Boeing’s rose and thorn: Boeing named aerospace veteran Robert “Kelly” Ortberg as its new President and CEO, and reported a $1.4 billion loss in revenue during the second quarter, according to the Seattle Times. On August 8, Ortberg will replace current CEO David Calhoun, who said in March he planned to retire at the end of the year. Boeing is unwell. The company agreed to plead guilty to federal fraud this month in a case stemming from two 737 MAX jetliner crashes that killed 346 people, and it has been under increased scrutiny and regulatory oversight since the infamous Alaska Airlines door-plug blowout.
SCORE jail contract: The Seattle City Council Public Safety Committee plans to discuss a potential contract with the SCORE jail at 2 pm today. The City hopes to expand its jail spots by 20 beds. Critics have pointed out that this move will be costly and that SCORE has dealt with a high number of jail deaths in the past year. More from Ashley on this later.
Seattle Police Department affirms that officers can interview kids: SPD has loosened its interpretation of a state law that requires officers to provide kids with an attorney before questioning. In December, an audit by the Seattle Office of the Inspector General found that SPD officers were not supplying kids with attorneys during questioning, detainment for probable cause, or before requesting a consent to search. Interim SPD Chief Sue Rahr told KOMO that she sent out a memo to all officers clarifying its policy: Officers can interview child witnesses, but they’re to stop questioning if they suspect their involvement and contact an attorney if they determine probable cause. Both Rahr and former Chief Adrian Diaz claimed the policy kept SPD from talking to potential juvenile witnesses to fatal shootings at Chief Sealth and Garfield High Schools.
“They canceled me” Washington Rep. Tarra Simmons, the first formerly incarcerated person elected to the state Legislature, is appealing her firing from Civil Survival, the criminal justice nonprofit she founded in 2015. Simmons’s attorney confirmed to public radio station KUOW that she was fired from her job as “founding director” in July, claiming the board of directors had discriminated and retaliated against her. Simmons, who is Latina and white, claims she was criticized for being too “white-presenting” at a staff retreat, while a former employee told the station that Simmons made “disparaging comments” about a lack of support from Black-led organizations. In December, Civil Survival paid Simmons a legal settlement. “I actually experienced more racial discrimination than anybody,” she said.
Big Mario’s Northlake Tavern up for sale: Classic Seattle pizza joint Northlake Tavern first closed in January of 2023 after 70 years of business, reopened as a Big Mario’s last summer, and is now closing as it goes up for sale. Management told Eater Seattle they felt Northlake Tavern would do better under new stewardship and as its own entity.
*Blows whistle* As a former certified lifeguard at a popular regional waterpark, I’m ordering you to stay out of the water at Green Lake Beach, Matthews Beach, and Andrew’s Bay Beach at Seward Park! The public health department says currently high bacteria levels could make you or your pets very sick. (Also: Stop running! No diving!)
Per recommendations from @KCPubHealth, people & pets should stay out of the water at Green Lake East & Seward Park (Andrews Bay Beach). Based on recent water samples, right now, the water here could make you sick. Matthews Beach continues to remain closed.https://t.co/M5L1tUC94k pic.twitter.com/mVkwYTGbAG
— Seattle Parks (@SeattleParks) July 30, 2024
Hamas leader killed: Ismail Haniyeh, the political chief for Hamas, was killed with his bodyguard in Tehran, Iran, where he was scheduled to attend the inauguration of the county’s new president, Masoud Pezeshkian. Hamas said his death was an assassination by Israel, while Israel has not formally claimed responsibility for Haniyeh’s killing. Israeli media has reported that ministers and officials were told not to comment on his killing. Pezeshkian promised that Iran would “defend its territory” and make the attackers “regret their cowardly action,” but it is unclear if Iran will retaliate.
Our incomplete plan is definitely complete: The right-wing Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 will cease policy work after its director Paul Dans stepped down Tuesday following pressure from former President Donald Trump’s campaign. Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said Project 2025, a plan to replace thousands of federal employees with partisan Trumpian stooges, ban abortion, and dissolve the Department of Education, had already completed what it set out to do–bring together 110 conservative organizations to create a unified conservative vision of taking power from the administrative state, which doesn’t sound completed to me.
A game of hot (authoritarian) potato: After Project 2025 gained traction as an election issue for Democrats, Trump attempted to distance himself from the plan, claiming not to know who was behind it and characterizing it as “seriously extreme.” He’s obviously lying, as Project 2025 was created by Trump’s allies and former aides (including Dans); picking JD Vance as his running mate eroded whatever plausible deniability he had. Vance is a close ally to Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts, and he even wrote the call for revolution that served as the foreword to Roberts’s new book, Dawn’s Early Light.
Paul Dans, the director of Project 2025 who is stepping down, was scheduled for an interview on his departure, but unfortunately canceled before the show. We hope he’ll join soon. pic.twitter.com/w9VvBKcPwr
— Kaitlan Collins (@kaitlancollins) July 31, 2024
Nearly 1,000 Indigenous kids died at federal boarding schools in the US, according to a federal report released Tuesday from the US Department of Interior. The Washington Post reports that hundreds of children were buried in 74 marked and unmarked burial sites at 65 former schools. Sixty of those children were from tribes with homelands in Washington, Idaho, and Oregon, according to the Seattle Times. The report urged the US to formally apologize for the attempt to destroy Indigenous cultures through forced assimilation at these 417 federal boarding schools, which operated from 1819 to 1967 in 37 states. US Department of Interior Secretary Deb Haaland launched an investigation into the schools after the discovery of unmarked graves at a school in Canada in 2021.
Harris speaks on immigration in Atlanta: From a stage in Atlanta, Vice President and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris attacked former President Donald Trump’s dismal record on immigration. She blamed Trump for tanking the so-called bipartisan border deal in May, adding that she’d pass it if she became president. This is not a flex. The bill raised barriers to asylum-seekers and sent away those who don’t qualify. Oklahoma Rep. James Lankford, who was hand-selected by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to negotiate the deal, called it the most conservative border security bill in four decades. While the bill did fail after Trump urged MAGA Republicans to reject it, let’s not pretend it was wonderful. In a new ad, Harris said she supports increasing the number of border patrol agents.
NEW AD: On the border, the choice is simple.
Kamala Harris is fighting to fix our broken immigration system. Donald Trump is trying to stop her. pic.twitter.com/t200w8iAYv
— Kamala HQ (@KamalaHQ) July 30, 2024
She’ll soon speak in Philly with a special someone <3: Harris’s campaign said her running mate will join her for a rally in Philadelphia next Tuesday. Does this mean she picked Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro? Not so fast! The campaign said geography has nothing to do with it, which could also be a total lie. We’ll see!
Re: Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s work is complete. They’ve written the plan, and now it’s up to the voters. If Republicans win, they’ll implement it as far as they can. If Democrats win, it’ll be consigned to the dustbin of history. So vote as if it’s on the ballot, because it is.
Trump calling Project 2025 “seriously extreme” is the sort of ambiguous comment he’s famous for. It reads as if he’s dissing Project 2025, but it might also be a compliment. And if you look at Trump’s statements about Project 2025, you’ll see the same strategic ambiguity. He says he doesn’t know who’s behind it, but he doesn’t say he won’t implement it.
@1
Of course Trump won’t implement Project 2025. There are plenty of lackeys who will do that for him.
Trump will yak about sharks, electrocution, and God knows what else while gobbling up KFC.
So what if the Dems pass a conservative immigration bill. Better that than the GOP starting concentration camps for illegals and protesters.
No running? No diving? Sounds like horseplay is still fine. Or odd that only at the beach in Enumclaw?
@2 Trump’s signature would be on the orders if he wins in 2024. Whether he cares about what he’s signing is another issue, but he’d definitely be the one nominally in charge. Of course, if Vance (or another Republican) wins in 2028, they’d likely be just as willing to implement Project 2025.
You assume the GOP would bother setting up a camp rather than just shooting them outright.
@4
Camps = cheap labor source.
Please recall that the day after Trump was elected in 2016, the prison stocks went up.
The bullets get reserved for USA citizens protesting, after martial law is declared.
Gah, it’s gonna be Shapiro who seems to have already been regarded as a front-runner pick. The Philly based announcement isn’t coincidental. I know next to nothing about the guy, so can’t talk trash on him, but it also seems somewhat uninspired as a pick.
If it’s being done entirely to capture Pennsylvania, I’d think we had a pretty good shot at that regardless (based mostly on the Fetterman win two years ago. He was far from perfect as a candidate and won pretty convincingly.) If she really is allowing for a potential swing state to play a large role in dictating the choice, I’d think one of the upper midwestern states that are always in play would’ve perhaps made more sense. Or I kinda like Mark Kelly who’s from Arizona and with more resume’ and name recognition to go on. Whatever though, I could be completely underestimating Shapiro’s appeal.
6, Shapiro makes the most sense just based on PA being in play but I just saw a list of the most recent VP announcements and none of them took place in their home state so it’s not a done deal. I suspect they won’t even know for sure who the candidate is until a day or 2 before the announcement.
2, People always say Republicans won’t do [crazy/scary/stupid thing] and those people are always proven wrong. Destroying the regulatory state and taking rights away from people has been the Republican’s primary objective since Reagan and it would be foolish to think they won’t pull the final trigger once they have the chance. If it’s not Trump it will be the next guy. They need to be shut out of power until they learn how to behave.
@5 Sigh. You’re probably right. They’ll deport just enough to please the base and keep the rest to steal the base’s jobs. And the base will eat it up.
@6 Has that been officially announced?
@6: Fetterman won Pennsylvania by adopting a working-class, outside-the-beltway persona that appealed to Pennsylvania’s purple demographics. He talked mostly about pocketbook issues and eschewed culture war talking points.
Shapiro is primarily known and loved by Pennsylvanians for his swift work fixing a collapsed bridge on I-95 in a fraction of the original estimated time, earning a reputation as an effective leader who was good in a crisis and could work across party lines to accomplish practical goals. His selection might very well win Pennsylvania for Democrats and help to otherwise soften the top of the ticket’s image as an out-of-touch coastal elite who will do nothing for working people.
@8,
No, it hasn’t been announced and I guess @7 could be correct and it’s not a done deal. I just think the location is a pretty dead giveaway. Not just PA, but eastern PA, which just happens to be the region of the state he hails from.