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1 Judge Indefinitely Delays Trump's Classified Documents Trial, Stormy Daniels Testifies In "Hush Money" Proceedings
As former President Donald Trump’s “hush money” trial continued in New York City yesterday, a different judge postponed another of his legal hearings. Yesterday, US Judge Aileen Cannon wrote that Trump’s trial in his classified documents case in Florida has been postponed indefinitely. The reason was to allow more time for pretrial hearings to be held to resolve “myriad and interconnected pre-trial and CIPA issues.” CIPA is a reference to the Classified Information Procedures Act, which has to be considered since classified information is at the heart of the case. The trial was scheduled to start in less than two weeks. Adult film star Stormy Daniels took the stand to testify during yesterday’s hearing in New York City, giving lurid details of the sexual encounter she says she had with Trump in 2006, and also the deal to allegedly buy her silence about the encounter to keep it out of the headlines just before the 2016 presidential campaign. Trump lawyer Todd Blanche told Judge Juan Merchan that some of Daniels’ testimony was “unduly and inappropriately prejudicial” and requested a mistrial. Merchan denied the motion but said he would be striking some of Daniels’ testimony. Court is not in session today.
2 TikTok Sues US Government On Free Speech Grounds Over Ban
The next move of TikTok wasn’t a surprise in its battle with Congress. The app and its parent company byteDance filed a lawsuit against the federal government yesterday, saying the legislation forcing the company to sell TikTok or see it banned in the US violates the First Amendment rights of its users. In the 65-page petition filed in the US Court of Appeals, TikTok said the law “subjects a single, named speech platform to a permanent, nationwide ban, and bars every American from participating in a unique online community.” Congress passed the “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act” as part of the massive $95-billion foreign aid package on April 24th, with President Joe Biden quickly signing it into law after it cleared both the House and Senate. This isn’t the first time TikTok has taken a ban to court; ByteDance filed a lawsuit against Montana one year ago when it passed a similar ban, and a federal judge ruled in favor of TikTok and blocked the ban in November before it took effect.
3 Boy Scouts Of America Changing Name To Be More Inclusive
Five years ago, the Boy Scouts of America started allowing girls to join the organization, and now they’re changing their name. A rebranding to Scouting America was announced yesterday, with the name change officially taking place on Feb. 8th, the 115th anniversary of the organization. Roger A. Krone, the president and chief executive officer of Scouting America, said in a news release that “This will be a simple but very important evolution as we seek to ensure that everyone feels welcome in Scouting.” The organization says it already has over 176,000 girls in its programs, including 6,000 who’ve earned the rank of Eagle Scout.