Supreme Court appears to uphold presidential immunity
The Supreme Court’s conservative majority seemed ready yesterday Provides former presidents with a degree of immunity from criminal prosecutionwhich could further delay the criminal case against Donald Trump accusing him of conspiring to subvert the 2020 election.
Such a ruling would likely send the case back to the trial court, ordering it to distinguish between official and private conduct. While there appears to be consensus among the justices that the criminal case may ultimately move forward based on Trump’s personal conduct, the additional proceedings could make it difficult to hold a trial before the 2024 election in November.
If Trump wins the White House, he could order the Justice Department to drop the charges against him.here has takeout from the argument.
In Trump’s New York trial, Former National Enquirer publisher David Pecker told jurors in vivid detail about accusations of falsifying business records How Trump relies on him to buy and bury damaging stories This could derail Trump’s 2016 campaign.
The U.S. Army begins construction of a floating dock off the coast of Gaza
Yesterday U.S. Army Engineers Construction of floating dock begins The facility, located off the Gaza coast, can help rescue workers deliver up to 2 million meals a day, defense officials said.
The terminal is designed to allow humanitarian aid to enter the besieged strip, bypassing Israeli restrictions on land convoys. But aid workers and defense officials say maritime projects are not an adequate substitute for more land-based aid.
Defense Department officials expect the project to be completed early next month.Experts say famine may occur In Gaza at the end of May.
Harvey Weinstein’s New York conviction overturned
new york supreme court Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 conviction on felony sex crime charges overturnedThe reversal shocked many women who decided to speak out against Weinstein, accelerating the #MeToo movement.
The court said the trial judge presiding over the sex crimes case made a serious error by allowing prosecutors to call as witnesses several women who testified Weinstein sexually assaulted them, even though none of the allegations resulted in charges.
Weinstein is still not a free man. He faces 16 years in prison in California, and the Manhattan district attorney said through a spokesman that he plans to retry the case in 2020.
The 2024 Venice Biennale, which opens this week, is at best a missed opportunity and at worst an artistic tragedy, our critic Jason Farago writes.
The real question is how the exhibition symbolizes, essentialises, minimizes and categorizes the more than 300 talented artists it features, farago wrote. While there was much he liked in the exhibition, he wrote, “the artist’s human complexity was upstaged by his designation as a member of a group, and the art itself was reduced to a symptom or triviality.”
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Host options reduced: Salt Lake City Ready for the 2034 Winter Olympics—and possibly beyond.
art and ideas
30th anniversary of the end of apartheid
South Africans will mark the 30th anniversary of the first post-apartheid elections tomorrow.
In just over a month, on May 29, they will vote in national elections that could bring about a major shift: the African National Congress, which has been in power for three decades, could lose its majority for the first time.
“It feels almost impossible to separate an election year from a major anniversary year,” colleague Lynsey Choutel, who reports from Johannesburg, told me.
“This anniversary forces not only political parties but also South Africans to reflect on: ‘What have the past 30 years meant to us?'” she added. “‘How can we restore political optimism and economic strength?'”
How does the legacy of apartheid impact life in South Africa today?
Lindsay: If you walk down the streets of a Johannesburg suburb, you can look around and see what has been achieved. This is a leafy suburb. There are cafes on the roadside. People are chatting.
But the majority of people enjoying this progress are white. Most people working server or low-wage jobs are black. Black South Africans have yet to catch up in terms of wealth.
Let’s fast forward to next month’s election. What’s your mood?
The ANC’s support is probably at its lowest, and it has never had to work harder to convince South Africans to vote for them. Some young people see this vote as critical as the 1994 vote. Many people are deeply disillusioned. High unemployment and corruption scandals have eroded their confidence in politicians.
The opposition stood up and said: “We are finally at a position where we believe we can lead.”
It’s a huge shift from 1994, which felt like an affirmation of Nelson Mandela and his party and the end of apartheid. This year, the sentiment among voters I spoke to was: “How do we use elections to get the country back on track and capitalize on post-apartheid freedoms?”
