Important Takeaways:
- Wesslin Omar Ramirez Castillo, 18, was arrested Sunday after Nassau County police responded to reports of a “suspicious male” wearing a mask.
- Ramirez Castillo allegedly “continued to display suspicious behavior while attempting to conceal a large bulge in his waistband” that ended up being a 14-inch knife, officials said.
- Police said that officers stopped him and patted him down under the mask law and found the knife. Ramirez Castillo allegedly refused to comply with officer commands and was placed under arrest.
- He was charged with criminal possession of a weapon, obstructing governmental administration and charged with violating the Mask Transparency Act.
- The controversial ban on wearing face coverings in public was signed into law Aug. 15 in Nassau County, which covers part of Long Island, just east of New York City.
- Those who violate the law face a misdemeanor charge punishable by up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine.
- County legislator Howard Kopel had said the mask ban bill was introduced in response to “antisemitic incidents, often perpetrated by those in masks” since the start of the Israel-Hamas war on Oct. 7.
- Critics say the ban poses a risk for those who want to peacefully protest while concealing their identities.
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Important Takeaways:
- Only way to know strength would be through storm surveys by the National Weather Service offices in Binghamton and Albany
- NBC5 meteorologists were able to use long-established radar technology to identify where tornado debris signatures occurred.
- One tornado was in Rome, Oneida County, where significant damage was reported. Pictures show a church destroyed and a B-52 bomber literally moved from its position.
- After that, there was a brief tornado between Old Forge and Inlet, just south of New York Route 28.
- Then, another tornado hit Hamilton County in a remote area near Morehouse.
- Two more hit in the vicinity of Wells, in both Hamilton and Warren counties.
- There may have been a sixth tornado near Edinburg, but the radar data was not beyond a reasonable doubt.
- Separate from these five radar-confirmed tornadoes, the National Weather Service in Albany found evidence of two other tornadoes that did not produce debris on radar.
- Most tornadoes locally are not strong enough, or located near enough to a radar, to produce a debris signature, which makes the five listed above special cases.
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Important Takeaways:
- At least 28 heat-related deaths have occurred in the West this month.
- At least 19 cities have broken their all-time high temperature records in the past week, including Las Vegas, which hit 120 degrees on Sunday for the first time in its history.
- In Houston, Texas, a million electrical customers remain without power for the fourth straight day since Hurricane Beryl barreled into the city.
- Remnants of Beryl brought up to six inches of rain on Wednesday evening from northern New York state to Vermont and New Hampshire, flooding neighborhoods and prompting evacuations.
- At least three tornadoes were reported in New York state on Wednesday, including an EF-1 twister near Buffalo that packed 110 mph winds, according to the NWS.
- In Vermont, heavy rain from the remnants of Beryl caused flash flooding in several cities, including Barre and Lyndonville, where multiple roads were closed due to flooding, officials said.
- By Sunday, the heat will return to the East Coast with temperatures in the 90s from Boston to Washington, D.C. Combined with the heat index, temperatures on the East Coast will feel above 100 degrees into next week, according to the National Weather Service.
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Important Takeaways:
- Rudolph Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, federal prosecutor and legal adviser to Donald Trump, was disbarred in the state on Tuesday after a court found he repeatedly made false statements about Trump’s 2020 election loss.
- A New York appeals court in Manhattan ruled that Giuliani, who had already had his New York law license suspended in 2021 for false statements he made after the election, is now “disbarred from the practice of law, effective immediately, and until the further order of this Court, and his name stricken from the roll of attorneys and counselors-at-law in the State of New York.”
- Before pleading Trump’s case in November 2020, Giuliani had not appeared in court as an attorney since 1992, according to court records.
- Giuliani built his public persona by practicing law, as the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan in the 1980s, when he went after mobsters, powerbrokers and others. The law-and-order reputation helped catapult him into politics, governing the United States’ most popular city when it was beset by high crime.
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“When once a Republic is corrupted, there is no possibility of remedying any of the growing evils but by removing the corruption and restoring its lost principles; every other correction is either useless or a new evil.” ~ Thomas Jefferson
Important Takeaways:
- Former President Trump became the first-ever former U.S. president to become a convicted felon on Thursday.
- Trump, the presumed 2024 GOP nominee, is scheduled to be sentenced on July 11, just one week before the Republican National Convention.
- His attorney Todd Blanche told CNN Trump’s legal team would “vigorously fight” with motions in the coming weeks and if unsuccessful with these, they would appeal following his sentencing.
- The appeals process is unlikely to conclude before the November election.
- Would Trump go to jail?
- Judge Juan Merchan will determine whether Trump’s punishment will include a prison sentence.
- The 34 charges are all Class E felonies — the least severe level in New York. They each carry the possibility of up to four years in prison.
- But the judge can also decide to sentence Trump to probation without prison time. That would require the former president to regularly report to a probation officer. If he commits any more crimes, Trump could then be jailed.
- Can Trump run for president as a convicted felon?
- While Trump can still run for president, it’s not yet clear if he’ll be able to vote for himself since some states have laws that limit the voting rights of a person with a felony conviction.
- Trump moved his residency to Florida after leaving the White House in 2021. According to Florida law, the ability of people with a felony conviction to vote depends on the laws in the state where they were convicted.
- “New York only disenfranchises people while serving a prison sentence, so assuming Trump is not sentenced to prison time, his rights would be restored by New York law and therefore also in Florida,” Blair Bowie, an attorney at the Campaign Legal Center said.
- “The only way he wouldn’t be able to vote is if he is in prison on Election Day,” Bowie said.
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Important Takeaways:
- Eric Adams under pressure to divulge details on ‘outside agitators’ at campus protests
- Adams, a Democrat and former city police officer, was asked by local reporters on Thursday morning to give a breakdown of the arrest numbers. He repeatedly declined to provide details.
- When pressed to provide further details, he said his office had “turned everything over to the school, and it is up to the school to determine if they’re going to release the names of students and non-students”.
- New York police department issued a press release saying that among those arrested at Columbia, “approximately 29% of individuals were not affiliated” with the school, while 60% of people arrested at the CCNY protests were not affiliated with the school
- NYPD commissioner said “These individuals are not university students, they are not affiliated with either the institutions or campuses in question, and they are working to escalate the situation.”
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Important Takeaways:
- The earthquake was centered near Whitehouse Station, New Jersey
- A 4.8 magnitude earthquake rocked the Northeast Friday morning, shaking buildings from Philadelphia to New Jersey to New York City to Connecticut to Westchester, New York.
- John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City, Newark Liberty International Airport in New Jersey and Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport are all on a ground stop while runways are inspected for damage.
- The New York City mayor’s office said there’s no immediate reports of damage in the city but crews are still assessing the impacts.
- Cars at the Holland Tunnel between New Jersey and Manhattan are being temporarily held so the tunnel can be inspected, according to the Port Authority.
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Important Takeaways:
- A Lebanese migrant who was caught sneaking over the border admitted he’s a member of Hezbollah, he hoped to make a bomb, and his destination was New York
- Basel Bassel Ebbadi, 22, was caught by the US Border Patrol on March 9 near El Paso, Texas
- Ebbadi said in a sworn interview after his arrest that he had trained with Hezbollah for seven years and served as an active member guarding weapons locations for another four years
- Ebbadi’s training focused on “jihad” and killing people “that was not Muslim,” he said.
- Border agents continue to see a surge in migrants whose names appear on the terror watchlist entering the US illegally as crossings continue at record levels.
- Border agents recorded 98 encounters with terror watchlisted individuals at both the northern and southern borders in fiscal year 2022, and almost twice as many, 172, in fiscal year 2023, which ends Sept. 30.
- So far, in the first four months of 2024, 59 people have been apprehended, according to federal data.
- “The federal government has failed to enact border security measures, and the state of Texas, through Gov. [Greg] Abbott’s Operation Lone Star, will continue to take unprecedented action to help secure the border,” DPS Lt. Chris Olivarez said.
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Important Takeaways:
- The northern invasion: New York, New Hampshire and Vermont see highest EVER border crossings as migrants take advantage of lax laws to get into Canada
- New York, Vermont and New Hampshire counties have seen a record number of illegal border crossings in recent months, startling statistics show.
- The new numbers, up more than twofold from 2022, come as an increasing number of migrants elect to travel through Canada rather than Mexico to avoid detection, creating a new spin on the now years-long crisis.
- While most still use legal ports of entry, more than 12,200 were apprehended crossing illegally from the north in 2023 – much more than the 3,578 arrested the year prior.
- Experts have attributed this phenomenon to Canada’s lax laws, like not requiring travelers from Mexico to have a visa to enter the country.
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Important Takeaways:
- California, New York residents moving out as 8.2 million Americans relocate to other states
- The federal agency estimated that the number of interstate movers rose about 4% from nearly 7.9 million people in 2021 to about 8.2 million last year. State-to-state migrations also comprised a larger share of all movers between 2021 and 2022, jumping from 18.8% to 19.9%.
- “The two largest flows, which were not statistically different from each other in size, came either to or from the four most populous states: large numbers of people moved from California to Texas and from New York to Florida,” survey statistician Mehreen S. Ismail wrote in a summary of the findings.
- According to the bureau, 102,442 people moved from California to Texas last year, the most between any two states. Another 91,201 people relocated from California to Arizona. California’s population is about 39 million, while Texas’ is 30 million. Arizona is home to 7.4 million people.
- In the next-biggest state-to-state jump, 91,201 people left New York for Florida. Another 75,103 people moved from New York to neighboring New Jersey.
- Texas had the country’s lowest outward migration rate at 11.7% of all movers, with 42,479 relocating to California and 38,207 to Florida.
- On the flip side, California had the nation’s lowest inward migration rate at 11.1% of all movers, with most coming from Texas.
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