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NFL to meet with minority head coaches, GM candidates

More than 60 minority head coaches and general manager candidates will meet with NFL owners as part of a two-day accelerator program, the league announced on Thursday. 

The Inaugural Coach and Front Office Accelerator program will provide senior women and minority candidates with leadership development sessions. Candidates will meet with football operations experts and facilitators and have time to network with team owners. 

The league said the program’s purpose is to build a diverse hiring pipeline for future head coach and front office positions within the 32-team league. 

Attendees of the two-day program will also engage in discussions with league owners on how to become a coach or front office executive, according to the statement. 

All 32 teams will send their nominated rising prospect to participate.

Notable names include Tampa Bay Buccaneers offensive coordinator Byron Leftwich, Kansas City Chiefs offensive coordinator Eric Bieniemy, Detroit Lions defensive coordinator Aaron Glenn, and Arizona Cardinals defensive coordinator Vance Joseph. 

“The NFL is committed to diversity and inclusion, and this program is the latest in a series of steps designed to improve our hiring practices and create opportunities for advancement,” league commissioner Roger Goodell said in a statement. 

“The program helps ensure that clubs receive exposure to high-performing, up-and-coming NFL talent and candidates get a chance to learn the business on a working level from team owners and executives.”

News of the program comes as Pittsburgh Steelers senior defensive assistant and linebackers coach Brian Flores filed a lawsuit against the NFL and three teams including the Miami Dolphins, New York Giants, and Denver Broncos earlier this year alleging racial discrimination in its hiring practices.

Two other minority coaches, Steve Wilks and Ray Horton, were added to Flores’s lawsuit last month. 

The league also hired former Justice Department Attorney General Loretta Lynch to defend the NFL in the suit.

Following the law suit, the league adopted a policy in March that will require all teams to hire a female or minority offensive assistant coach for the upcoming season. 

“I think the Accelerator is some of the most important work the League and our committee will do all year because the potential of the program is exponential,” Atlanta Falcons owner and chairman Arthur Blank.

“It’s an unprecedented opportunity for emerging leaders, owners and team leadership to get to know each other better over these two days, and the relationships formed in this setting will be integral to future hiring cycles.”

The Inaugural Coach and Front Office Accelerator program will take place May 23- 24 during the league’s annual spring meeting in Atlanta, Ga.

Source: TEST FEED1

Before we regulate Big Tech, let’s make sure we don’t hurt national security

With the laudable goals of promoting competition and outlawing unfair tactics in the online world, Congress is considering antitrust bills that would regulate how companies such as Apple, Amazon, Facebook (Meta), Google (Alphabet) and Microsoft treat other businesses that use their digital platforms. Regardless of the extent of regulation, everyone recognizes that the platforms must be kept free from malware and spyware.

But some of the provisions in the bills might inadvertently undercut the ability to do that. Endangering cybersecurity on our major social media and commercial online platforms, which are critical to almost every aspect of our personal and commercial lives, is a national security risk.

We should be even more wary about these risks now in view of President Biden’s statement in late March that Russia was “exploring options for potential cyberattacks” — an unprecedented cyber warning by a commander in chief. Apart from the Russian cyber threat, we’re already struggling in our cyber battle against the spy agencies and ransomware gangs operating in China, North Korea and Iran – with American schools, hospitals and businesses everyday suffering data thefts and ransomware attacks. We need to make sure our nation’s cyber infrastructure is in a better position to fend off increasingly sophisticated attacks.

Yet there’s concern that the two bills recently reported out by the Senate Judiciary Committee – the American Innovation and Choice Online Act (S.2992) and the Open App Markets Act (S.2710) – could in fact increase cybersecurity risks. The bills would restrict some operating abilities of the Big Tech platforms and force them to redesign their systems, for example, to allow business users (which could include foreign entities) to have more open access to the platform’s proprietary software, thus theoretically encouraging interoperability and cutting down the competitive benefits of that software.

The bills also seek to block certain steps the platforms take to enforce their rules, thus giving business users greater operating freedom on the platforms; and to shield such users’ own data from analysis by the platforms, thus preventing the platforms from taking unfair competitive advantage of their users’ data.

While those abilities can be abused by the platform owners, they are also, at least in some respects, essential. That’s because in order to prevent the installation of malware or spyware, to discover technical vulnerabilities that could be exploited by foreign countries or to uncover and stop disinformation on their platforms, the platforms in many cases rely on the very abilities that would be banned.

Mandating that a third party has the right to connect and operate seamlessly with a platform’s own systems could, for example, mean that the platform couldn’t scan for or block malicious code; the platform does indeed have to “discriminate” against bad software. Yet, depending on the interpretation of the bills’ provisions, that might be unintentionally outlawed. Obviously, curtailing a platform’s ability to prevent a computer virus from infecting that platform or its users, or allowing disinformation to be posted and disseminated, can’t be good for our national security.

To be fair, the bills contain exceptions allowing some business practices to continue where necessary for cybersecurity. But it’s not clear that the exceptions are comprehensive enough, or will be properly interpreted by the regulatory agencies and the courts, to ensure that online platforms will indeed be able to shield themselves from cyber maliciousness. We shouldn’t have to take that risk, however small.

This isn’t to say that Big Tech should be immune from scrutiny or regulation. Indeed, revelations over the past few years about some of the capabilities and operations of several companies have highlighted some intrusive and abusive practices that most people think should be banned.

So, there is a reasonable public policy argument for the belated imposition of some restrictions on an industry that was very deliberately allowed to grow without restraint and indeed with special legal protections (such as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which exempted online platforms from liability for what their users posted).

Yet the way Congress is seeking to impose these restrictions creates potential problems. Because of the possibility that a given technologic practice or ability could be equally used for good purposes (say, creating additional or safer functionality for users) as well as for bad (unfairly blocking users’ ability to make selections or forcing them to use more expensive options), it’s hard to lay down a rule that simply bans a particular practice or ability.

Moreover, the bills use antitrust tools that aren’t well suited to solving complex problems that call for fine distinctions in business practice and online speech. Regulating technology to achieve subjective outcomes – such as more and fair competition – is intrinsically difficult and made even more challenging by its constant innovation. By contrast, regulating for objective outcomes – such as reducing the number of deaths due to impure drugs or automobile crashes – is more straightforward. So given the acknowledged difficulties of legislating in this area, it’s especially important to ensure that proposed rules don’t have unintended consequences.

The reality is that, for social and political reasons, some regulation of Big Tech is appropriate and seemingly inevitable. Consequently, we are in a debate between proponents who claim that the online platforms have exaggerated the risks of the bills and minimized the value of the security exceptions, and opponents who say that well-meaning but overbroad legislation could bring more harm than what is sought to be cured.

There’s some merit to both positions. But when national security is at stake, it’s hard to see why we should take the risk, especially when there is an easy way of minimizing that risk by undertaking what should have been done at a much earlier stage of the legislative process: a national security review of the proposed legislation.

When the cyber criminals and spy agencies of countries such as Russia, China, North Korea and Iran discover a computer network they want to get into, they probe the network looking for ways to get in. Similarly, network owners do “penetration testing” on their own systems in the hope of discovering vulnerabilities before those cyber adversaries do. We know what those countries are going to do when they confront networks that will be forced to comply with any of these proposed bills, namely look for ways to exploit the new rules.

Thus, we should do our own “penetration testing” first by establishing some review by the federal government of exactly what vulnerabilities are likely to be created, even if unintentionally, by any law in this area before it becomes effective. This could be done, for example, by asking the national cyber director to coordinate an expedited review with the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security and Defense, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the intelligence and other relevant committees in Congress, reporting on potential technical problems with the bills and possible solutions.

The risk of not doing so is neither trivial nor one we should take; and the only risk of doing such a review is a short delay. In this case, that’s the right risk to take.

Glenn S. Gerstell is a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic & International Studies. He served as general counsel of the National Security Agency from 2015 to 2020.

Source: TEST FEED1

House Jan. 6 committee asks GOP Rep. Loudermilk to appear

The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol is asking Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) to voluntarily appear before its investigators, arguing he may have knowledge about reconnaissance tours through the building the day before the deadly riot.

“Based on our review of evidence in the Select Committee’s possession, we believe you have information regarding a tour you led through parts of the Capitol complex on January 5, 2021,” the panel wrote in the letter to Loudermilk.

“Public reporting and witness accounts indicate some individuals and groups engaged in efforts to gather information about the layout of the U.S. Capitol, as well as the House and Senate office buildings, in advance of January 6, 2021.”

The letter does not spell out why Loudermilk is of interest, but it does note his involvement in an effort from the House Committee on Administration, which urged release of Capitol Police footage of the Capitol’s tunnels and entrances and exits on Jan. 5.

The letter to the Capitol Police Board — first obtained by The Hill in February — claimed that the video showed “no tours, no large groups, no one with MAGA hats on.” 

“The Select Committee’s review of evidence directly contradicts that denial,” the committee writes to Loudermilk.

Developing.

Source: TEST FEED1

Taking it from the streets to the ballot box

This past weekend in cities big and small, in red states and blue, we saw tens of thousands of protesters taking to the streets, outraged by the leaked Supreme Court draft ruling that would overturn Roe v. Wade, criminalize abortion and strip us of our rights and freedoms. The images from the protests across the country all looked the same: a broad coalition of people of all ages, races, genders, and backgrounds coming together to say we are not going to sit idly by as Republicans look to roll back decades’ worth of progress. It was a powerful reminder that we are the majority. And a majority who will not allow ourselves to be ruled — and our basic freedoms oppressed — by the minority.

For organizations like mine, and for those who want to ensure our rights and freedoms are expanded and not taken away, our mission is to ensure that the energy, passion, and enthusiasm we saw in the streets last weekend will translate into votes in November. 

Because it is now evident to everyone that if the Supreme Court strikes down Roe, it will not be the action of just five justices, but rather the entire Republican Party. And it will crystalize what has been clear to many of us for some time: today’s Republican Party is more extreme, out-of-touch, and dangerously MAGA-supersized than ever before. 

And the MAGA party will not stop at overturning Roe, which we know will have an outsized impact on poor, Black, brown, rural, and trans communities. They are already making noise about overturning laws around contraception, marriage equality and even interracial marriage. They are banning books and targeting LGBTQ+ kids. They want to end the guarantee of Social Security and Medicare and raise taxes on half of all Americans. And they are attacking the foundation our democracy was built on: free and fair elections. 

The MAGA party Donald Trump spawned is pushing its radical vision of America all over Congress, our courts, our schools, and our bodies. And they don’t want to turn the clock back two years to when Trump was president; they want to turn the clock back generations.

“Don’t compare me to the Almighty. Compare me to the alternative” has long been one of President Biden’s favorite sayings. To win in November, we need to implement this strategy. Democrats need to make this election a choice. A choice of whether we are going to continue to move forward or instead go back to some of the darkest times in our nation’s history. 

We saw in the streets this weekend — and in polling since the leaked Supreme Court opinion — that the majority of people do not want to go back. They reject this extreme MAGA ideology. 

Yes, history is not on the side of Democrats this November. Nearly every modern president’s party has lost seats in the first midterm elections. But history doesn’t have to repeat itself. Eighty-one million people, the most in history, turned out to reject this very ideology two years ago. It can happen again. 

Americans who believe in the freedom to vote and reproductive freedom are squarely in the majority. The MAGA party has overplayed its hand, and we need to remind voters of this every day between now and Election Day. We need to take the outrage resulting from Republicans’ stripping away our rights and freedoms and channel it into votes. In pundit speak, we need to “close the enthusiasm gap.” If the protests are any indication, we have the power to do just that.

We also need to have a laser-like focus on turning out people who voted for the first time in 2018 or 2020 but may not this year without a push. These “surge voters” were key to winning back the House in 2018 and the White House and Senate in 2020. These voters tend to be younger, more active online, and less political. They came out to reject Trump and the MAGA mindset twice before, and they are likely to be the margin of victory needed in key Senate and House races. We must meet them where they are and make sure they understand the critical choice we face in this election. 

Republicans, who were already measuring the drapes in the Speaker’s office, were counting on voter enthusiasm being on their side in November. But the leaked Supreme Court ruling has changed the game. It awakened a sleeping majority in this country and exposed everyone to the extremism of the MAGA incarnation of the Republican Party. 

If we do the work, we can take the winning coalition in the streets this weekend to the ballot box. And if we do, for the third election in a row, we will defeat this extreme ideology. 

Epting is the executive director of MoveOn, one of the largest political advocacy organizations in the country, with millions of members. 

Source: TEST FEED1

Texas resuming abuse investigations into families of transgender children

The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) on Thursday suggested it would resume investigating families with transgender children for abuse. The move comes just a week after a multipart ruling struck down an injunction that had blocked the state from opening such investigations into parents that allow their children to receive gender-affirming medical care.

In a statement first reported by the Dallas Morning News, the agency said it “treats all reports of abuse, neglect, and exploitation seriously and will continue to investigate each to the full extent of the law.” 

DFPS did not expressly mention gender-affirming medical care – like puberty blockers or hormone therapies – in its statement, but an agency spokesperson told Changing America that the statement was issued in response to inquiries about the status of pending investigations following last week’s ruling.

The Texas Supreme Court last week ruled that the state must stop an investigation into the family of one transgender child, but struck down a statewide injunction blocking investigations into the families of other transgender minors, clearing the way for further probes.

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But Justice Jimmy Blacklock in the opinion also wrote that both Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) and Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) – who have equated gender-affirming medical care to “child abuse” – do not have authority over such investigations.

“[T]he Legislature has granted to DFPS, not to the Governor or the Attorney General, the statutory responsibility to ‘make a prompt and thorough investigation of a report of child abuse or neglect,’” Blacklock wrote.

In February, Paxton in an opinion said he believed certain types of gender-affirming care for transgender children amounted to abuse under his interpretation of Texas law, prompting Abbott to order state agencies to open abuse investigations into the parents of transgender youth, warning of “criminal penalties.”

“The Governor and the Attorney General were certainly well within their rights to state their legal and policy views on this topic,” Blacklock wrote, “but DFPS was not compelled by law to follow them.”

Gender-affirming care for transgender and nonbinary minors is supported by most major medical organizations – including the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychological Association – who say restrictions on such care put the wellbeing of young people at risk.

Source: TEST FEED1

Harris meets with abortion providers, condemns 'outrageous' Oklahoma law

Vice President Harris on Thursday spoke with a group of abortion providers who she said are serving “on the front lines” of a “war on women’s rights.”

Harris held a virtual meeting with doctors, nurses and reproductive rights advocates who are working in states with particularly restrictive abortion laws like Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas. The gathering was prompted by news earlier this month that the Supreme Court had drafted an opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that protects a woman’s right to an abortion.

“We cannot deny that this decision will have real and immediate effects on women around our country,” Harris said. “So, I am here today, joined by doctors, nurses and leading advocates, who are on the front lines against this war on women’s rights.”

Harris noted that her remarks came less than an hour after legislators in Oklahoma approved a bill that would effectively outlaw all abortions except to save the life of a pregnant woman or if the pregnancy is the result of a rape that was reported to authorities.

Harris called the Oklahoma law “outrageous, and it’s just the latest in a series of extreme laws around the country. Several of the medical professionals joining us today are seeing the impact of these laws that are designed to punish and control women.”

The Biden administration has spoken out strongly against efforts to restrict abortion access, but has struggled to find concrete ways to protect reproductive health in the face of the potential Supreme Court ruling.

A vote last week on the Women’s Health Protection Act failed as Republican senators and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) voted to block consideration of the bill, which would have would have protected various abortion procedures across the nation.

Harris and President Biden have urged Americans to elect more pro-abortion lawmakers in response to the looming decision and failed Senate vote.

The vice president on Thursday cautioned other rights could be at risk if the Supreme Court throws out Roe, such as the right to use contraception and the right to marry regardless of race or sexual orientation.

“Overturning Roe opens the door to restricting those rights,” she said. “It would be a direct assault on the fundamental right of self-determination— to live and love without interference from the government.”

Source: TEST FEED1

Biden authorizes $100 million in weapons, equipment to Ukraine

The Biden administration announced $100 million in military assistance to Ukraine on Thursday, moments after the Senate sent a $40 billion supplemental aid package to the president’s desk.

The equipment will include additional artillery, radars and other equipment to Ukraine, President Biden said in a statement following passage of the Ukraine aid.  

In a separate statement, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the weapons will be coming from the Pentagon’s existing inventories.

“These weapons and equipment will go directly to the front lines of freedom in Ukraine, and reiterate our strong support for the brave people of Ukraine as they defend their country against Russia’s ongoing aggression,” Biden said.

Thursday’s package is the tenth shipment of weapons to Ukraine under presidential drawdown authority, which allows the Pentagon to dig into its existing stockpiles. It also brings the total military assistance that the U.S. has provided to the country to $3.9 billion since Russia’s invasion began.

Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin urged Congress last week to advance the supplemental by Thursday in order to continue sending security assistance at the current pace.

Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said last Friday that there was $100 million left of the $2.5 billion in drawdown authority that was passed in March. The remaining money would only last through the middle of May.

The $40 billion supplemental, which Biden is expected to sign, includes $9 billion for the Pentagon to replenish the weapons it sent to Ukraine, exceeding the administration’s request of $5 billion.

Source: TEST FEED1

Children's book authors condemn recent bans

More than 1,300 children’s book authors are signing onto a letter to Congress condemning the recent spate of bans at school libraries in Republican-led states, which came ahead of a Thursday House hearing that heard testimony overwhelmingly from advocates speaking out against the censorship.

The letter is signed by famous and well-known authors including Judy Blume, Mo Willems and Rick Riordan, who say the bans are targeting not just their works and the nation’s intellectual discourse, but also the “children, families, and communities who are caught in the crosshairs of these campaigns.”

“When books are removed or flagged as inappropriate, it sends the message that the people in them are somehow inappropriate. It is a dehumanizing form of erasure.” the letter reads. “Every reader deserves to see themselves and their families positively represented in the books in their schools.”

Authors sent the letter to Reps. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) and Nancy Mace (R-S.C.) and the House Committee on Oversight and Reform, which held its second hearing on the issue Thursday.

In opening statements, Raskin said, “Book censorship wrecks the healthy environment for free inquiry and learning,” and tied book bans to rising extremism in the nation, including the white supremacist gunman who shot and killed 10 people at a majority-Black neighborhood supermarket in Buffalo last weekend.

“These laws are being used to undermine public faith in public schools and destroy one of the key pillars of our democracy,” Raskin said.

During the hearing, lawmakers heard from people who identify with the LGBTQ community, including high-school students and teachers who spoke out against the bans because they can lead to mental health issues for LGBTQ students, who have some of the highest rates of suicide in the nation.

Lawmakers also heard from a historian who warned banning books would be the beginning “of the end for democracy,” as well as other free speech activists.

One parent-activist spoke out in support of the bans, arguing against racial or sexual indoctrination.

Since 2021, officials have placed more than 1,500 bans or restrictions on books in 86 school districts across 26 states, according to an April report from advocacy group PEN America.

The states with the most restrictions or bans on books in public schools include Texas at 713, Pennsylvania with 456, Florida’s 204, Oklahoma’s 43, Kansas’s 30 and Tennessee with 16.

Tennessee has proposed one of the most restrictive bills, advancing a measure this spring to ban any book supporting LGBTQ issues. One Tennessee state lawmaker has said he would “burn” books that he objected to during an assembly session on tightening book review restrictions.

Republicans have objected to books that they consider salacious or that indoctrinate students on issues including race or gender. Critical race theory, an academic framework based on the idea that racism is systemic in the nation’s institutions, has also been a focal point for the book bans.

During Thursday’s hearings, Mace, a Republican, said she supports teaching the full history of the U.S., but that she has “seen attempts to indoctrinate our students” on topics that should not fit into the school curriculum.

“Our children’s innocence should be protected and prioritized,” she said, arguing against critical race theory or hyper-sexual topics.

The Hill has compiled a list of the 10 most targeted books, including “The Hate U Give” by Angie Thomas, which focuses on a high-schooler who witnesses the death of her friend at the hands of a police officer, and “Maus” by Art Spiegelman, a critically acclaimed graphic novel about World War II and the Holocaust.

Thomas signed the letter that was sent to Congress on Tuesday, as did John Green, whose book “Looking for Alaska” has been frequently targeted. Other signers whose books are on the list of most targeted include Lesléa Newman, Jerry Craft and Maia Kobabe.

The authors argue that libraries and school systems have systems in place that allow parents to express concerns about a book, but outright bans are harmful. Recent progress to include more Black, Indigenous and people of color in books is being eroded by the increased censorship, they wrote.

“A book may not be for every student, but — as we know from the many letters we receive from young readers — a single book can matter deeply to an individual student,” the letter reads. “Libraries are bastions of the First Amendment. They provide equal access to a wealth of knowledge and ideas for all public school students.”

Source: TEST FEED1

Twenty-one Democratic AGs file motion to intervene in California emissions lawsuit

Democratic attorneys general from 20 states and the District of Columbia on Thursday filed a motion to intervene in a lawsuit from Republican attorneys general against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over California’s vehicle emissions standards.  

The Democrats, led by California Attorney General Rob Bonta, filed the motion in defense of the state’s standards, which are stricter than federal standards.

The Trump administration had in 2019 revoked a 2013 waiver allowing the state to impose more stringent standards than the federal government, but EPA Administrator Michael Regan reversed the revocation in March after announcing in 2021 that the EPA would review the decision. 

“California’s standards are some of the best tools we have to reduce emissions, fight climate change, and protect public health. But unfortunately, there are some who continue to ignore these benefits, choosing inexplicably to defend outdated, pollution-generating vehicles even as technologies enabling emissions reductions and cost savings continue to advance,” Bonta said in a statement Thursday.

“My office has defended California’s authority to set its own vehicle emissions standards from an onslaught of attacks in recent years, and we’re not going to back down now,” he said. 

Bonta filed the motion Thursday afternoon in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

He was joined by the attorneys general for Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington, as well as the District of Columbia and the cities of New York and Los Angeles. 

Last week, 17 Republican attorneys general, led by Ohio’s Dave Yost, announced a lawsuit against the EPA over the restoration of the waiver, claiming that allowing the state to set its own standards under the Clean Air Act violated the doctrine of equal sovereignty.  

The Hill has reached out to Yost’s office for comment. 

Source: TEST FEED1