Sheldon H. Jacobson: ‘Made in America’ is alive, well and misunderstood

The reason that such iconic all-American companies have moved their production capacity to China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, India and Mexico, among others, is cost. Labor costs in these countries are significantly lower than in the U.S. Given that American consumers are highly price sensitive, they demand lower prices. Since consumer spending is 70% of the nation’s gross domestic product, which now rests at around $30 trillion, anywhere costs can be reduced to keep prices competitive is an opportunity that companies have exploited, and they will continue to do so.

Chicago Tribune

Trump Cuts Off Medical Visas from Gaza After Laura Loomer Meltdown

The move comes after Loomer, the right-wing provocateur, freaked out over a video of children from Gaza coming to the U.S. for medical care

Rolling Stone

Trump’s Rhetoric on DC Echoes a History of Racist Narratives About Urban Crime

His rhetoric echoed that used by conservative politicians going back decades who have denounced American cities, especially those with majority non-white populations or led by progressive politicians, as lawless or crime-ridden and in need of outside intervention.

Mississippi Free Press

A startup promised 45,000 EV jobs to struggling towns. They’re still waiting.

Desperate for jobs, three communities embraced a bold electric vehicle promise. Now, they’re left with questions — and no jobs.

Grist

They Can’t Get Answers From the Oil Industry. North Dakota’s Oversight Program Hasn’t Helped.

The newsrooms’ investigation found that the program has focused on other issues. It has instead helped owners resolve complaints about companies withholding payments entirely and failing to pay interest on late royalty payments, records show. Some mineral owners said in interviews that they do not trust state officials to help them get information about the deductions and therefore have not tried to use the program.

ProPublica

These States Responded to DOJ’s Requests For Voter Data

“Most of the letters are very vague about why the DOJ is asking for this data,” Levitt said. “Most of these letters cite generally [Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA)]. That’s not good enough.”

Democracy Docket

4 laws that could stymie the Trump EPA’s plan to rescind the endangerment finding, central to US climate policies

The endangerment finding is a 2009 determination by the Environmental Protection Agency that six greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, contribute to climate change and therefore pose a threat to public health and welfare.

The Conversation

AmeriCorps is under siege. What happens in the communities it serves?

AmeriCorps programs that survived last spring’s DOGE cuts are slowly beginning a new year of service amid major uncertainty over whether they will be able to continue their work in classrooms, food banks, senior centers and other community hubs.

Nebraska Examiner

Immigration arrests dip in July, and activists hope they’re partly responsible

ICE did not respond to NPR requests for comment, but in the past agency officials have said they need more officers and detention spaces to meet administration goals. With billions of dollars of new money from Congress, ICE has launched a drive to recruit more officers and build more detention facilities.

But in the near-term, protesters and activists believe they may be able to slow the pace of arrests and deportations. Oregon is a case in point.

NPR

Trump’s domestic troop deployment tests the limits of a nearly 150-year-old law

The cases in both California and Washington mainly hinge on Posse Comitatus Act, which passed in 1878 and largely prevents the military from enforcing domestic laws. Experts say that in both cases there are clear limitations to the law’s enforcement.

AP News

Trump Has No Cards

Why would Putin need to make a deal with him?

The Atlantic

European leaders to join Ukraine’s Zelenskyy for White House meeting with Trump

The remarkable move — with one European leader after another announcing that they’ll be at Zelenskyy’s side when he travels to the White House on Monday — was an apparent effort to ensure that the meeting goes better than the last one in February, when Trump berated the Ukrainian president in a heated Oval Office encounter.

NPR

Belarusian hackers‘ attack on the IT infrastructure of Russia’s main airline sends ‘direct message’

Silent Crow and Cyber Partisans, two groups of anonymous Belarusian hackers living abroad and fighting with the Belarusian and Russian dictatorships, recently claimed responsibility for an attack on the IT infrastructure of Aeroflot, Russia’s flagship airline.

Global Voices

Andry Hernández Romero on surviving CECOT: ‘They told us we would die there’

“I want the world to know that being Venezuelan is not a crime,” Hernández Romero told The Advocate in an exclusive interview, which was conducted through an interpreter.

Advocate

Picturing Palestine

As a Palestinian in diaspora, I am constantly frustrated with how American fiction depicts my people…

Texas Observer

Grave by grave, a new project in divided Cyprus tries to mend mistrust

In the five decades since a Turkish invasion, vandalism and the ravages of time have transformed hundreds of Cyprus’ cemeteries into evidence of the geographic and political rift.

Religion News Service

Air Canada suspends restart plans after union defies return to work order

Air Canada said it suspended plans to restart operations on Sunday after the union representing 10,000 flight attendants said it will defy a return to work order. The strike was already affecting about 130,000 travelers around the world per day during the peak summer travel season.

NPR