Here are some of tonight’s other top stories:
- Prosecutors overwhelmed by amount of evidence in the January 6 insurrection.
- Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Mark Milley offended by Republicans attacks on the military studying critical race theory.
- Republican-controlled state legislatures are undermining city mayors.
- Vice President Harris to visit southern border; as US Border Patrol chief is reassigned.
- Afghanistan government projected to collapse 3-6 months after US-led departure.
- Dangerous COVID-19 delta variant already 20 percent of US cases.
- Michigan Republicans refute their party’s “big lie” — “no evidence of widespread or systemic fraud” in the state’s election.
- White farmers sue to block Black and minority farmers from getting USDA relief payments.
- IPCC steps up warning on climate tipping points; Antarctica nearly climate disaster.
- Historic heat wave in Pacific Northwest.
Details and links to sources below the fold.
This is an open thread. Everyone is encouraged to share articles, stories, and tweets in your comments.
602,205 PEOPLE HAVE DIED FROM CORONAVIRUS IN THE U.S. 177.9 MILLION PEOPLE IN THE U.S. HAVE RECEIVED A VACCINATION DOSE
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Prosecutors blame ‘extraordinary amounts of evidence’ for slow pace in Jan. 6 cases
Federal prosecutors say they are still processing mountains of evidence in hundreds of cases stemming from the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. The unprecedented scale of the investigation, which involves more than 450 defendants, has meant individual cases are moving slowly.
In a hearing Wednesday involving Georgia resident Lisa Eisenhart and her son, Eric Munchel, a representative from the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia said they are processing “extraordinary amounts of evidence” in the case.
The evidence includes thousands of citizen tips submitted to the FBI and prosecutors were not yet ready to offer a possible plea deal to the defendants, who face eight criminal counts for their alleged role in the pro-Trump riot, the representative said.
NPR News
Prosecutors Get Their 1st Guilty Plea In The Jan. 6 Oath Keepers Conspiracy Case
Federal prosecutors secured their first guilty plea Wednesday in the Justice Department's sprawling conspiracy case involving the Oath Keepers extremist group in connection with the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
At a hearing in federal court in Washington, D.C., Graydon Young pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy and one count of obstruction of an official proceeding. The 55-year-old Florida resident agreed to cooperate with investigators, which could prove critical as the government pursues the remaining defendants in the high-profile case.
Young is one of 16 people associated with the Oath Keepers to be charged with conspiracy, obstruction and other offenses over the Capitol riot. Prosecutors say the defendants coordinated their efforts and actions to try to disrupt Congress' certification of the Electoral College count on Jan. 6.
NASA Can't Figure Out What's Causing Computer Issues On The Hubble Telescope
The storied space telescope that brought you stunning photos of the solar system and enriched our understanding of the cosmos over the past three decades is experiencing a technical glitch.
Scientists at NASA say the Hubble Space Telescope's payload computer, which operates the spacecraft's scientific instruments, went down suddenly on June 13. Without it, the instruments on board meant to snap pictures and collect data are not currently working.
Scientists have run a series of tests on the malfunctioning computer system but have yet to figure out what went wrong.
Politico
Top general fires back at 'offensive' criticism of military being 'woke'
The military's top officer on Wednesday pushed back against GOP lawmakers who said the Pentagon's efforts to combat racism and promote diversity have made the armed forces too "woke."
Joint Chiefs Chair Gen. Mark Milley gave a fiery defense of open-mindedness in the ranks during a House Armed Services hearing, saying he's offended at the accusation that those efforts have undercut the military's mission and cohesiveness.
‘Rogue city leaders’: How Republicans are taking power away from mayors
Mayors and city councils across Arizona issued face mask mandates during the pandemic to prevent the spread of Covid-19, angering conservative state lawmakers who decried government overreach. So the legislators turned to the newest Republican playbook and passed a law allowing businesses to ignore those public health requirements. […]
But the bill’s main sponsor says it was needed to ensure “rogue city leaders” can’t impose mask mandates again, should another outbreak occur. […]
The strategy used in Arizona has been employed with new intensity by Republicans in states like Texas, Florida and Georgia, where lawmakers over the past year passed legislation preempting the ability of city — and state — leaders to enforce their own regulations. The bigfooting of local officials accelerated as the pandemic turned public health decisions into political minefields, but it also also touched on other wedge issues, like police funding, gun control and climate change.
Mother Jones
India Walton, Socialist and Former Nurse, Is Set to Become Buffalo’s First Female Mayor
In what’s shaping up to be a stunning upset, India Walton, a socialist candidate running her first political campaign in Buffalo, New York, appears set to defeat four-term incumbent Byron Brown in the city’s Democratic mayoral primary. With 100 percent of precincts reporting, Walton has a lead of 1,507 votes.
The 38-year-old progressive challenger is now on track to become the city’s first female mayor and the country’s only socialist mayor of a major US city. […]
Walton, who counts Missouri Democratic Rep. Cori Bush as a role mode, is a lifelong Buffalo resident, a former nurse, and the founding executive director of a local land trust…
AP News
Biden targets law-breaking gun dealers in anti-crime plan
President Joe Biden announced new efforts Wednesday to stem a rising national tide of violent crime, declaring the federal government is “taking on the bad actors doing bad things to our communities.” But questions persist about how effective the efforts can be in what could be a turbulent summer.
Crime rates have risen after plummeting during the initial months of the coronavirus pandemic, creating economic hardship and anxiety. Biden’s plan focuses on providing money to cities that need more police, offering community support and most of all cracking down on gun violence and those supplying illegal firearms.
“These merchants of death are breaking the law for profit,” Biden said. “If you willfully sell a gun to someone who’s prohibited, my message to you is this: We’ll find you and we’ll seek your license to sell guns. We’ll make sure you can’t sell death and mayhem on our streets.”
Border Patrol chief who supported Trump’s wall is forced out
The chief of the U.S. Border Patrol was forced out of his job Wednesday, after less than two years in a position that lies in the crosshairs of polarizing political debate.
Rodney Scott wrote to agents that he will be reassigned, saying he “will continue working hard to support you over the next several weeks to ensure a smooth transition.” […]
Scott refused to fall in line with a Biden administration directive to stop using terms like “illegal alien” in favor of descriptions like “migrant.”
Los Angeles Times
VP Harris to make first trip to U.S.-Mexico border to assess migration
Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to the U.S. southern border on Friday, the administration confirmed Wednesday, following months of Republicans’ criticism over the Biden administration’s handling of a large increase in families and unaccompanied minors arriving from Central America.
The trip to El Paso with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas is sure to be politically fraught. Harris, who is in charge of diplomatic efforts with Central American leaders, had resisted going to the U.S.-Mexico border since becoming vice president, though she went numerous times as a senator and as California’s attorney general.
The conditions there are not officially part of the task that President Biden assigned Harris in March. She is responsible for addressing the “root causes” of migration from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador by working with leaders and activists in those countries.
Yet Republicans have called her the “border czar,” hoping to make Harris the face of an issue that they believe could help them politically in next year’s midterm congressional elections.
In two very different California disputes, Supreme Court affirms private property rights
The Supreme Court upheld an individual’s right to private property against government intrusion in two very different California cases Wednesday, underscoring the libertarian leanings of the more conservative majority.
The decisions — one unanimous and the other ideologically split — also bolstered privacy rights.
In one case, the justices sided with a California motorist who complained when a police officer followed him without a warrant into his home garage, where he was questioned and ticketed for drunk driving.
In the second, the court voided a long-standing California labor rule that gave union organizers limited access to private farmland to talk to workers.
The Hill
Intel analysis: Afghan government could collapse six months after US troops withdraw
Afghanistan’s government could collapse as quickly as six months after all U.S. troops withdraw from the country, according to new analysis from the U.S. intelligence community.
The new assessment, which differs starkly from previous positive analysis, comes after the Taliban made battlefield gains in Afghanistan, including the seizure of a key district in northern Kunduz province this week.
Taliban forces have also besieged Mazar-e-Sharif this week, the provincial capital of Balkh.
The latest intelligence assessment, reported by The Wall Street Journal, said that the Afghan government, led by President Ashraf Ghani, could collapse between six to 12 months after all American forces are pulled from the country.
Al Jazeera
‘Historic moment’: Legal experts unveil new definition of ecocide
After six months of deliberation, a team of international lawyers has unveiled a new legal definition of “ecocide” that, if adopted, would put environmental destruction on a par with war crimes – paving the way for the prosecution of world leaders and corporate chiefs for the worst attacks on nature.
The expert panel published the core text of the proposed law on Tuesday, outlining ecocide as “unlawful or wanton acts committed with knowledge that there is a substantial likelihood of severe and either widespread or long-term damage to the environment being caused by those acts”.
Its authors want the members of the International Criminal Court (ICC) to endorse it and hold big polluters to account in a bid to halt the unbridled destruction of the world’s ecosystems.
Calls grow to evacuate Afghans who helped US troops to Guam
With US and NATO forces facing a September 11 deadline to leave Afghanistan, many are recalling that desperate, hasty exodus as they urge the Biden administration to evacuate thousands of Afghans who worked as interpreters or otherwise helped US military operations there in the past two decades.
Despite unusual bipartisan support in the US Congress, the administration has not agreed to such a move, declining to publicly support something that could undermine security in the Afghanistan…
Legislators have urged the administration to consider temporarily relocating Afghans who worked for American or NATO forces to a safe overseas location while their US visas are processed. Some have suggested Guam, a US territory that served a similar purpose after the Vietnam War. Kurdish refugees also were flown to the Pacific island in 1996 after the Gulf War.
CNBC
Fauci says delta accounts for 20% of new cases and will be dominant Covid variant in U.S. in weeks
White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci said Wednesday the delta variant now accounts for roughly 20% of newly diagnosed cases in the U.S. and will become the dominant Covid strain in the nation in a matter of weeks.
“It just exploded in the U.K. It went from a minor variant to now more than 90% of the isolates in the U.K.,” Fauci said… Fauci said the variant has a doubling time of about two weeks and currently accounts for 20% of the isolates in the U.S., which are newly diagnosed infections. “So you would expect, just the doubling time, you know, in several weeks to a month or so it’s going to be quite dominant, that’s the sobering news.”
The New Yorker
The Delta Variant Is a Grave Danger to the Unvaccinated
Lineage B.1.617.2, now known as the Delta variant, was first detected in India, in December, 2020. An evolved version of sars-CoV-2, Delta has at least a dozen mutations, including several on its spike protein that make it vastly more contagious and possibly more lethal and vaccine-resistant than other strains. In India, the Delta variant contributed to the most devastating coronavirus wave the world has seen so far; now, it has been detected in dozens of countries, including the United States. […]
The vast majority of Delta-variant cases seem to have occurred in adults under fifty, whose rates of vaccination remain lower than those of older people. […]
To a significant degree, the emergence of a variant like Delta was predictable, and, with rapid and widespread immunization, the threat that it poses can be subdued. But its arrival is still incredibly consequential. Delta drives an even wider wedge between vaccinated and unvaccinated people. They have already been living in separate worlds, facing vastly different risks of illness and death; now, their risk levels will diverge further. People who’ve been fully vaccinated can, by and large, feel confident in the immunity that they’ve received. But those who remain susceptible should understand that, for them, this is probably the most dangerous moment of the pandemic.
The Washington Post
Colleges want students to get coronavirus shots, but there’s a stark red-blue divide
[…] To avoid a reprise of pandemic disruptions, educators are pushing as hard as possible in the next several weeks for mass inoculation. The health association recommends colleges require vaccination of on-campus students where state law allows. […]
More than 500 colleges and universities plan to require coronavirus vaccination for at least some of their students and employees, according to data as of Tuesday from the Chronicle of Higher Education. They include the entire Ivy League; public university systems in Maryland, California and New York; and most of the U.S. News & World Report lists of the top 50 national universities and liberal arts colleges. The vast majority of vaccine-mandate schools are in states President Biden carried in last year’s election, reflecting a deep red-blue divide. Some mandates only apply to students in campus housing.
Decisions about vaccine requirements are shot through with politics. In emails obtained through public record requests, officials at public universities in Republican-led states acknowledge the sensitivity of the issue.
In sentencing regretful Capitol protester, federal judge rebukes Republicans
U.S. District Judge Royce C. Lamberth castigated Republican lawmakers on Wednesday for downplaying the violence of the mob that stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6, saying in handing down the first sentence to a charged defendant that those who break the law must pay a penalty.
“I’m especially troubled by the accounts of some members of Congress that January 6 was just a day of tourists walking through the Capitol,” he said. “I don’t know what planet they were on. . . . This was not a peaceful demonstration. It was not an accident that it turned violent; it was intended to halt the very functioning of our government.” […]
Referring to the words of Rep. Andrew S. Clyde (R-Ga.), who last month suggested that many inside the Capitol following the pro-Trump mob’s attack on the building looked like they were on a “normal tourist visit,” the judge said that video introduced in court “will show the attempts of some congressmen to rewrite history . . . is utter nonsense.”
The Kansas City Star
Judge rules against Medicaid expansion in Missouri, but decision will be appealed
Missouri’s voter-approved Medicaid expansion is unconstitutional because it infringes on lawmakers’ authority over spending, a state judge ruled Wednesday in a decision that will be appealed.
Gov. Mike Parson’s administration isn’t required to extend health coverage to roughly 275,000 low-income MIssourians, Cole County Circuit Judge Jon Beetem found in his decision. Expansion supporters had hoped he would order the state to implement the program beginning July 1, even though the Republican-controlled General Assembly refused to fund it.
Beetem wrote that under the Missouri Constitution, the public “may only spend or appropriate the revenues that they raise in the initiative.”
The Oregonian
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown commutes sentences of 41 inmates who helped battle historic wildfires
Gov. Kate Brown has commuted the sentences of 41 prisoners who helped fight wildfires that burned across the state last year, the Oregon Department of Corrections confirmed Wednesday.
Of those she identified for commutation, 23, including eight women, are expected to be released on July 22 provided they have housing in place.
Brown shaved 12 months off the sentences for the remaining 18 prisoners, including three women.
Texas Monthly
Meet the Two Latinas From the Rio Grande Valley Guiding Biden’s Political Strategy
Trey Martinez Fischer, a Texas state representative from San Antonio, was addressing Vice President Kamala Harris, seated across the sixteen-foot mahogany conference table in the Roosevelt Room, close by the Oval Office. All the remaining seats at the table were occupied by Texas lawmakers who had been invited to the White House. Harris had greeted the group as “courageous leaders” and “American patriots” because many of them were Texas House members who had staged a walkout near midnight on the eve of the last day of the legislative session, denying Republicans the necessary quorum to advance a bill to impose new restrictions on voting in the state. But as Martinez Fischer spoke, he redirected the praise back to a White House staffer in the room, Natalie Montelongo, deputy director of Biden’s Office of Political Strategy and Outreach.
Montelongo had sent him a text on May 29, just as Black and Latino representatives were meeting on Zoom to consider the possibility of a walkout the next day, Martinez Fischer said. She had alerted him to the president’s statement calling the voting bill “un-American” and “an assault on democracy.” “It was very clear to me after reading the statement that the eyes of the nation were looking at Austin, Texas, and the need to be bold and to be decisive, and we needed to react accordingly,” Martinez Fischer told me later, recounting what he had said in the Roosevelt Room. “Frankly, I think that was the spark that told us that breaking the quorum was the democratic thing to do.”
NBC News
Republican official in Ohio faces charge for voting twice in November election
Edward Snodgrass, who is a Porter Township trustee, has admitted to forging his dead father’s signature on an absentee ballot and then voting again as himself, court records and other sources revealed.
Snodgrass was busted after a Delaware County election worker questioned the signature on his father’s ballot. A subsequent investigation revealed the ballot had been mailed to H. Edward Snodgrass on Oct. 6 — a day after the 78-year-old retired businessman died. […]
Snodgrass said he made “an honest error” …
Detroit Free Press
Michigan Republican-led investigation rejects Trump's claim that Nov. 3 election was stolen
An investigation led by Michigan Republican lawmakers found no basis for claims by … Donald Trump and his allies that there was widespread fraud in the 2020 election, a Michigan Senate report released Wednesday concludes.
The results of the inquiry by the Michigan Senate Oversight Committee, chaired by a Republican and comprised of a GOP majority, are the latest repudiation of conspiracies and lies revolving around Michigan's election results.
"The Committee found no evidence of widespread or systemic fraud in Michigan's prosecution of the 2020 election," the report states.
"Citizens should be confident the results represent the true results of the ballots cast by the people of Michigan."
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Controversial voting changes shelved at Minnesota Capitol as legislators seek compromise
Republicans' push for voter ID and a provisional ballot system appears to have failed at the Minnesota Capitol, and Democrats' hopes to expand voter access and felon voting rights have fallen by the wayside too.
A deal on the bill that helps fund elections — among many other aspects of state government — leaves out controversial elections provisions that have been sources of contention in Minnesota and across the country. […]
A draft of the agreement negotiators struck on the state government bill does include a number of other new items, including a security requirement for absentee ballot drop boxes …
The Guardian
Black US farmers dismayed as white farmers’ lawsuit halts relief payments
The US Department of Agriculture was scheduled to begin sending out payments to Black and minority farmers this month, as part of a $4bn loan forgiveness program included in the $1.9tn coronavirus relief bill that passed Congress in March.
But a lawsuit on behalf of white farmers accusing the Biden administration of discrimination has, at least temporarily, stopped the checks, prompting dismay among Black farmers and campaigners.
The money, intended as a way to address more than 100 years of discriminatory practices and policies that have historically and disproportionately disadvantaged Black owners of farmland, is now being held up due to an injunction granted this month by a federal judge in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
IPCC steps up warning on climate tipping points in leaked draft report
Climate scientists are increasingly concerned that global heating will trigger tipping points in Earth’s natural systems, which will lead to widespread and possibly irrevocable disaster, unless action is taken urgently.
The impacts are likely to be much closer than most people realise, a a draft report from the world’s leading climate scientists suggests, and will fundamentally reshape life in the coming decades even if greenhouse gas emissions are brought under some control.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is preparing a landmark report to be published in stages this summer and next year. Most of the report will not be published in time for consideration by policymakers at Cop26, the UN climate talks taking place in November in Glasgow.
Mongabay
Earth tipping points could destabilize each other in domino effect: Study
When the first tile in a line of dominoes tips forward, it affects everything in front of it… This is essentially what could happen to ice sheets, ocean currents and even the Amazon biome if critical tipping points are crossed, according to a new risk analysis. The destabilization of one element could impact the others, creating a domino effect of drastic changes that could move the Earth into an unfamiliar state — one potentially dangerous to the future of humanity and nature as we know it.
The study, published this month in Earth System Dynamics, examines the interactions between five subsystems that are known to have vital thresholds, or tipping points, that could trigger irreversible changes. They include the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, the Greenland Ice Sheet, the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Amazon Rainforest.
Scientists believe the AMOC could reach its critical threshold when warming temperatures weaken the current enough to substantially slow it, halt it, or redirect it, which could plunge parts of the northern hemisphere into a period of record cold, even as global warming continues elsewhere. Likewise, the Antarctic ice sheet may reach its irreversible threshold when warming temperatures trigger a state of constant ice loss, which could ultimately result in a 4-meter (13-foot) rise in global sea levels over the coming centuries. In fact, it’s suggested that the West Antarctic Ice Sheet may have already passed its critical threshold, and that ice loss is unstoppable now.
Deutsche Welle
Antarctic nearing climate disaster despite landmark historic treaty
When the Antarctic Treaty came into effect 60 years ago, its signatories had little idea how successful it would be.
World leaders agreed to leave an uninhabited continent twice the size of Australia free from war, weapons and nuclear waste. They declared that the southern polar region, which is 98% ice and does not have an indigenous population, should belong to no country and instead be devoted to collaborative science. In the following decades, extra rules to stop companies mining minerals and drilling for oil turned Antarctica into the biggest nature reserve in the world.
Now climate change is undermining that success story.
Brazil: Environment minister steps down amid logging probe
Brazilian Environment Minister Ricardo Salles announced that he was leaving his post on Wednesday as authorities investigate his alleged role in an illegal logging scheme, Brazilian media reported.
The Supreme Court ordered the investigation to go ahead last month. The minister in President Jair Bolsonaro's far-right government gained infamy for presiding over massive deforestation in the Amazon rainforest.
BBC News
Gold rush fuels armed violence in Brazilian Amazon
At around midday on 11 May, Dario Kopenawa, an indigenous leader, received a desperate phone call from a remote village in the Brazilian Amazon. Palimiú has a population of about 1,000, who live in large communal houses on the banks of a river called Uraricoera. You can only reach it by plane, or after a long journey on a boat.
Kopenawa, who is from the Yanomami tribe, is used to hearing pleas for help from communities in the rainforest, but this one was different. "They attacked us," a man told him, "they almost killed us". They, Kopenawa was told, were garimpeiros, or illegal gold miners, who had arrived on seven motorboats, some carrying automatic weapons, and started shooting indiscriminately.
Hiding behind trees, the Yanomami fought back, using shotguns and bows. An indigenous man was grazed by a bullet in the head, Kopenawa learned, and four miners were injured. The attackers left after half an hour, but threatened to come back for revenge. Terrified, women fled into the dense jungle with their children to seek refuge. It was chaotic, and two boys, aged one and five, drowned.
Apple Daily: Hong Kong pro-democracy paper announces closure
Hong Kong's largest pro-democracy paper Apple Daily has announced its closure, in a blow to media freedom in the city.
The tabloid's offices were raided last week over allegations that several reports had breached a controversial national security law. Police detained the chief editor and five other executives, and company-linked assets were frozen.
The publication had become a leading critic of the Hong Kong and Chinese leadership.
ProPublica
How China Spreads Its Propaganda Version of Life for Uyghurs
[…] A monthslong analysis of more than 3,000 of the videos by ProPublica and The New York Times found evidence of an influence campaign orchestrated by the Chinese government.
The operation has produced and spread thousands of videos in which Chinese citizens deny abuses against their own communities and scold foreign officials and multinational corporations who dare question the Chinese government’s human rights record in Xinjiang.
It all amounts to one of China’s most elaborate efforts to shape global opinion.
Beijing is trying to use savvier and more forceful methods to broadcast its political messages to a worldwide audience. And Western internet platforms like Twitter and YouTube are playing a key part.
Reuters
Indigenous group in Canada announces discovery of hundreds of unmarked graves
A Canadian indigenous group announced on Wednesday the "horrific and shocking discovery" of hundreds of unmarked graves at the site of a former residential school, just weeks after the discovery of other children's remains shook the country.
The Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations said in a statement that the number of newly found unmarked graves was "the most significantly substantial to date in Canada." The statement did not specify numbers.
The group said it would announce at a news conference on Thursday morning "the horrific and shocking discovery of hundreds of unmarked graves at the site of the former Marieval Indian Residential School" in Saskatchewan.
'Historic' heat wave takes aim at Pacific Northwest
The U.S. Pacific Northwest could experience a historic heat wave in the coming days that has the potential to shatter long-standing temperature records, strain power grids and endanger vulnerable residents, forecasters said on Wednesday.
A high-pressure dome was building over the upper northwest and Canada, the National Weather Service said, similar to the atmospheric conditions that punished California and U.S. Southwestern states last week.
"This will be setting the stage for the beginning of a potential historic heat wave for the Northwest this weekend," the weather service said in issuing excessive heat watches for parts of California, Oregon and Washington state.
"While record high temperature are not expected over the next two days over the Northwest, the high temperatures will still be 10 to 20 degrees above average and lead into the weekend when numerous record highs are likely," the weather service said.
Ars Technica
US seizes 33 Iranian state-run media sites accused of election disinformation
On Tuesday, the US government said it seized 33 websites run by a branch of the Iranian government that spread disinformation in the US before the 2020 presidential election. The US also seized three websites that it said were operated by an Iraqi terrorist organization.
Yesterday's Department of Justice announcement said the 33 Iranian sites were used by the Iranian Islamic Radio and Television Union (IRTVU), which is owned or controlled by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force (IRGC-QF). The DOJ said the IRTVU "targeted the United States with disinformation campaigns and malign influence operations."
"Visitors to leading Iranian media sites like Press TV and Al-Alam, the country's main English- and Arabic-language broadcasters, as well as the Al-Masirah TV channel of Yemen's Huthis, were met with single-page statements declaring the website 'has been seized by the United States government' accompanied by the seals of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the US Commerce Department," the AFP wrote.