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1 President Biden Has Reportedly Decided On Response To Killing Of Three US Soldiers
As he was leaving the White House yesterday for a fundraising trip to Florida, President Joe Biden took a few questions from reporters gathered outside. One of the first things asked was if he had made a decision on the military response the United States will have to the drone attack that killed three US soldiers in Jordan on Sunday, and the president answered with a simple “Yes.” He went on to say, “I don’t think we need a wider war in the Middle East. That’s not what I’m looking for.” During the flight on Air Force One, National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters on board that “It’s very possible that what you’ll see is a tiered approach here, not just a single action, but potentially multiple actions over a period of time.” There’s already a reaction overseas; the Iranian-backed Iraqi militia Kataib Hezbollah announced in a statement yesterday “the suspension of military and security operations against the occupation forces in order to prevent embarrassment to the Iraqi government.” The Pentagon said yesterday that the number of service members injured in the attack is at least 40, with several in critical condition. After Biden spoke to the families of the three service members killed, Kirby announced that the president will attend the dignified transfer on Friday, marking the return of fallen service members to American soil.
2 "Classified And Top Secret" Documents Allegedly Stolen By Ransomware Gang
A notorious ransomware gang says it has classified and top secret documents from several US intelligence agencies, and they’re threatening to release them. The group Blackcat, also known as ALPHV, claimed in a post on the dark web that it had grabbed 300 gigabytes of data from the Technica Corporation, a company that reportedly works with the federal government with data security and storage. In the post on the dark web, the group claimed it had “documents related to the FBI and other US intelligence agencies. If Technica does not contact us soon, the data will either be sold or made public.” The post also included over 20 sample documents from the theft, and analysts say that based on those samples the threat should be taken seriously.
3 Ohio Introduces Bill To Allow Execution By Nitrogen Gas
In the wake of the first state execution of a prisoner using nitrogen gas, Ohio lawmakers took the first step yesterday to allow the procedure there. Ohio state Reps. Phil Plummer and Brian Stewart introduced the legislation during a press conference yesterday, saying that the bill would allow nitrogen gas to join lethal injection as an execution method and that it “shall be used in instances where lethal injection is not an available means of carrying out a capital sentence.” There have been no executions in Ohio since 2018 when the governor’s office said there was a lack of access to certain drugs used for lethal injection. There are currently 129 people on death row in Ohio.