people who may not have time to do more than glance at the headlines, or who want to stay informed without becoming obsessed by politics and news. These roundups are a targeted way to get a sense of the shape of the past week on the national level. Without such a map, we can be disoriented, not knowing where we have been over the past several days, or where we may be going.
But by spending concentrated, limited time thinking about the big picture, we can devote more of our time to where “agency and justice begin and end,” as Karen Swallow Prior put it: “on the ground, bodily, in community and real relationships, in flesh and blood.”
The first quote of this week's newsletter is dedicated to Neil King Jr., my friend and the author of American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal. Neil passed away Tuesday at the age of 65 after defying cancer for 8 years, and lived his life to the absolute fullest. He was an extraordinary human being, an inspiration, and a confidante. I am just one of many who miss him terribly. I will publish a fuller tribute to Neil next week, after his memorial service.
Quotes of the Week
“Your absence has gone through me/ Like thread through a needle./ Everything I do is stitched with its color.” - W.S. Merwin, "Separation"
"The mind gets busy when it is left alone to do its own thing — in particular, it tends to think about other people’s minds. If you want to raise empathetic, imaginative children who can figure out how to entertain themselves, don’t keep their brains too occupied." - Darby Saxbe
“We were commodified like a good to be sold. They made fake orphans and fed the market.” - Yooree Kim, commenting on the adoption scandal uncovered by the Associated Press this year
Big Stories This Week
A second assassination attempt against Donald Trump was halted by Secret Service before the suspect can make the attempt, this time on a golf course in Florida. The last time there were two assassination attempts on the same politician so close to one another was in 1975, when two different women both made attempts on then-President Gerald Ford within three weeks of each other.
Israel's war against Hamas in Gaza expanded into Lebanon on its northern border, with explosive devices inside communications device across the country going off simultaneously in what appeared to be a coordinated attack by Israel on Hezbollah, the militant group aligned with Hamas and Iran. Israel's defense chief calls it a "new phase in the war," raising new worries about an escalating, widening regional conflict.
Donald Trump and J.D. Vance were blamed for sparking threats against schools and hospitals in Springfield, Ohio, by spreading false rumors about Haitan immigrants eating pets in that town. However, the threats were said by Ohio's governor's office to have come primarily from "foreign countries." By midweek, Trump had noticeably shifted his message emphasis toward a more economic focus, talking about how he would seek to bring down prices on various goods and services. Vice President Kamala Harris has a slight edge in the national and state-based polling, but the race remains "as close as it gets," according to Nate Silver.
Sean "Diddy" Combs, the famed music mogul, was arrested and charged by federal prosecutors in New York with building a criminal enterprise of sexual exploitation and rape.
Week in Review
Friday, Sept. 13
Two elementary schools and one middle school in Springfield, Ohio, are evacuated due to bomb threats. It's the second day of bomb threats in the city, after City Hall and two schools were evacuated the previous day. Springfield Mayor Rob Rue says the threats are caused by the false internet rumors about pet-eating spread by Donald Trump and J.D. Vance. "All these federal politicians that have negatively spun our city, they need to know they're hurting our city, and it was their words that did it," Rue says.
Saturday, Sept. 14
Bomb threats are called in against two hospitals in Springfield, Ohio. It's the third straight day of violent threats connected to false rumors about immigrants.
Sunday, Sept. 15
An attempted assassination aimed at Donald Trump, the second in roughly two months, is foiled by Secret Service agents at a golf course in Florida. President Biden calls on Congress to allocate more funding for the Secret Service so they can hire more agents and provide higher levels of protection for Trump.
Donald Trump's running mate, J.D. Vance, says that if he has to "create stories" to get attention and to drive the message he wants, he will do so. It's interpreted as an apparent admission that he has intentionally spread false rumors about immigrants eating dogs and other pets in Ohio. Others interpret it as Vance "insisting that the hoax — mean, ridiculous, and debunked — is true, feigning callous obtuseness on national television."
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, emphasizes that rumors about immigrants in his state are false and says that "the Haitians who are in Springfield are legal. They came to Springfield to work ... What the companies tell us is that they are very good workers. They're very happy to have them there, and frankly, that's helped the economy. Now, are there problems connected? Well, sure. When you go from a population of 58,000 and add 15,000 people onto that, you're going to have some challenges and some problems. And we're addressing those."
Monday, Sept. 16
Trump blames the attempted assassination on Democratic criticism of him, "despite," the Associated Press writes, "his own long history of inflammatory campaign rhetoric and advocacy for jailing or prosecuting his political enemies."
Sean "Diddy" Combs, the powerful music producer accused by multiple women of sexual assault and rape in recent months, is arrested in New York after being indicted by a grand jury.
A Florida Sheriff posts video of an 11-year old boy being walked into a police facility, along with the boy's name and mug shot, after the child is arrested for making school shooting threats as a hoax. "Since parents, you don’t want to raise your kids, I’m going to start raising them. Every time we make an arrest, your kid’s photo is going to be put out there. And if I can do it, I’m going to perp walk your kid so that everybody can see what your kid’s up to," Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood writes on his Facebook page.
Tuesday, Sept. 17
Russian intelligence is seeking to undermine Kamala Harris' candidacy for president, "disseminating fabricated videos designed to sow discord and spread disinformation" about Harris, according to a new report by the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center. The Center reported in August that Iranian intelligence was seeking to use disinformation and hack and leak operations to undermine Donald Trump's campaign.
Hundreds of pagers — decades old communication technology used by some to avoid surveillance, and often clipped to a user's belt — explode simultaneously in Lebanon and Syria. Israel intelligence is believed to be behind the attack, which kills at least 12 people, including two small children, and wounds thousands. The Israeli military announces that stopping attacks from Lebanon on its north border is now an official war goal, a sign that the Netanyahu government may be expanding and broadening the scope of the conflict.
A spokesman for Ohio Gov. Dewine says that "the vast majority of the bomb threats" against locations in Springfield, Ohio, "came from foreign countries. Not 100%, but it’s the vast majority." One Republican pundit says this shows that the threats are an example of "foreign actors ... trying to sow discord."
Sean "Diddy" Combs is charged with three counts of federal sex trafficking and racketeering charges in an indictment unsealed in the morning. The indictment details Combs' alleged creation of a "criminal enterprise" to organize, oversee and protect a series of sex parties in which women were forced or manipulated into sex acts with male sex workers for Combs' entertainment.
The strength of democracy around the world declined for the 8th straight year, with lower numbers of participation, more incidents of contested elections, and higher rates of malign influence and disinformation aimed at corrupting results, according to a new report.
Instagram yields to growing pressure on the company to protect children, and makes all underage accounts automatically private.
Wednesday, Sept. 18
The Federal Reserve cuts interest rates by a half point, a larger than expected reduction. It signals an end to the central bank's campaign against rising inflation, and a move to inject momentum into a slowing economy. Another half-point cut is expected later this year, along with four more cuts in 2025 and two more in 2026.
A second wave of bombs explode in Lebanon as Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant says, "We are at the start of a new phase in the war."
The body of what is believed to be the Kentucky highway shooter is discovered in the woods by a civilian couple who decided to join the manhunt.
Thursday, Sept. 19
The stock market booms to new highs as multiple Wall Street indexes set new records one day after the central bank's rate cut.
A CNN investigation alleges that North Carolina Republican Mark Robinson, the GOP's candidate for governor in that state, was active on a pornography website message board more than a decade ago, and made comments expressing an attraction to pornography involving transgender men. Robinson denies having made the comments.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah vows that Israel will "face just retribution and a bitter reckoning" for the bombings earlier in the week. Hours later, Israel forces launch dozens of airstrikes on Hezbollah targets in Lebanon.
A Kentucky judge is shot and killed in his chambers by the county Sheriff, after an argument.
Friday, Sept. 20
In person early voting begins in three states: Minnesota, South Dakota and Virginia. Election Day is six , the states with the first early in-person voting opportunities. Election Day is Nov. 5, just over seven weeks away.
Israel and Hezbollah exchange airstrikes.
Interesting Reads
A Toast to Neil King, by John Feehery for The Feehery Theory
America’s Inflation Fight Is Ending, but It’s Leaving a Legacy, by Jeanna Smialek for The New York Times
Western nations were desperate for Korean babies. Now many adoptees believe they were stolen, by Kim Tong-Hyung and Claire Galofaro for The Associated Press
The exploding device attacks dealt a major but not crippling blow to Hezbollah, analysts say, by Abby Sewell and Bassem Mroue for The Associated Press
Pope Francis Is Turning Certainty on Its Head, by David French for The New York Times
US warplanes, ships and troops ready in the Middle East if the conflict expands, by Lolita C. Baldor and Tara Copp for The Associated Press
Elon Musk has often inflamed politically tense moments, raising worries for the US election, by Ali Swenson for The Associated Press
New York City's web of scandals, by Noah Bressner for Axios
Trump’s Lie Is Another Test for Christian America, by Russell Moore for The Atlantic
Veteran CIA officer who drugged and sexually assaulted dozens of women gets 30 years in prison, by Jim Mustian and Joshua Goodman for The Associated Press
The Octagon Inside the Sphere: Bloody Fights and Soaring Films, by Emmanuel Morgan for The New York Times
Trump’s Legal Bulldog — and Possible Attorney General — Says He’s Just Trolling All of Us, by Adam Wren for Politico Magazine