Good morning, and welcome to The Epoch Times News Brief for Tuesday, Aug. 20, 2024. I’m Bill Thomas, we have some really intriguing stories to share with you today, and here’s what’s going on.
Former President Donald Trump’s sentencing date in New York may be postponed, a counter-sniper was not the first person to shoot the man who tried to assassinate the former president, and billions of records are confirmed stolen in a major security breach. Also, the Department of Homeland Security wants to prevent more illegal immigrants from being deported, and the CDC says COVID-19 levels are very high in dozens of states.
DA Defers to Judge in Trump Case
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg says he’ll defer to a New York judge on former President Donald Trump’s request to delay his sentencing date until after the presidential election this year.The letter sent by Bragg’s office, which the court received yesterday, says prosecutors will leave it up to state Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan to decide whether Trump’s sentencing should be delayed past the already scheduled hearing date, which is coming up on Sept. 18. In May, a Manhattan jury found Trump guilty on 34 counts of falsifying business records.
You should know that Trump’s attorneys asked the judge last week to postpone sentencing until after the start of early voting for the election. They said the timing would harm the electoral process and by delaying the sentencing date, “the Court would reduce, even if not eliminate, issues regarding the integrity of any future proceedings.”
Attorneys for Trump also argued there’s not enough time for the defense to potentially appeal Merchan’s ruling on Trump’s request to overturn the conviction due to the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark ruling on presidential immunity.
You should know that the high court’s decision found that presidents cannot be criminally prosecuted for their official acts, and that evidence of their official actions cannot be used to help prove criminal cases involving unofficial actions.
Just a reminder, the former president faces criminal charges in two other jurisdictions—one in Fulton County, Georgia, and the other in Washington—for alleged election interference following the 2020 election. His classified records case in Florida was dismissed by a federal judge last month, although special counsel Jack Smith has promised to appeal the judge’s decision.
By the way, you should also know that Trump pleaded not guilty to all the charges, repeatedly saying they’re politically motivated and designed to harm his 2024 candidacy.
Local Officer Shot Trump Rally Shooter First, Knocking Him Down, Investigation Finds
The first bullet that struck the man who tried to kill Trump was from a local law enforcement officer, according to an investigation by a U.S. congressman.It’s not in dispute that Thomas Crooks fired eight shots from the rooftop of a building near where Trump was speaking in Butler County, Pennsylvania, on July 13.
However, Rep. Clay Higgins (R-La.) found that the next shot came from a Butler County Emergency Services Unit SWAT officer, who was about 100 yards away from the building on which Crooks was perched.
The congressman’s report states that when the SWAT officer saw Crooks as a moving target on the rooftop, he quickly left his post and sprinted toward a clear shot position directly into the line of fire while Crooks was firing. The report adds the shot may have damaged the buffer tube on Crooks’s weapon, according to eyewitness testimony, which would have left Crooks unable to fire more shots.
By the way, that same SWAT officer says Crooks went down from his firing position but popped back up several seconds later. The report says that’s when the U.S. Secret Service counter-sniper shot and killed him.
Interesting to note that Higgins traveled to Butler County and was assisted in the investigation by local officials, including the Butler County Emergency Services Unit tactical team commander and a top official with the Butler County District Attorney’s office.
Higgins said that he investigated several theories regarding the Trump shooting that day, including that there was a second shooter. He says he remains convinced that all 10 shots heard that day were accounted for, with eight coming from Crooks, one from the local SWAT officer, and one from the Secret Service.
Social Security Numbers Confirmed Stolen
An organization called National Public Data, which performs employee background checks, confirms it was hacked. The Florida-based company has been named in a class-action lawsuit, filed by Maine’s attorney general, which says that billions of pieces of information from Americans’ records, including Social Security numbers, were stolen in a massive data breach.In a notice published by the attorney general’s office last Friday, the data company reported that 1.3 million people, including more than 2,000 Maine residents, were affected by the breach.
The lawsuit, filed earlier this month in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, alleges that cybercrime organization USDoD hacked the firm and that hackers then put the database for sale on the dark web for $3.5 million. The suit also alleges that personal information, including the Social Security numbers of hundreds of millions of Americans, was hacked and leaked online.
You should know that the complaint alleges that the individuals affected by the breach weren’t even customers of National Public Data; rather, their information was “scraped” by “unauthorized third parties” and shared with the company without their knowledge.
National Public Data confirmed the data breach in a statement on its website last week and advised consumers to try to mitigate any potential harm associated with Social Security numbers being used for nefarious purposes. One of its recommendations is to contact Equifax, TransUnion, and Experian—the three major U.S. credit reporting agencies—to get a free credit report.
DHS Issues Rule Protecting Illegal Immigrants Married to US Citizens
Saying the government is trying to keep families together, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has unveiled a new rule that is estimated to protect more than half a million illegal immigrants from being deported, and here’s how they’re doing it.A law called the Immigration and Nationality Act gives federal officials the ability to grant parole to illegal immigrants who are already in the United States. DHS officials are using these powers to grant protection to some illegal immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens.
You should know that this new rule covers spouses of U.S. citizens who have lived in the country for at least 10 years as of June 17 and who were not found to “pose a threat to national security, public safety, or border security.”
The department also says that the move would increase the economic prosperity of American communities, strengthen diplomatic relationships with partner countries in the region, and reduce the strain on limited government resources.
The DHS says around 500,000 of the 765,000 noncitizens who are married to U.S. citizens qualify, and 50,000 children of these immigrants can also apply for protection, provided they’ve been in the United States since June 17, do not have certain crimes on their record, and do not pose a threat to national security or public safety.
By the way, this new rule will also grant these illegal immigrants work authorization.
However, some experts say this new law might not be legal and there will be “inevitable legal challenges.”
CDC Says ‘Very High’ COVID-19 Levels Reported in 31 States
Citing recent wastewater data, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that “very high” levels of COVID-19 have been observed in 31 states as well as in Washington, D.C., and “high” levels have been observed in 11 other states.All states along the West Coast and the Mountain states are in the “very high” category.
Officials say Omicron variants KP.3 and KP.3.1.1 account for about half of all cases.
A spokesperson for the CDC told The Epoch Times earlier this month that the KP.3.1.1 variant “is very similar to other circulating variants in the United States, and all current lineages are descendants of JN.1, which emerged in late 2023.”
Meanwhile, in June, an advisory panel for the Food and Drug Administration said that major U.S. vaccine makers should now target any COVID-19 variants that are derived from JN.1. and that those vaccines should be rolled out in the fall of 2024.
You should also know that there is no information “currently indicating that this variant causes more severe COVID-19.”
COVID-related deaths, according to the same CDC data, have been at record lows for the past three months, and COVID-19 is no longer a top cause of death in the United States. It actually fell to No. 10, according to death certificates last year. You should know that early in the pandemic, the virus was the nation’s third leading cause of death and dropped to the fourth cause of death in 2022.
By the way, the current leading causes of death in the U.S. are heart disease, cancer, and a category of injuries that include gun-related deaths and drug overdoses.
And now, looks like our time is just about up for today, so we’re going to call it a wrap for the Tuesday edition of The Epoch Times News Brief.
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And finally, as we do each and every day on this program, we wrap everything up with a very notable quote, and this one comes to us from Suze Orman, who said: “Just because you can afford it doesn’t mean you should buy it.”
Suze Orman is an American financial adviser, author, and podcast host.
Before we go, today is National Chocolate Pecan Pie Day, and equally important, today is International Hawaiian Pizza Day. That’s pizza with both ham and pineapple.
For all of us here at The Epoch Times News Brief, I’m Bill Thomas.
Thank you for making us your one-stop source for a concise, accurate, and unbiased daily synopsis of many of the news stories you need to know about.
Enjoy the remainder of your Tuesday and we’ll see you right back here next time for another edition of The Epoch Times News Brief. Let’s all continue to watch out for one another, and have a superb day today! Bye for now.
