Author: NCIJ NETWNCIJ NETWORK

Senator Tommy Tuberville called Dr. Abdul El-Sayed a “terrorist.”Representative Nancy Mace described “every single Muslim holding public office in America” as “a threat to both national security and our republic.”And on Monday, President Trump said that there were “jihadists being elected all over the place.”In the days since Dr. El-Sayed’s victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary, Republican leaders have embraced Islamophobic attacks and falsehoods like those three comments to portray him as an anti-American extremist. The onslaught is being fueled in part by Republican Party officials and has quickly become a central aspect of the strategy to beat Dr. El-Sayed…

In his first few weeks in Downing Street, Andy Burnham could hardly have been clearer that his aim as prime minister is to make people feel better.His supporters inside the Labour Party characterise him as a leader with the political nous to prioritise policies that will make a difference, and the communication ability to sell those messages to the masses.His critics, including Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, have branded him a “people pleaser” who doesn’t want to take difficult decisions.The conundrum over how to manage the early release of prisoners is an acute example of the tricky political decision-making that inevitably…

Earlier this summer, Amazon customers began noticing that emails related to their online orders looked sparse: Order confirmation emails didn’t name specific items anymore, and instead listed only item categories.Complaints about the vague emails appear to have started in July; orders placed as recently as June contain thumbnails and names of the exact item purchased. Some shoppers are complaining to Amazon about the new system, saying the emails with no details make it harder to keep track of purchases (and kind of look like spam or a phishing attempt). Amazon has a long history of tweaking how order emails look…

Mozilla announced today that it updated the GPG key used to sign Firefox and Thunderbird releases after it was accidentally exposed on GitHub. However, in a Monday blog post, it noted that the risk of a supply chain attack in which threat actors could distribute malicious installers signed with the exposed key is low because only a limited number of individuals had access to the GitHub repository. Additionally, Mozilla has yet to find evidence that the previous GPG key was accessed by unauthorized parties while being exposed. After discovering the incident, the organization revoked the key used to sign Linux tarballs,…

In brief Chloé Bakalar, OpenAI’s AI ethics lead, left the company last month without a public announcement, the Financial Times reported. She was OpenAI’s only dedicated ethicist and has not been replaced, according to a person familiar with her role. Her exit follows departures by OpenAI’s head of safety systems and its chief futurist. OpenAI’s head of ethics has left less than a year after joining, and the company has not replaced her, the Financial Times reported on Monday.Chloé Bakalar joined as AI ethics lead last August and departed in July with no public announcement, according to the paper. A…

The blue ribbon for largest known galaxy goes to a behemoth that probably grew by cannibalizing its smaller neighbors. Known as IC 1101, the galaxy’s diameter is estimated to be a whopping 520 kiloparsecs, or nearly 1.7 million light-years, researchers report in a study submitted July 16 to arXiv.org. That’s wider than 17 Milky Ways lined up in a row. Researchers analyzed the deepest images — or those with the longest exposure time — ever taken of IC 1101, captured in 2022 by the Isaac Newton Telescope at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory, located on La Palma in the…

Throughout Brazil, the contact between domestic cats and wild felines has been exposing threatened, biologically vulnerable feral species to diseases, which can reduce their populations.According to experts, habitat fragmentation is a common denominator of this crisis, from the Amazon to the Pampa, where felines are forced to leave the boundaries of their native areas and approach sites modified by human action.From the imposing jaguar to one of the smallest and rarest, the pampas cat, no Brazilian feline escapes the risks of contracting fungi, bacteria, parasites, and known viral diseases, such as feline leukemia and others.Studies and veterinarians warn that…

Angola’s state-owned oil company Sonangol has found more offshore black gold, augmenting the African country’s oil reserves.   Courtesy of Sonangol The National Agency of Petroleum, Gas and Biofuels (ANPG), alongside Sonangol Exploration and Production, as operator, and the partners of the contractor group of Block 3/05, have revealed the completion of drilling operations at the PAC 416 well in the southwest compartment of the Pacassa field in Block 3/05 within the Lower Congo Basin. The main objective of the well was to develop the oil potential of the southwestern compartment of the Pacassa field. The PAC 416 well reached…

Claim: An image authentically shows a coyote standing on its hind legs and pressing a crosswalk signaling button before crossing a road. Rating: In July and August 2026, people posted a brief video as a Facebook reel and YouTube short allegedly featuring an authentic photo of a coyote standing on its hind legs and pressing a crosswalk signaling button before crossing a road. The short video shared a story with the image claiming a wildlife camera installed along state Route 87 captured the picture outside Payson, Arizona. A sign reading “White Canyon Trailhead” appeared in the background of the image.…

Four prominent US human rights organizations have accused the Trump administration of using its “crippling” sanctions regime against the international criminal court (ICC) to undermine global efforts to prosecute war crimes and crimes against humanity.In a lawsuit filed in federal court on Tuesday, the groups – the American Friends Service Committee, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Human Rights Watch and the Open Society Institute – argued that the administration’s targeting of the ICC, as well as of groups and individuals affiliated with it or assisting its work, amounts to a “blatantly illegal attack on international justice”, the groups said.The suit…