NewzIntel.com

Category: Americas

  • MIL-OSI USA: CE Los Angeles, multiagency case dismantles identity theft mill, organized retail scheme spanning 7 California counties

    Source: US Immigration and Customs Enforcement

    LOS ANGELES — Felony charges were filed April 25 against three people involved in a suspected identity theft mill, where stolen identities were used in an organized retail crime scheme. The scheme involved suspects applying for store credit cards using stolen identities and credit lines to purchase merchandise. The fraud scheme was carried out in Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino, Riverside, Alameda, San Mateo, and Santa Clara Counties. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement assisted the investigation led by the California Department of Justice based on a referral from a Signet Jeweler’s Corporate Fraud Investigator, in cooperation by Santa Maria Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, California Highway Patrol and Westminster Police department.

    “These arrests are the result of excellent collaboration between HSI, private industry, state and local law enforcement partners,” ICE Homeland Security Investigations Orange County Assistant Special Agent in Charge Christopher Bracken. “HSI will work tirelessly with our partners in California to ensure that those who commit fraud will be held accountable.”

    As a result of the investigation, a 34-count felony complaint was filed against three defendants by DOJ. The charges include organized retail theft, grand theft, and identity theft of 13 victims.

    “I am committed to using the full force of the California Department of Justice to fight organized retail crime both in the field and in the courtroom,” said Attorney General Rob Bonta. “This was not a one-off shoplifting offense, it was a malicious, coordinated scheme. These crimes hurt our businesses and pose a serious threat to our communities. I am thankful to Signet Jewelers as well as our local and state law enforcement partners for their collaboration in the battle against organized retail crime. We will not give up until we put a stop to this criminal activity all together.”

    From March 2023 to July 2023, the defendants fraudulently obtained over $100,000 worth of merchandise from high end retail stores and Harbor Freight retailers.

    “The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department is deeply committed to tackling organized retail crime through strategic multiagency collaboration, intelligence sharing, and targeted enforcement,” said Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Detective Division Chief Joe Mendoza. “By working closely with our local, state, and federal partners, we continue to strengthen our efforts, disrupt criminal networks, protect both businesses and our communities, while holding individuals accountable.”

    A copy of the criminal complaint in this case is available here. Photos related to this investigation can be found here, here and here.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Apr 30, 2025 Martz Gold Line Strike Over After Workers Win and Ratify Strong Contract Deal

    Source: US Amalgamated Transit Union

    Forestville, MD– After a strong and united 6-day strike, Local 689 Martz Gold Line workers won a strong contract after an agreement reached between the Union and the company was ratified today.

    On Tuesday, the parties met to continue negotiations with a mediator at the request of the company, and as a result of the day-long session a deal was reached. The new contract improves working conditions, wages, and benefits. Major components include a COLA clause for Year 2 and Year 3 of the contract.

    “Throughout the negotiations and strike, Martz workers stood shoulder to shoulder in solidarity and together they won a strong contract,” said Local 689 President Raymond Jackson. “Once again, workers have proven that workers bonded together and speaking with one voice are undefeatable.”

    “We thank Maryland Governor Wes Moore, Maryland Secretary of Transportation Paul Wiedefeld and Maryland Senior Director of Labor Relations Dyana Forester for their support, as well as the other elected officials and allies who have supported these workers on the strike line.”

    Last Thursday, April 24, the Martz Gold Line workers walked off the job over unfair labor practices committed by the company during contract negotiations and the company’s refusal to bargain in good faith.

    “When we fight, we win! All of the ATU spread across America and Canada are proud of what Martz Gold line workers accomplished,” said International President John Costa. “On the picket lines last week, I saw firsthand their strength, unity, and solidarity. United, the workers stood up to the company and through the strength on the strike line, forced the company to the bargaining table and won a strong contract. These workers demonstrated the strength of collective action and its impact on working people.”

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: TRANSCRIPT: LEADER JEFFRIES REMARKS ON PRESIDENT TRUMP’S FIRST 100 DAYS

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Hakeem Jeffries (8th District of New York)

    Today, Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries delivered the following speech on what a disaster for the American people that Donald Trump’s first 100 days have been and how costs, chaos and corruption are all up, thanks to the President and his Rubber Stamp Republicans.

    Good morning. Good morning. Thank you. Thank you, everyone. Good morning. Good morning. Thank you. Good morning. Good morning. Good morning.

    Right at the top, let me make one thing clear: The Trump administration has been a disaster. 100 days in, Donald Trump and Elon Musk have failed to make your life more affordable. They failed to make you safer. They failed to make us more respected around the world. But their biggest failure is this: they have failed to appreciate the strength of the American people.

    During the dawn of the Republic, it was once observed that when people fear the government, there is tyranny. When the government fears the people, there is liberty.

    Donald Trump and Republicans thought they could shock and awe us into submission. They thought we would be too complacent to stand up for liberty and justice for all. They thought we would walk away from the principle of equal protection under the law. They thought wrong. They thought wrong. They thought wrong.

    Trump’s unconstitutional assault on the American way of life is unprecedented, but the so-called dictator on day one is learning an important lesson. Americans don’t bend the knee to bullies. In the face of tyranny, we join together. In the face of tyranny, we rise up together. In the face of tyranny, we get into some good trouble together. And we’re just getting started.

    100 days in, Donald Trump has the lowest approval rating of any president in modern American history. 100 days in, voters have elected Democrats in Republican-held districts all across the country, including in Iowa and Pennsylvania. 100 days in, Elon Musk spent $25 million to buy a state supreme court seat in Wisconsin, and lost by double digits. 100 days in, more than 200 different lawsuits have been filed against the unconstitutional and unlawful executive orders of Donald Trump, and the American people are winning in court. 100 days in, principled opposition to Republican extremism is taking shape from sea to shining sea. The American people are rising up and making it clear that the Trump administration has a lot to fear.

    When my oldest son JJ was 9 years old, he played travel baseball with a group of his friends. Many of you know that travel sports can be taxing on the schedule. It’s a labor of love for our children. During the season, it seems like almost every weekend for several months, you’re on the road. And so, this one particular Memorial Day weekend, JJ had a baseball tournament in a little town off the beaten path somewhere in the Northeast. 

    Travel sports can take you to some interesting places. I decided to make it a road trip and bring my youngest son, Joshua, with us. He was just 6 years old at the time. And so I said to him, he’s gonna come on this trip, and it’ll be like a vacation. What did I say that for, y’all? 

    When I mentioned vacation, he had visions of Atlantis. So we pulled up to the motel where we were staying, and the situation was a bit shaky. My 6 year old looked at the motel, looked at me, looked at the motel and looked at me and said: “Dad, is this where we’re staying?” I said, “Yes, Joshua, why do you ask?” He responded, “Oh my God, Dad, this is a debacle.” 6 years old. I looked at him and asked, “What does the word debacle mean?” He responded quickly. He said: “I don’t know Dad, it’s something bad.”

    This is the moment we are in right now in the United States of America, with Donald Trump and the Republicans in charge. 

    Crashing the economy is something bad. Destroying Medicaid as we know it is something bad. Taking a chainsaw to Social Security is something bad. Raising costs on hardworking American taxpayers is something bad. Firing federal workers, including thousands of veterans who served this country, is something bad. Canceling medical research for children with cancer is something bad. Destroying the retirement accounts of everyday Americans is something bad. Trying to whitewash the most painful parts of our history is something bad. Targeting law-abiding immigrant families is something bad. Undermining the rule of law is something bad. 

    The first 100 days of the Trump administration have been a debacle. Enough. Enough. America is better than this. 

    When the new Congress began in January, Democrats were prepared to get to work in a bipartisan way. The Trump administration chose a different path. Far-right Republicans are tearing America apart, targeting our democratic way of life and tarnishing our reputation as the land of the free. It is wrong, and we will continue to push back aggressively. Donald Trump and the Republicans in Congress have given us 100 days of chaos, 100 days of cruelty and 100 days of corrupt behavior. That is not constructive leadership, it’s a recipe for disaster. 

    The American people deserve common sense leadership, the American people deserve compassionate leadership, the American people deserve courageous leadership that changes things for the better. Our message to the American people is simple: We hear you. We see you. We feel you. Democrats are determined to make life better for you.

    Donald Trump and his sycophants spent yesterday bragging about the speed with which they’ve moved during these first 100 days. They’re right.  Never has a president failed so spectacularly, so often, so quickly as Donald Trump. The White House referred to its strategy for the first 100 days as “shock and awe.” Well, they’re half right. It is shocking how rapidly this administration collapsed into chaos, cruelty and corruption. It is shocking how quickly MAGA Republicans turned their backs on working class Americans. It is shocking how spineless Republicans have been in the United States Congress. And it is shocking and tragic and infuriating how much damage Donald Trump and the Republican party’s policies have already done.

    Here’s the thing. They expected us to step back. But the American people are here to fight back. On the campaign trail, Donald Trump promised to end inflation. He promised to lower costs on day one.  When he was asking for your vote, Donald Trump told you he would make life more affordable for everyday Americans. Now that he’s in office, it’s a different story.

    In March, President Trump was asked if he was worried that car prices would go up because of his tariffs. His reply? “I couldn’t care less.” The cost of living in the United States is too high. America is too expensive. And Donald Trump couldn’t care less. He couldn’t care less that housing costs are too high. He couldn’t care less that grocery costs are too high. He couldn’t care less that childcare costs are too high. He couldn’t care less that health insurance costs are too high. He couldn’t care less that utility costs are too high. Donald Trump couldn’t care less. Prices everywhere are too high, and Donald Trump couldn’t care less. 

    100 days in, Donald Trump is making life harder for you and your family. And every day his costly tariffs stay in place, life in America gets more expensive. American families will pay thousands of dollars more per year. Small businesses are shutting down. Corporations are not hiring. Businesses are unable to invest because of the uncertainty that has been created.  Inflation is on the rise, life is getting more expensive and the reckless economic policies of Donald Trump and House Republicans are driving us toward a recession.

    Republicans in Congress could put a stop to this insanity at any time. Since they won’t, next November, we will. Yes, we will. Yes, we will. Which brings me to Elon Musk. I knew he would get that reaction. 

    We all agree that government should be more efficient. But like most things in life, there’s the American way and then there’s the cruel way. 100 days in, it’s clear that DOGE is not the American way. Cancelling medical research for children with cancer is cruel. Denying relief for communities reeling from natural disasters is cruel. Firing thousands of our veterans, like Joseph Quintinella of Virginia, who served this country in the Marines, is cruel. 

    But their cruelty doesn’t stop there. Republicans actually believe that Social Security is a Ponzi scheme. And they want to take a chainsaw to it. During the first 100 days of the Trump administration, Social Security has faced an unprecedented attack. Social Security offices have been closed, wait times have dramatically increased and people are being denied access to benefits that they have earned. Republicans continue to insist that Social Security is an entitlement program. They think they are entitled to destroy it. 

    When I was 15 years old, I got my working papers and secured my first job. I was a messenger dropping off packages from office building to office building in Midtown Manhattan. My salary was $3.35 per hour. That was the minimum wage back in the day. And I thought that I had made it big, particularly upon learning that as a high school student who worked part time, I wouldn’t have to pay any income tax. So I couldn’t wait to get my first check. 

    On a piece of paper, I multiplied $3.35 by the number of hours I expected to work during my first pay period. I figured out the total, and in my mind, that money was already spent. I couldn’t wait to go to Albee Square Mall in downtown Brooklyn and get some new sneakers so I could dress like Run DMC. But then the check came, and some money was missing. 

    I had two questions, y’all: Who is FICA, and why is he taking my money? 

    Here’s what I learned. All of us pay the FICA tax in connection with Social Security and Medicare. We pay the FICA tax on our first job. We pay the FICA tax on our last job. We pay the FICA tax on every single job we have throughout our lifetime. 

    Social Security and Medicare are not entitlement programs. They are earned benefits. Earned benefits. You work hard for those benefits, pay into those benefits and deserve those benefits. They are earned benefits. 

    Democrats will make sure that Donald Trump and House Republicans keep their hands off your Social Security and your Medicare. Hands off today. Hands off tomorrow. Hands off this week. Hands off next week. Hands off this month. Hands off next month. Hands off this year. Hands off next year. Hands off Social Security and Medicare Forever. Forever. Forever.

    Now, if this administration actually had some common sense, it would look at the damage that it’s done, the rejection from the people, the historic unpopularity of this president, and they would change course. But Donald Trump is doubling down. And instead of being a check and balance on this president’s abuse of power, Republicans in Congress are nothing more than a rubber stamp for his extreme agenda.

    Recently, I met a woman named Mary Beth. She lives in Canton, North Carolina, a town of 4,400 people that is still rebuilding from Hurricane Helene. She has custody of her four grandchildren, ages 10, 12, 15 and 16. Their parents can no longer care for them due to addiction, domestic violence and homelessness. The moment you talk to Mary Beth, you know that caring for those grandkids is everything. 

    And she’s doing it on a fixed income, working part time making $8 an hour at a coin laundry— and is no longer employed—to supplement the disability support that she had received. Mary Beth has had to skip refilling her prescriptions to make sure her grandkids don’t have to skip any meals. 

    Medicaid is the only reason her grandchildren are able to see a doctor, including the youngest, who is dealing with ADHD and autism. Mary Beth works hard, loves her family and is a patriotic American. And Mary Beth is here with us today. 

    But her family, just like millions of others throughout America, is now at risk of losing their healthcare. Why? Republicans are trying to slash Medicaid by up to $880 billion, the largest healthcare cut in American history.  

    And why are Republicans trying to rip healthcare away from working people, from Americans with disabilities, from children, from grandmothers like Mary Beth? So that they can give their billionaire donors like Elon Musk another tax cut. These healthcare cuts will hurt families, hurt women, hurt children, hurt veterans, hurt seniors and hurt disabled Americans. Hospitals will close, nursing homes will shut down and people will die. 

    Here’s the thing, in the United States of America—this is the wealthiest country in the history of the world—healthcare is not a privilege, healthcare is a right for every single American. For every single American. 

    If we were in the majority right now, none of this would be happening. But even in the minority, we are going to do everything we can to protect the healthcare of the American people.

    And we’ll keep reminding our Republican colleagues—especially the ones who vote like extremists but then go home and pretend to be moderates when it’s time to run for re-election— that the people are watching. It’s time for Republicans in Congress to stop being a rubber stamp for Donald Trump’s extreme agenda.

    You don’t work for Donald Trump. You don’t work for Elon Musk. You don’t work for the far-right extremists. You work for the American people.

    As Democrats, we will fight as hard as we can, fight as hard as we can, over the next two years to stop bad things from happening. We will protect our system of free and fair elections.

    And then work hard to convince the American people to entrust us with the majority next November. At that point, we will be able to do much, much more for you.

    We will build an affordable economy that works for everyday Americans. We will confront the climate crisis with the fierce urgency of now. We will block any budget that goes after your Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid. And we will hold the Trump administration accountable for its corrupt abuse of power.

    Over these next 100 days, House Democrats are going to lay out a blueprint for a better America. And you will see a vision for this country’s future that isn’t about Donald Trump. It’s all about you. All about you. How can we make your life better? How can we put more money in your pocket? How can we lower your costs? How can we help you give your kids the future they deserve? These are the questions we are thinking about each and every day.

    Now, the American Dream isn’t about getting something for nothing. You have to work for it. But if you work hard and play by the rules, here’s what you should be able to have: A good-paying job. An affordable home. High-quality healthcare. Education for your children. And the ability to retire with grace and with dignity. That’s the American Dream. That’s the American Dream. That’s the American Dream. And when we’re back in charge, that’s what we will fight hard to deliver for you. 

    In January—late January—I had the opportunity to visit the Altadena community in Los Angeles County that was devastated by the wildfires. I met someone named Jackie Jacobs, an amazing 88-year-old woman who was raised in the Jim Crow South before moving to California. Her home was tragically burned to the ground.  She and her husband, David, who have been married for more than 50 years, barely managed to escape the raging wildfires. All they had was the clothing on their backs. They lost everything else. Photos gone. Possessions gone. Property gone. But the first thing Mrs. Jacobs said to us while touring the devastation was that she gave all glory, all praise and all honor to Almighty God—just as the Scripture teaches us. She believed that things would work out. Several of us teared up. Mrs. Jacobs lost everything, but she never lost her faith. She never lost her faith.

    Republicans have shown that their recipe for governing is chaos, cruelty and corruption. These first 100 days have not been easy. Everything we care about is under assault. The economy is under assault. Healthcare is under assault. Social Security is under assault. Veterans are under assault. Farmers are under assault. The right to organize is under assault. Public schools are under assault. The American way of life is under assault. Democracy itself is under assault. Everything we care about is under assault. 

    But just like Mrs. Jacobs, we must never lose faith. We must never lose faith. Faith in our community. Faith in our country. Faith in a brighter future. Faith in Almighty God. 

    America is a resilient nation. We are a resilient people. We have a resilient Constitution. We will never give up.  We will never give in. We will always show up. We will always speak up. We will always stand up. We will continue our march toward a more perfect union. We will not rest until we end this national nightmare and deliver an America with liberty and justice for all.

    God bless you. God bless our troops. May God continue to bless the United States of America.

    Full speech can be viewed here.

    ###

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Rep. Weber Introduces Police Officers Protecting Children Act

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Randy Weber (14th District of Texas)

    Washington, D.C. – Today, U.S. Reps. Randy Weber (TX-14) and August Pfluger (TX-11) introduced the Police Officers Protecting Children Act to allow qualified law enforcement officers and retired law enforcement officers to carry a concealed firearm in a school zone. Senator Tim Sheehy (R- MT) introduced the companion bill in the U.S. Senate.

    “In Southeast Texas, we know that evil people do evil things, and in 2018 the unimaginable happened at Santa Fe High School, leaving ten people dead,” said Rep. Weber. “There is absolutely no reason we should prevent trained professionals—our law enforcement heroes—from stepping up to protect our children. This bill is about empowering those who are ready and able to respond in a crisis.”

    “Our children deserve to feel safe every time they step into a classroom,” said Rep. Pfluger. “The Police Officers Protecting Children Act would empower qualified law enforcement officers to carry concealed firearms within school zones, ensuring they can act quickly to safeguard students during emergencies. As a father of three school-aged daughters, I send my girls to school each morning with the hope that they are protected and secure, and this legislation will help me and parents across the country have greater peace of mind. I am honored to partner with Congressman Weber and Senator Sheehy to reintroduce this commonsense legislation.”

    Read the bill here.

    The legislation is cosponsored by U.S. Representatives: Rep. Don Bacon (NE-02), Rep. Claudia Tenney (NY-24), Rep. Jim Baird (IN-04), and Andrew Clyde (GA-09).

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: ICE removes illegal alien, child sex predator to Mexico

    Source: US Immigration and Customs Enforcement

    BUFFALO, N.Y. – U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement removed illegally present Mexican national Miguel Saldivar-Moran from the United States to Mexico, April 29. Saldivar has convictions for acting in a course of sexual conduct against a child and criminal sex act among other charges.  

    “ICE will not tolerate criminal aliens who violate innocent children in our communities,” said ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations Acting Deputy Field Office Director Philip Rhoney. “We will pursue these vile predators with utmost urgency and effect their removal from the United States.”

    Salvidar, 45, admitted to illegally entering the United States in 1997 by crossing the border from Mexico into Arizona without being admitted or paroled by a U.S. Immigration official. Between 2003 – 2013, Saldivar was convicted of three counts of DWI and one count of endangering the welfare of a child for which he was sentenced to probation and fines. An immigration judge ordered him removed from the U.S. Sept. 7, 2016. Saldivar appealed to the Board of Immigration Appeals, but the BIA denied his claim June 30, 2017.

    The Suffolk County Court on Long Island, New York convicted Saldivar May 14, 2019, for the crimes of first-degree sexual abuse, acting in course of sexual conduct against a child, first degree criminal sex act and acting in a manner to injure a child.

    ICE Buffalo arrested Saldivar April 10, upon his release from New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision custody in Attica, New York.

    Members of the public can report crimes and suspicious activity by dialing 866-347-2423 or completing ICE’s online tip form.

    Learn more about ERO Buffalo’s mission to preserve public safety on X, @EROBuffalo.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Southeast Texas man convicted of distributing child sexual abuse materials following multi-national investigation

    Source: US Immigration and Customs Enforcement

    CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas – Angel Valdez, a 19-year-old Corpus Christi resident, was convicted April 28 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas of distributing child sexual abuse materials following a multi-national investigation conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Corpus Christi Police Department, and law enforcement authorities in Australia.

    Valdez came to the attention of authorities in December 2023 after he posted a comment to social media supporting the work of an individual who had recently been sentenced to prison in Australia for animal cruelty.

    Australian authorities launched an investigation and began conversations with Valdez in an undercover capacity. During those communications, Valdez spoke about his interest in animal cruelty and his interest in child sexual abuse materials. On Feb. 14, 2024, Valdez sent a video of child sexual abuse materials depicting a prepubescent girl being forced to perform sex acts on an adult female.

    Authorities executed a search warrant at Valdez’ residence in Corpus Christi June 28, 2024, and discovered a laptop containing child sexual abuse materials. Following the discovery, Valdez admitted that he had participated in the online conversations and distributed the video containing a minor being sexually abused.

    “As a direct result of multi-national cooperation between Homeland Security Investigations special agents, officers from the Corpus Christi Police Department and our law enforcement partners in Australia, we have successfully removed a dangerous predator from the local community who preyed on two of our most innocent and vulnerable populations – children and animals,” said ICE HSI Houston Special Agent in Charge Chad Plantz. “Vile criminals like this individual will find no refuge, as law enforcement agencies across the globe stand united in their commitment to pursue justice relentlessly and remove dangerous threats from our society.”

    Valdez is scheduled to be sentenced Aug. 12. At that time, he faces up to 20 years in federal prison and a possible $250,000 maximum fine. He will remain in custody pending that hearing.

    Assistant U.S. Attorney Patrick Overman is prosecuting the case.

    For more news and information on ICE’s efforts to investigate child exploitation in Southeast Texas follow us on X @HSIHouston.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Governor Stein Champions Child Care and Early Education at Smart Start Conference

    Source: US State of North Carolina

    Headline: Governor Stein Champions Child Care and Early Education at Smart Start Conference

    Governor Stein Champions Child Care and Early Education at Smart Start Conference
    lsaito

    Raleigh, NC

    Today Governor Josh Stein joined the Smart Start Conference in Greensboro to highlight his priorities for child care and early education. Governor Stein also urged North Carolina’s federal delegation to oppose efforts to eliminate the Head Start program. 

    “Programs like Smart Start help North Carolina’s children live up to their full potential,” said Governor Josh Stein. “Federal proposals to eliminate the Head Start program are wrongheaded. Investing in our kids is investing in our future – and I’ll take that return every time.” 

    Today Governor Stein, Lieutenant Governor Hunt, and Superintendent Maurice “Mo” Green sent a letter to Congressional leaders, including North Carolina’s federal delegation, laying out the consequences of proposals to eliminate the Head Start program. There are more than 19,500 children in North Carolina who rely on Head Start and Early Head Start for high-quality child care, access to health screenings, and healthy food to prepare them for school and beyond. Head Start brings over $290 million in federal funds directly to local economies in North Carolina, supporting more than 5,600 jobs across local agencies, private nonprofit child care centers, and school systems. If federal Head Start funding were to be cut, as many as 500 child care programs that operate Head Start and Early Head Start may close. North Carolina is classified as a “child care desert” for infant and toddler care, where on average, five families with babies are competing for every available licensed child care slot.  

    In March Governor Stein launched the North Carolina Task Force on Child Care and Early Education. The task force seeks to identify solutions to expand access to affordable, high-quality child care and early education across North Carolina and to support and grow the early childhood education workforce. Governor Stein remains committed to ensuring that North Carolina’s children are able to learn and thrive in safe, nurturing, and supportive child care and early education settings. Investing in child care will also support parents and employers by reducing the number of people who would otherwise be pushed out of the workforce due to lack of child care. 

    Read Governor Stein, Lieutenant Governor Hunt, and Superintendent Green’s full letter to Congress here.  
     

    Apr 30, 2025

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI: Calian to Hold Conference Call Following Announcement of Second Quarter FY 2025 Results

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    OTTAWA, Ontario, April 30, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Calian® Group Ltd. (TSX:CGY), a diverse products and services company providing innovative healthcare, communications, learning and cybersecurity solutions, will hold a conference call at 8:30 a.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, May 14, 2025, to discuss results for the three-month period ended March 31, 2025. The results will be released before markets open.

    Interested participants from the financial and media community should join the live presentation by going to the Calian website and clicking on the Investors section to find the conference call link or directly via the following URL: https://edge.media-server.com/mmc/p/b8tamp8d/

    A replay of the audio webcast will be available at the same location a few hours after the conclusion of the call.

    About Calian

    www.calian.com

    We keep the world moving forward. Calian® helps people communicate, innovate, learn and lead safe and healthy lives. Every day, our employees live our values of customer commitment, integrity, innovation, respect and teamwork to engineer reliable solutions that solve complex challenges. That’s Confidence. Engineered. A stable and growing 40-year company, we are headquartered in Ottawa with offices and projects spanning North American, European and international markets. Visit calian.com to learn about innovative healthcare, communications, learning and cybersecurity solutions.

    Product or service names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.  

    Media inquiries:
    media@calian.com
    613-599-8600

    Investor Relations inquiries:
    ir@calian.com

    —————————————————————————–

    DISCLAIMER

    Certain information included in this press release is forward-looking and is subject to important risks and uncertainties. The results or events predicted in these statements may differ materially from actual results or events. Such statements are generally accompanied by words such as “intend”, “anticipate”, “believe”, “estimate”, “expect” or similar statements. Factors which could cause results or events to differ from current expectations include, among other things: the impact of price competition; scarce number of qualified professionals; the impact of rapid technological and market change; loss of business or credit risk with major customers; technical risks on fixed price projects; general industry and market conditions and growth rates; international growth and global economic conditions, and including currency exchange rate fluctuations; and the impact of consolidations in the business services industry. For additional information with respect to certain of these and other factors, please see the Company’s most recent annual report and other reports filed by Calian with the Ontario Securities Commission. Calian disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise. No assurance can be given that actual results, performance or achievement expressed in, or implied by, forward-looking statements within this disclosure will occur, or if they do, that any benefits may be derived from them.

    Calian · Head Office · 770 Palladium Drive · Ottawa · Ontario · Canada · K2V 1C8
    Tel: 613.599.8600 · Fax: 613-592-3664 · General info email: info@calian.com

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Tony Blair opposes phasing out fossil fuels. These academics disagree

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Jack Marley, Environment + Energy Editor, UK edition

    Rapidly phasing out fossil fuels and limiting energy consumption to tackle climate change is “a strategy doomed to fail” according to former UK prime minister Tony Blair.

    In the foreword of a new report, Blair urges governments to rethink their approach to reaching net zero emissions.

    Instead of policies that are seen by people as involving “financial sacrifices”, he says world leaders should deploy carbon capture and storage, including technological and nature-based approaches, to meet the rising demand for fossil fuels.

    But speak to many academic experts on climate change and they will tell a very different story: that there is no strategy for addressing climate change that does not involve ending, or at least massively reducing, fossil fuel combustion.

    This roundup of The Conversation’s climate coverage comes from our award-winning weekly climate action newsletter. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 45,000+ readers who’ve subscribed.

    A fossil fuel phase-out is ‘essential’

    “There is a wealth of scientific evidence demonstrating that a fossil fuel phase-out will be essential for reining in the greenhouse gas emissions driving climate change,” says Steve Pye, an associate professor of energy at UCL.



    Read more:
    COP28 president is wrong – science clearly shows fossil fuels must go (and fast)

    “I know because I have published some of it.”

    Ed Hawkins, a climate scientist at the University of Reading, agrees.

    “Rapidly reducing our reliance on fossil fuels, and not issuing new licenses to extract oil and gas, is the most effective way of minimising future climate-related disruptions,” he says.



    Read more:
    Science shows the severe climate consequences of new fossil fuel extraction

    “The sooner those with the power to shape our future recognise this, the better.”

    Fossil fuels are responsible for 90% of the carbon dioxide heating the climate. The amount burned annually is still rising, and so is the rate at which the world is getting hotter. Scientists now fear we are approaching irreversible tipping points in the climate system, hence their support for an urgent replacement of fossil fuels with renewable energy.



    Read more:
    Climate tipping points are nearer than you think – our new report warns of catastrophic risk

    Blair is confident that an emergency response on this scale can be avoided by absorbing CO₂ immediately after burning fossil fuels, from the smokestacks where the greenhouse gas is concentrated.

    Not all of the emissions responsible for climate change would be prevented. UCL earth system scientist Mark Maslin says that natural gas, which would linger as an energy source thanks to carbon capture, still leaks from pipelines and storage vessels upstream of power plants.



    Read more:
    The UK’s £22 billion bet on carbon capture will lock in fossil fuels for decades

    Commercial applications of the technology also have a poor track record. Just two large-scale coal-fired power plants are operating with CCS worldwide – one in the US and one in Canada.

    “Both have experienced consistent underperformance, recurring technical issues and ballooning costs,” Maslin says.

    CCS is no alternative to turning off the fossil fuel taps.
    Pan Demin/Shutterstock

    Blair might baulk at what he perceives to be the expense of ditching fossil fuels. But economic modelling led by Oxford University’s Andrea Bacilieri suggests his concern is misplaced. A rapid phase-out of fossil fuels could save US$30 trillion (US$1 trillion a year) by 2050 she concludes, compared with allowing power plants and factories to keep burning them with CCS.

    Developing CCS will be necessary to help manage an orderly transition from fossil fuels according to Myles Allen, a professor of geosystem science at Oxford University. But it is not a substitute for undergoing that transition, he says.



    Read more:
    Getting carbon capture right will be hard – but that doesn’t make it optional

    “Above all, we need to make sure the availability of CCS does not encourage yet more CO₂ production.”

    Keeping the public on board

    Is Blair right to fret about a public backlash to lower energy use? Academics suggest multiple reasons to think otherwise if the alternative is prolonging the use of fossil fuels.



    Read more:
    Should you get a heat pump? Here’s how they compare to a gas boiler

    Replacing a gas boiler with a heat pump that runs on electricity, for example, can lower a household’s energy consumption without a deliberate effort. That’s because renewable appliances convert power to heat more efficiently (how much depends on how well insulated the home is).



    Read more:
    Heat pumps without home insulation could raise bills and energy demand – here’s what the government can do

    In fact, it’s dependence on fossil fuel that is preventing many households from making this switch. The high wholesale price of gas determines the cost of electricity for UK consumers.



    Read more:
    How gas keeps the UK’s electricity bills so high – despite lots of cheap wind power

    And surveys repeatedly show that support for net zero policies is broad and deep in the UK – including those that would involve lifestyle changes say Lorraine Whitmarsh (University of Bath), Caroline Verfuerth and Steve Westlake (both Cardiff University), who research public behaviour and climate change.



    Read more:
    Net zero: direct costs of climate policies aren’t a major barrier to public support, research reveals

    “Crucially, the public wants and needs the government to show clear and consistent leadership on climate change,” they say.

    Meanwhile, what can corrode public acceptance of sacrifices is the high-consuming behaviour of a minority (think pop stars in rockets, as Westlake recently argued). And, arguably, the statements of powerful people like Blair.



    Read more:
    Why Katy Perry’s celebrity spaceflight blazed a trail for climate breakdown

    New research even suggests the politics that Blair and many others like him favour might also play a role here. Felix Schulz (Lund University) and Christian Bretter (The University of Queensland) are social scientists who study how ideology affects personal views on climate policy.

    They identified respondents in six countries (the UK, US, Germany, Brazil, South Africa and China) who shared Blair’s neoliberal worldview, which the pair define as a belief that individuals are primarily responsible for their own fortune, and need to take care of themselves – as well as an abiding faith in the free market.



    Read more:
    People with neoliberal views are less likely to support climate-friendly policies – new research

    “We observed a strong link between a neoliberal worldview and lack of support for the climate policies in our study,” they say.

    Schulz and Bretter urge us to consider how someone’s ideology ultimately shapes their understanding of the problem and its solutions as well.

    – ref. Tony Blair opposes phasing out fossil fuels. These academics disagree – https://theconversation.com/tony-blair-opposes-phasing-out-fossil-fuels-these-academics-disagree-254530

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI Global: Medicine’s overgeneralization problem — and how AI might make things worse

    Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Benjamin Chin-Yee, Hematologist/Assistant Professor, Western University

    In medicine, there’s a well-known maxim: never say more than your data allows. It’s one of the first lessons learned by clinicians and researchers.

    Journal editors expect it. Reviewers demand it. And medical researchers mostly comply. They hedge, qualify and narrow their claims — often at the cost of clarity. Take this conclusion, written to mirror the style of a typical clinical trial report:

    “In a randomized trial of 498 European patients with relapsed or refractory multiple myeloma, the treatment increased median progression free survival by 4.6 months, with grade three to four adverse events in 60 per cent of patients and modest improvements in quality-of-life scores, though the findings may not generalize to older or less fit populations.”

    It’s medical writing at its most exacting — and exhausting. Precise, but not exactly easy to take in.

    Unsurprisingly, then, those careful conclusions often get streamlined into something cleaner and more confident. The above example might be simplified into something like: “The treatment improves survival and quality of life.” “The drug has acceptable toxicity.” “Patients with multiple myeloma benefit from the new treatment.” Clear, concise — but often beyond what the data justify.

    Philosophers call these kinds of statements generics — generalizations without explicit quantifiers. Statements like “the treatment is effective” or “the drug is safe” sound authoritative, but they don’t say: For whom? How many? Compared to what? Under what conditions?

    Generalizations in medical research

    In previous work in the ethics of health communication, we highlighted how generics in medical research tend to erase nuance, transforming narrow, population-specific findings into sweeping claims that readers might misapply to all patients.

    In a systematic review of over 500 studies from top medical journals, we found more than half made generalizations beyond the populations studied. More than 80 per cent of those were generics, and fewer than 10 per cent offered any justification for these broad claims.

    Researchers’ tendency to over-generalize may reflect a deeper cognitive bias. Faced with complexity and limited attention, humans naturally gravitate toward simpler, broader claims — even when they stretch beyond what the data support. In fact, the very drive to explain the data, to tell a coherent story, can lead even careful researchers to overgeneralize.

    Artificial intelligence (AI) now threatens to significantly exacerbate this problem. In our latest research, we tested 10 widely used large language models (LLMs) — including ChatGPT, DeepSeek, LLaMA and Claude — on their ability to summarize abstracts and articles from top medical journals.

    Even when prompted for accuracy, most models routinely removed qualifiers, oversimplified findings and repackaged researchers’ carefully contextualized claims as broader statements.

    AI-generated summaries

    Analyzing nearly 5,000 LLM-generated summaries, we found rates of such over-generalizations as high as 73 per cent for some models. Very often, they converted non-generic claims into generics, for example, shifting from “the treatment was effective in this study,” to simply “the treatment is effective,” which misrepresented the study’s true scope.

    Strikingly, when we compared LLM-generated summaries to ones written by human experts, chatbots were nearly five times more likely to produce broad generalizations. But perhaps most concerning was that newer models — including ChatGPT-4o and DeepSeek — tended to generalize more, not less.

    What explains these findings? LLMs trained on overgeneralized scientific texts may inherit human biases from the input. Through reinforcement learning from human feedback, they may also start favouring confident, broad conclusions over careful, contextualized claims, because users often prefer concise, assertive responses.

    The resulting miscommunication risks are high, because researchers, clinicians and students increasingly use LLMs to summarize scientific articles.

    In a recent global survey of nearly 5,000 researchers, almost half reported already using AI in their research — and 58 per cent believed AI currently does a better job summarizing literature than humans. Some claim that LLMs can outperform medical experts in clinical text summarization.

    Our study casts doubt on that optimism. Over-generalizations produced by these tools have the potential to distort scientific understanding on a large scale. This is especially worrisome in high-stakes fields like medicine, where nuances in population, effect size and uncertainty really matter.

    Precision matters

    So what can be done? For human authors, clearer guidelines and editorial policies that address both how data are reported and how findings are described can reduce over-generalizations in medical writing. Also, researchers using LLMs for summarization should favour models like Claude — the most accurate LLM in our study — and remain aware that even well-intentioned accuracy prompts can backfire.

    AI developers, in turn, could build prompts into their LLMs that encourage more cautious language when summarizing research. Lastly, our study’s methodology can help benchmark LLMs’ overgeneralization tendency before deploying them in real-world contexts.

    In medical research, precision matters — not only in how we collect and analyze data, but also in how we communicate it. Our research reveals a shared tendency in both humans and machines to overgeneralize — to say more than what the data allows.

    Tackling this tendency means holding both natural and artificial intelligence to higher standards: scrutinizing not only how researchers communicate results, but how we train the tools increasingly shaping that communication. In medicine, careful language is imperative to ensure the right treatments reach the right patients, backed by evidence that actually applies.

    Benjamin Chin-Yee receives funding from the Gates Cambridge Trust and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

    Uwe Peters receives funding from a Volkswagen research grant on meta-science (“The Cultural
    Evolution of Scientific Practice”; WBS GW.001123.2.4).

    – ref. Medicine’s overgeneralization problem — and how AI might make things worse – https://theconversation.com/medicines-overgeneralization-problem-and-how-ai-might-make-things-worse-252486

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Magaziner, Amo Honor Senate President Dominick J. Ruggerio on House Floor

    Source: US Representative Seth Magaziner (RI-02)

    WASHINGTON, DC – Today, Representative Seth Magaziner (RI-02) and Congressman Gabe Amo (RI-01)  spoke on the House Floor to honor the late Senate President Dominick J. Ruggerio of North Providence. Over the course of more than 40 years in the Rhode Island state legislature, Senate President Ruggerio fiercely advocated for the people and places that make Rhode Island unique. On April 21, 2025, he passed away after a long battle with cancer.

    “President Ruggerio dedicated his life to making Rhode Island a better place, devoting forty years of service in the Rhode Island State Senate, culminating in his leadership as Senate President. Through it all, he was a tireless advocate for working people, a skilled legislator, and a kind and gracious presence to everyone he met,” said Representative Magaziner. “When I was state treasurer, I was proud to work with him on the 2018 statewide school construction initiative, where we made a historic investment in repairing or replacing hundreds of Rhode Island public school buildings.”

    “Donny, as he was referred to by those who knew him best, was a force to be reckoned with. A forza, as his Italian loved ones would say. For over 40 years as a state legislator for North Providence — a jewel of the First Congressional District — President Ruggerio served as a champion for all Rhode Islanders,” said Congressman Amo. “Earlier this week, we came together at St. Anthony Church in North Providence to remember this beloved icon in Rhode Island history. Today, I join President Ruggerio’s friends, family, staff, and colleagues who will carry on the torch that he lit and ensure that his legacy shines a light for generations to come.

    WATCH CONGRESSMAN MAGAZINER AND CONGRESSMAN AMO’S REMARKS

    MAGAZINER REMARKS AS DELIVERED

    Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the life and legacy of a true Rhode Island public servant, State Senate President Dominick Ruggerio.

    President Ruggerio dedicated his life to making Rhode Island a better place, devoting forty years of service in the Rhode Island State Senate, culminating in his leadership as Senate President.

    Through it all, he was a tireless advocate for working people, a skilled legislator, and a kind and gracious presence to everyone he met.

    President Ruggerio made his career in the labor movement, working with the Laborer’s International Union of North America before retiring where he assumed the office of Senate President.

    During his tenure in the Senate, he championed raising the minimum wage, protecting workers’ pensions, and rebuilding infrastructure among many other causes.

    When I was state treasurer, I was proud to work with him on the 2018 statewide school construction initiative, where we made a historic investment in repairing or replacing hundreds of Rhode Island public school buildings.

    I saw on that occasion and throughout my time in the State House that his commitment to the future of our state was unwavering.

    My thoughts are with Dominick Ruggerio’s family on his passing this past week, particularly with his children Charlie and Amanda, and his four grandchildren, and with all in Rhode Island who had the privilege to know and to work with him.

    I yield back.

    AMO REMARKS AS DELIVERED

    I rise today to honor Rhode Island’s late, great, Senate President, Dominick Ruggerio

    Mr. Speaker, Donny, as he was referred to by those who knew him best, was a force to be reckoned with.

    A forza, as his Italian loved ones would say.

    For over 40 years as a state legislator for North Providence — a jewel of the First Congressional District — President Ruggerio served as a champion for all Rhode Islanders.

    From infrastructure to the environment, labor protections and more, he fought for the places and the people who make the Ocean State great.

    Hardworking people like my mom, who worked for years as an SEIU nurse in Rhode Island nursing homes.

    Every time our paths crossed, he would remind me how, with enough hard work, grit, and determination, that anything is possible — even my own story.

    Donny loved our state and he loved our state house.

    Throughout his tenure, he mentored so many legislators, countless legislators — regardless of which side of the aisle they sat on.

    His passing last week after a lengthy battle with cancer is both a profound loss for our community and for our state.

    Earlier this week, we came together at St. Anthony Church in North Providence to remember this beloved icon in Rhode Island history.

    Today, I join President Ruggerio’s friends, family, staff, and colleagues who will carry on the torch that he lit and ensure that his legacy shines a light for generations to come.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Cantwell Statement on Commerce Department Report Showing Shrinking Economy Under Trump

    US Senate News:

    Source: United States Senator for Washington Maria Cantwell

    04.30.25

    Cantwell Statement on Commerce Department Report Showing Shrinking Economy Under Trump

    WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, the U.S. Department of Commerce issued a report on the state of the economy over the first three months of 2025. The report showed that the country’s gross domestic product shrank by 0.3% during the first months of President Donald Trump’s second term.

    U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation and senior member of the Senate Finance Committee, released the following statement:

    “Today’s GDP numbers are another warning sign our economy is moving in the wrong direction. The economy shrunk in the first quarter when it should be growing.  The Trump tariffs are a drag on the economy and American families will continue to feel the pain.”

    The Commerce Department report follows months of tariff whiplash from the Trump administration, during which the president erratically and unilaterally announced, imposed, raised, dropped, and reimposed a series of blanket and industry-specific tariffs on imports coming to the United States. In January 2025, it was widely expected that GDP growth would be at least 2% in the first quarter of 2025 – but that changed after President Trump announced his tariffs.  Shortly after the Commerce Department report was released, he posted on Truth Social that the declining economy “has NOTHING TO DO WITH TARIFFS” and is instead a holdover from former President Joe Biden’s economy. Under the last quarter of President Biden’s administration, the GDP grew 2.4%.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Canada: Increased BC Parks licence plate sales support more, better parks programs

    Source: Government of Canada regional news

    Sales of the BC Parks licence plates continue to grow, helping to protect unique species and ecosystems, and improving visitors’ experiences in provincial parks.

    Between April 2023 and March 2024, more than 84,000 BC Parks licence plates were bought, a 7% increase from the same period a year before.

    “Everyone who has bought BC Parks licence plates is supporting a more sustainable future by contributing to the protection and preservation of unique species and sensitive ecosystems, as well as supporting First Nations to share their cultures and histories,” said Tamara Davidson, Minister of Environment and Parks. “From the mountains to the coast, we’ve worked with First Nations and community partners on a variety of grassroots projects. My recent visit with BC Parks staff has shown me first-hand the work that can be accomplished with these programs that are making an incredible impact on parks.”

    The licence-plate sales generated approximately $11 million in net revenue, supporting more than 250 projects and programs in parks throughout B.C. This includes a wide range of initiatives, such as the Student Ranger Program, wildlife inventories, partnerships with First Nations on educational programs and signs, wildfire-fuel mitigation, invasive-species management, ecosystem restoration, and educational programs for children and families.

    At Helliwell Park on Hornby Island, licence-plate funds help support the recovery of the endangered Taylor’s checkerspot butterfly. In 2015, BC Parks partnered with community members and scientists to begin restoring the park’s coastal-bluff meadows. The goal was to create habitat suitable for the release of hundreds of Taylor’s checkerspot larvae being captively bred at the Greater Vancouver Zoo.

    Historically, the Taylor’s checkerspot was found in several areas of southern Vancouver Island, including Helliwell Park in the early 1990s. The species was thought to be gone from Canada. However, undocumented populations were found on Denman Island in 2006 and on private land in the Courtenay area in 2018.

    Last year was the fourth year that captively bred Taylor’s checkerspot larvae were reintroduced into Helliwell Park. The butterflies are now breeding in the park and adult butterflies have been spotted flying around.

    “Support from the licence-plate program has been crucial to the success of our project,” said Chris Junck, outreach co-ordinator, Taylor’s Checkerspot Recovery Project. “In particular, consistent funding for several years enabled us to expand habitat restoration areas required to re-establish the butterfly population, and conduct surveys to monitor their survival.”

    In Gowlland Tod Park near Victoria, the PEPÁḴEṈ HÁUTW̱ Foundation used funding from the licence-plate program to assist with ecosystem restoration and the development of a restoration lesson plan for teachers to encourage land-based learning and respect for Indigenous culture.

    More than 500 students and volunteers have helped remove invasive plants, plant and seed native species and remediate contaminated areas in the park. The foundation is also in the process of installing interpretive signs to increase public awareness, understanding and respect for the importance of protecting and nurturing native species.

    The Tod Inlet area of Gowlland Tod Park is also known as SNIDȻEȽ in the SENĆOŦEN language of the W̱SÁNEĆ people and means Place of the Blue Grouse. It is an important area to the W̱SÁNEĆ and abundant with traditional food resources. 

    “The SNIDȻEȽ Resiliency Project is a collaborative initiative actively restoring the important native ecosystems of SNIDȻEȽ, which is the first WŚANEĆ village site,” said Judith Lyn Arney, ecosystems director for the PEPÁḴEṈ HÁUTW̱ Foundation. “Since 2010, W̱SÁNEĆ children and community members, local schools and organizations, international visitors and programs, and countless individuals passionate about reciprocity to the land have all participated in the healing of this special place. The PEPAKEṈ HÁUTW̱ Foundation is grateful for the support of the licence-plate program in this beautiful project.”

    Funding from the licence-plate program helped buy an adaptive mountain bike in the Kootenays so people with mobility challenges can enjoy outdoor recreation. It has also helped the BC Parks iNaturalist Program reach one million observations within six years.

    The iNaturalist Program is a collaboration between the BC Parks Foundation, BC Parks, University of Victoria and Simon Fraser University, and encourages people to use iNaturalist to instantly identify plants and animals in parks by recording and sharing their observations. More than 13,000 people have contributed to the project, recording nearly 14,000 species in parks and protected areas. Scientists use the data to better understand what species live in parks. They have found endangered and threatened species, as well as discovering new species for B.C. and Canada.

    “Your BC Parks licence plate not only looks great on your car, it shows you are a proud B.C. resident who supports the most beautiful places in this province,” said Andy Day, CEO, BC Parks Foundation. “Funds from your licence plate are used to keep parks beautiful and create more activities and adventures for you to enjoy, many of which you can now find at www.DiscoverParks.ca. Thanks for keeping B.C. beautiful by getting a plate.”

    The BC Parks Licence Plate Program is a partnership between the Province and ICBC. Licence-plate sales have been steadily increasing since 2020. As of March 2025, more than 552,000 licence plates have been sold, generating more than $54 million in net revenue for the program.

    Learn More:

    To learn more about the BC Parks Licence Plate Program and how to purchase a licence plate, visit: https://bcparks.ca/get-involved/buy-licence-plate/

    To view the 2023/2024 licence plate program report, visit: https://bcparks.ca/get-involved/buy-licence-plate/#annual-report

    For more information about BC Parks, visit: https://bcparks.ca/

    MIL OSI Canada News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Photo & Video Chronology — April 25 & 29, 2025 — Kīlauea eruption pause

    Source: US Geological Survey

    Photo & Video Chronology — April 25 & 29, 2025 — Kīlauea eruption pause

    A USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory monitoring helicopter overflight midday on April 29, 2025, provided views Halema‘uma‘u during a pause in eruptive activity at Kīlauea. 

    This photograph, taken during a USGS Hawaiian Volcano Observatory monitoring helicopter overflight midday on April 29, 2025, shows an overview of Kīlauea Iki (center) and Pu‘u Pua‘i (bottom center to right). Kīlauea Iki erupted in 1959 over a 5-week period with 17 fountaining episodes, similar to the ongoing eruption in Halema‘uma‘u. Pu‘u Pua‘i formed as a result of the Kīlauea Iki lava fountaining activity, during which the highest lava fountains were recorded at Kīlauea, reaching up to 1,900 feet (580 meters) high. The pale line that cuts across Kīlauea Iki is the popular Kīlauea Iki trail. The ongoing eruption at Kīlauea’s summit has now lasted over 4 months with episode 18 ending on April 22. USGS photo by N. Deligne.

    Get Our News

    These items are in the RSS feed format (Really Simple Syndication) based on categories such as topics, locations, and more. You can install and RSS reader browser extension, software, or use a third-party service to receive immediate news updates depending on the feed that you have added. If you click the feed links below, they may look strange because they are simply XML code. An RSS reader can easily read this code and push out a notification to you when something new is posted to our site.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Governor Kehoe Orders Capitol Dome Lighted Blue in Honor of Fallen Law Enforcement Officers

    Source: US State of Missouri

    APRIL 30, 2025

    Jefferson City — In honor of Missouri’s fallen law enforcement officers, Governor Mike Kehoe ordered the Missouri State Capitol dome and Missouri Law Enforcement Memorial to shine blue beginning at sunset on Friday, May 2, 2025, until sunrise on Sunday, May 4, 2025.

    “The Missouri Capitol dome will shine blue this weekend as we honor and remember the law enforcement officers who made the ultimate sacrifice,” Governor Kehoe said. “It takes great courage, strength, and commitment for law enforcement officers to put on their uniform each day knowing that their duty requires them to run toward the dangers that others flee. We have a responsibility to honor the fallen and ensure they are never forgotten.”

    The annual ceremonies honoring fallen Missouri law enforcement officers will be held at the Missouri Law Enforcement Memorial on the north side of the State Capitol. The 2025 Candlelight Vigil will be held on Friday, May 2, and the Memorial Service will take place on Saturday, May 3.

    The names of four law enforcement officers who died in the line of duty during 2024 have been added to the memorial’s Wall of Honor in advance of this year’s ceremonies, as well as two  historical officer deaths for which the line of duty circumstances have recently been confirmed through research. The Wall of Honor now includes 752 fallen officers.

    Line-of-Duty Deaths

    • Cody R. Allen – On Feb. 29, 2024, Independence Police Department Officer Cody Allen was shot and killed while responding to the shooting of Jackson County Civil Process Server Drexel Mack, who had been serving an eviction notice.
    • Stephen A. Singer – Early on the morning of April 8, 2024, Lake Lafayette Police Department Chief Steven Singer died in his home as a result of a heart attack. The evening before, he had pursued several suspects who were trespassing with utility task vehicles (UTV) near the dam at Lake Lafayette.
    • Phylicia Carson – On Aug. 31, 2024, Osage Beach Police Department Officer Phylicia Carson was killed in a vehicle crash while responding to assist another officer involved in a vehicle pursuit.
    • David Lee III – On Sept. 22, 2024, St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department Officer David Lee III was struck by a vehicle and killed while assisting at the scene of a motor vehicle crash on eastbound I-70. Officer Lee was setting out flares when a speeding drunk driver lost control of his vehicle and struck him.
    • Noah Bowles – On Feb. 8, 1904, Lewistown Marshal Noah Bowles was attempting to arrest a man for public intoxication on a railway platform in Lewistown. The suspect, who had allegedly been harassing passengers on a recently arrived train, fatally shot Marshal Bowles with a revolver.
    • George D. Hooper – On March 17, 1918, Webb City Police Department Chief George Hooper was shot and killed in an exchange of gunfire. He had approached a gunman who had been firing a handgun and pursuing a woman on foot near railroad tracks. The gunman shot Chief Hooper, who returned fire. A deputy sheriff shot and killed the gunman.

    The families of the fallen and representatives of law enforcement agencies from across Missouri will participate in the ceremonies.

    Friday May 2, 2025

    Candlelight vigil honoring Missouri law enforcement officers who died in the line of duty

    When: 8:00 p.m.

    Where: Law Enforcement Memorial at the Missouri State Capitol, located on North Capitol Drive

    Media: Open

    Saturday, May 3, 2025

    Governor Kehoe and Attorney General Bailey to deliver remarks at memorial service honoring Missouri law enforcement officers who died in the line of duty

    When: 10:00 a.m.

    Where: Law Enforcement Memorial at the Missouri State Capitol, located on North Capitol Drive

    Media: Open (Saturday’s service will be livestreamed on the Missouri Department of Public Safety Facebook page)

    Photos of the Capitol lighted blue will be available on Governor Kehoe’s Flickr Page.

    ###

     

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI Video: WH Chief of Staff: “The President’s promises…have been kept time and time again.”

    Source: United States of America – The White House (video statements)

    #POTUS #WhiteHouse #Media #America #USA

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMNRuw5tfd0

    MIL OSI Video –

  • MIL-OSI Video: POTUS: “The biggest thing we’re working on, maybe bigger than tariffs…one Big Beautiful Bill.”

    Source: United States of America – The White House (video statements)

    #Trump #DonaldTrump #POTUS #PresidentTrump #Taxes #Tax #Budget #Bill #Congress #America #USA

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fIFS43cQZE

    MIL OSI Video –

  • MIL-OSI Video: Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt Briefs Members of the New Media, Apr. 30, 2025

    Source: United States of America – The White House (video statements)

    The White House

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYiS2WJLKRk

    MIL OSI Video –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Kean Announces New District Office Location and Regional Satellite Office Hours Across District

    Source: US Representative Tom Kean, Jr. (NJ-07)

    Contact: Riley Pingree

    (April 30, 2025) LEBANON BOROUGH, NJ – Today, Congressman Tom Kean, Jr. (NJ-07) announced the relocation of his main district office to 100 Corporate Dr, Suite 106, Lebanon, New Jersey 08833, effective May 1, 2025. The district office was previously located in Bernardsville, New Jersey.

    The new district office in Lebanon Borough is situated in northern Hunterdon County, serving as a central location within the district with nearby roadway access to Interstate-78 and U.S. Route 22. New Jersey’s 7th Congressional District includes all of Hunterdon and Warren counties, as well as parts of Morris, Somerset, Sussex, and Union counties.

    In conjunction with the move, two of Congressman Kean’s five regional satellite office locations will also shift to new towns. Satellite office hours previously held in Flemington on the first Thursday of the month will now be in Bridgewater, and office hours formerly held in Mountainside will now be hosted in Clark on the first Friday of the month. All counties in the district will continue to have a dedicated regional presence for constituent services. 

    “My office always strives to provide the best possible service to constituents across our district, and that mission will continue as we head to a new space in Lebanon on May 1,” said Congressman Tom Kean, Jr. “As part of the move, we will also be launching new satellite offices in Bridgewater and Clark, while maintaining our current locations in Hopatcong, Mount Olive, and Washington. These satellite offices ensure that in-person constituent services remain accessible in every county we serve.”

    “I am so glad to bring the residents of Lebanon Borough closer to our nation’s capital with the opening of U.S. Congressman Tom Kean, Jr.’s new office location,” said Lebanon Borough Mayor Jim Pittinger. “The Congressman has been a great partner to the Borough, and we are honored to welcome him to Lebanon.”

    “We are proud to continue partnering with Congressman Tom Kean, Jr. to ensure that residents have convenient, local access to their federal representative and his staff, resources, and solutions,” said Bridgewater Township Mayor Matthew Moench. “Hosting Congressman Kean’s Somerset County satellite office hours at the Bridgewater Municipal Building is another way we’re showing how all levels of government can work together to serve the people of Bridgewater.”

    “Clark Township is proud to welcome a congressional satellite office to our municipal building,” said Clark Township Mayor Angel Albanese. “This collaboration ensures our residents have direct, convenient access to vital federal services right here in town. We are committed to making it easier for our community to get the assistance they deserve, and we thank Congressman Tom Kean, Jr. for his partnership in serving our constituents.”

    A full list of office locations and hours of operation is available below, as well as on Congressman Kean’s website HERE. You may also contact his District Office at (908) 547-3307 for more information.

    ###

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: My weekly column: 100 days of promises kept under President Trump

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Representative Randy Feenstra (IA-04)

    April 30th marked 100 days of promises kept under President Trump. Like he pledged on the campaign trail, he has mobilized every tool at his disposal to make America strong again and reverse the failed policies pushed by the Biden administration. From border security and energy dominance to government efficiency and economic investment, President Trump has delivered real results for the American people and has worked around the clock to put our families, farmers, workers, and small businesses first.

    The clearest example of President Trump’s decisive leadership is his complete and total lockdown of our southern border. Illegal border crossings have plummeted by 95% and illegal immigrant “gotaways” have fallen by 99%. Drug traffickers, criminals, sex traffickers, and violent MS-13 and Tren de Aragua gang members have been quickly removed from our country. After Biden halted construction of the border wall, President Trump immediately restarted this vital national security initiative and reiterated his unwavering support for our border patrol agents who were treated so poorly under the Biden administration. President Trump was absolutely right when he remarked during his joint address to Congress on March 4th that “it turned out that all we really needed was a new President” to secure our border.

    Strengthening his work to close the border, President Trump honored families who have lost loved ones to illegal immigrant crime by signing the Laken Riley Act – the first piece of legislation to become law this year. The Laken Riley Act also included Sarah’s Law, in honor of 21-year-old Iowan Sarah Root, who was senselessly killed by a drunk driving illegal immigrant in 2016. Instead of answering for his crimes, this criminal posted bail, was released from jail, and fled our country never to be seen again. Sarah’s Law – now the law of the land thanks to President Trump – ensures that illegal immigrants who murder or seriously injure American citizens are detained without bail and held accountable for their actions. Fortunately, the illegal immigrant who killed Sarah Root was recently arrested in Honduras and the Trump administration worked quickly with Honduran authorities to extradite this criminal back to the United States to face justice. This is the action that the American people wanted to see, and President Trump is delivering.

    Upon his return to the White House, President Trump also announced that he would do everything in his power to restore American energy dominance – and that he did. He created the National Energy Dominance Council to determine every avenue available to increase energy production, lower gas prices, and make the United States the world’s energy powerhouse. He rescinded countless Biden executive orders that promoted the Green New Deal over affordable gas and electricity prices and cut needless red tape that prevented American energy producers from reaching their full production capacity. He overturned the Biden administration’s ban on liquefied natural gas exports, signed a resolution – that I voted for – to completely repeal Biden’s costly tax on natural gas production, and stopped the Biden administration’s ridiculous electric-vehicle mandates on American families. Under President Trump’s watch, we will use the energy resources abundantly available in our own country and reduce our dependence on our foreign adversaries for our energy needs.

    Government efficiency is another bright spot of President Trump’s America First agenda. The Biden administration exploded our national debt with trillions of dollars of wasteful spending that fueled inflation and made life more expensive for Americans. As promised, the Trump administration uncovered example after example of waste, fraud, and abuse in our federal government. DEI positions in federal agencies have been cut, spending on liberal initiatives has been slashed, and welfare for illegal immigrants has been suspended. Eliminating this type of waste ensures that programs like Medicare and Social Security – intended for American citizens only – can remain solvent now and well into the future. With President Trump in the White House, taxpayer dollars are being treated with the care that they deserve.

    Additionally, because of President Trump’s mission to hold our trading partners accountable to our laws and protect our farmers, workers, manufacturers, and businesses from unfair and unlawful trade practices, business investment is accelerating in our country. More than $5 trillion in new investments in America have been announced, which will create over 451,000 new jobs in American communities. This impressive figure does not even include pledges that other countries have made to bring manufacturing and jobs to the United States, spurring additional economic growth. To complement these investments, my Republican colleagues and I are working hard to extend President Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act to deliver tax relief for our families, farmers, workers, and businesses. While Democrats want Americans to see the highest tax hike in U.S. history, President Trump and Republicans are committed to lowering taxes and unleashing U.S. economic prosperity. The American workforce and American industry will no longer be taken advantage of by foreign nations, and American citizens will rightfully keep more of their hard-earned money.

    This is not an exhaustive list of the amazing achievements that President Trump has delivered in just 100 days, but it does prove that he is working harder than ever to serve the American people. I know that President Trump will take this same aggressive and results-oriented approach to his next four years in office.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Congresswoman Pingree Leads Bipartisan, Bicameral Effort to Expand and Strengthen Local Meat Processing

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congresswoman Chellie Pingree (1st District of Maine)

    Today, U.S. Representatives Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) and Jim Baird (R-Ind.), along with U.S. Senators John Thune (R-S.D.) and Tina Smith (D-Minn.), reintroduced legislation to support small meat and poultry processors throughout the U.S. The bipartisan, bicameral Strengthening Local Processing Act would make it easier for local livestock and poultry producers to process meat locally, by expanding access to federal resources and providing critical support for training and technical assistance to small processors.

    “Access to USDA processing facilities remains a significant challenge for livestock producers in Maine and across the country. Their livelihoods depend on having somewhere to take their animals, but under the current system, their options are severely limited. Chefs, retailers, and consumers want to buy locally raised meat, and they’re frustrated by how difficult it is to get,” said Congresswoman Pingree, a longtime farmer and member of the House Agriculture Committee. “Our bipartisan Strengthening Local Processing Act will increase processing, enhance opportunities for local producers, and help small slaughterhouses and butchers grow their businesses—delivering the quality, locally raised meat and poultry consumers expect at the store.”

    Under federal law, farmers and ranchers are required to send their animals to one of a limited number of U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) or state-inspected slaughterhouses—often hundreds of miles away—in order to sell individual cuts of locally raised meats. As a result, many smaller meat and poultry processing plants are booked out for months, and small farms are unable meet new demand due to a lack of processing capacity. 

    The Strengthening Local Processing Act will increase the federal cost share for both state facility inspections (from 50 to 65%), as well as the Cooperative Interstate Shipment (from 60 to 80%), thus encouraging more states to operate state inspection programs and participate in CIS. There are currently 29 states that operate a state inspection program, and 10 states that participate in CIS. 

    The legislation would create a competitive grant program for small and very small establishments, state inspected facilities, custom exempt facilities, or new small-scale slaughter facilities to help increase processing capacity and grow resiliency. It would also create two new grant programs for meat processing workforce training—one for colleges, universities, nonprofits, worker training centers, and others to establish or expand meat processing training program and one for small and very small establishments or nongovernmental organizations to offset the cost of training new meat processors.

    ###

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Loses Final Appeal, Must Restore Health Care to Striking Workers

    Source: Communications Workers of America

    PITTSBURGH – On Tuesday, the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals rejected two attempts by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (PG) to evade its obligation to provide editorial workers the health care plan it illegally tore away from members of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh (TNG-CWA Local 38061) in 2020.

    Last month the same court ordered the PG to restore that health care to all Guild bargaining unit employees. The order includes workers who crossed the picket line to work for the PG during the journalists’ more-than-two-and-a-half-year strike. The PG appealed this ruling on two fronts. On March 27, the PG asked the court for permission to deny the higher-quality, yet cheaper, health care plan to workers who crossed the picket line and only restore it for strikers. On April 7, the PG asked to have the entire injunction case reheard.

    Both attempts failed on Tuesday. The Third Circuit Court panel had the opportunity to offer an explanation for a response on petitions for rehearing when judges find a party to be asking compelling legal questions. The judges chose not to respond to the PG.

    “The Post-Gazette’s attempts to evade its responsibility have exhausted the courts and exhausted every legal delay tactic, while our strikers’ determination and solidarity have only grown,” said Zack Tanner, president of the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh-CWA Local 38061. “The Post-Gazette must immediately restore our health care for every member of our bargaining unit or risk the consequences of being in contempt of court. This ruling is a clear signal that it is time for the Post-Gazette to settle the strike by restoring the terms of our union contract before the courts take further action against the company’s lawless mistreatment of dedicated journalists.”

    The striking newsroom workers are still fighting for their full strike demands: dignified health care and the restoration of their union contract, including paid time off, wages, employees having a guaranteed work week, and the right to question company discipline, among other issues. Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh members have struck since October of 2022 for these demands.

    In 2020, the company illegally and unilaterally tore up the editorial workers’ union contract, claiming they had bargained to an impasse. Both an administrative law judge and the National Labor Relations Board in Washington, D.C., ruled that the company broke federal labor law in this instance, in addition to bargaining in bad faith and illegally surveilling its workers.

    The Board ordered the PG to pay back workers for all the wage and vacation reductions and increased healthcare costs it forced onto workers in 2020, in addition to restoring all the other bargained rights it tore up five years ago. The Third Circuit Court is set to rule on enforcement of that full order.

    While injunctions, particularly from a Circuit Court, are rare, the granting of enforcement orders at that level is comparatively common.

    ###

    About CWA: The Communications Workers of America represents working people in telecommunications, customer service, media, airlines, health care, public service and education, manufacturing, tech, and other fields.

    cwa-union.org @cwaunion

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Justice Department Declines Prosecution of Company That Self-Disclosed Export Control Offenses Committed by Employee

    Source: US State of North Dakota

    Company’s Prompt Self-Disclosure and Extraordinary Cooperation Led to Employee’s Successful Prosecution for Unlawfully Exporting Software to a Restricted Chinese University

    Note: View the declination letter here.

    The Justice Department today announced that it has declined the prosecution of Universities Space Research Association (USRA) after it self-disclosed to the Department’s National Security Division (NSD) criminal violations of U.S. export control laws committed by its former employee, Jonathan Soong. Soong pleaded guilty to willfully violating the Export Administration Regulations (EAR) by exporting U.S. Army-developed aviation software to a university in the People’s Republic of China (PRC) that had been placed on the Commerce Department’s Entity List and was sentenced to 20 months in prison.

    “If we stay vigilant, all of us — including our citizens, small businesses, and large corporations — can play a critical role in protecting our country,” said Sue J. Bai, head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “A criminal who compromised our national security was brought to justice because his employer caught him and immediately turned him in. We decline to prosecute his employer and are ready to work together with such responsible corporate actors who are committed to joining us in this fight to protect our country from foreign adversaries.”

    “USRA discovered that one of its employees was funneling sensitive aeronautics software to a Beijing university in violation of export control laws and at risk to our national security,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Patrick D. Robbins for the Northern District of California. “What the company did next made all the difference in the Government’s decision not to prosecute it: the company took swift and proactive measures to disclose the employee’s wrongdoing, provide all known facts, and cooperate – and continue to cooperate – with the government’s investigation.”

    According to court documents, in April 2016, USRA contracted with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to, among other things, license and distribute for a fee aeronautics-related and U.S. Army-owned flight control software. Soong was employed by USRA as a program administrator under the contract and was responsible for performing due diligence on prospective purchasers to ensure that the sale or transfer of software licenses complied with applicable law, including by checking the Entity List. Soong willfully exported software subject to the EAR to Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, also known as Beihang University (Beihang), a university in the PRC, knowing that an export control license was required for the export to Beihang because it was on the Entity List. Beihang was on the Commerce Department’s Entity List due to its involvement in the development of military rocket systems and unmanned air vehicle systems. Soong further used an intermediary to complete the transfer and export of the software to Beihang to avoid detection, and embezzled tens of thousands of dollars in software license sales by directing purchasers to make payment to an account he personally owned and controlled.

    This scheme continued until NASA inquired about the sales of software licenses to PRC-based purchasers and USRA began to investigate. Soong initially lied to USRA and fabricated evidence that he had conducted due diligence on the purchasers and provided it to USRA’s counsel to provide to NASA, but after USRA’s counsel investigated further and confronted Soong with evidence that contradicted his statements, he admitted to knowing that Beihang was on the Entity List when he exported the software to Beihang and that a license had been required for the export.

    Within days of learning that Soong had willfully violated U.S. export control laws, and before USRA had completed its own investigation to understand the scope of the misconduct, USRA self-disclosed the crime to NSD and fully cooperated with the ensuing criminal investigation, which eventually established that Soong had acted alone at USRA. USRA’s cooperation included proactively identifying, collecting, and disclosing relevant evidence to investigators, including foreign language evidence and evidence located overseas, and providing detailed and timely responses to the government’s requests for information and evidence. USRA remediated the root cause of the misconduct by disciplining a supervisory employee who failed appropriately to supervise Soong, and by significantly improving its internal controls and compliance program. USRA also compensated the government both for the funds Soong embezzled, and for the time Soong had spent embezzling funds instead of performing his duties under USRA’s contract with NASA.

    The Justice Department declined USRA’s prosecution after considering the factors set forth in the Department’s Principles of Federal Prosecution of Business Organizations and the National Security Division Enforcement Policy for Business Organizations (NSD Enforcement Policy). The NSD Enforcement Policy creates a presumption that companies that (1) voluntarily self-disclose to NSD potentially criminal violations arising out of or relating to the enforcement of export control or sanctions laws, (2) fully cooperate, and (3) timely and appropriately remediate will generally receive a non-prosecution agreement, unless aggravating factors are present.  In appropriate cases, the NSD Enforcement Policy authorizes prosecutors to go further, and exercise discretion to decline a company’s prosecution. This is the second time that NSD has exercised its discretion to decline the prosecution of a company under the NSD Enforcement Policy.

    The case was investigated by the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security; the Department of Defense’s Defense Criminal Investigative Service; and the FBI. The NASA Office of Inspector General; U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Division; U.S. Army Counterintelligence; and the Department of Homeland Security, Homeland Security Investigations provided valuable assistance.

    Trial Attorney Rachel Craft of the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Barbara Valliere for the Northern District of California prosecuted the case.

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Governor Lamont Highlights Proactive Steps Connecticut Is Taking To Address ‘The Link’ Between Child Abuse and Animal Cruelty

    Source: US State of Connecticut

    (NEWINGTON, CT) – Governor Ned Lamont today joined other state officials and animal welfare advocates for a news conference at the headquarters of the Connecticut Humane Society in Newington to commemorate Child Abuse Awareness Month and Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Month and highlight the proactive work being done among Connecticut state agencies to cross report accounts of animal cruelty for assessment and possible investigation to determine the safety of children in households where these reports have occurred.

    Numerous studies have shown that there is a strong correlation between instances of animal abuse, child maltreatment, and other forms of interpersonal violence, including domestic violence and elder abuse. Professionals refer to this correlation as “The Link.”

    Over the last several years, staff from Connecticut state agencies, including the Connecticut Department of Children and Families (DCF) and the Connecticut Department of Agriculture (DOAG), have been strengthening their partnerships to respond to “The Link” by cross reporting these instances to each other. Upon receiving reports of reasonable suspicion of animal cruelty from state, regional, and municipal animal control officers, DOAG staff are mandated to forward that information to staff from DCF, who then review whether any children in those homes could be impacted.

    “It’s clear that in homes where animal cruelty has occurred, child abuse or other forms of domestic violence may be present,” Governor Lamont said. “By cross reporting this information between state agencies, our staff can proactively investigate whether other forms of violence are occurring in a home and take measures to protect any children, adults, or animals who may be impacted.”

    “Our continued collaboration with DCF and other state and local partners is essential to increasing education and outreach around the link between child abuse and animal cruelty,” Connecticut Agriculture Commissioner Bryan P. Hurlburt said. “Through training and education, animal control officers are key partners in recognizing and responding to signs of cruelty and sharing that information appropriately to protect the safety and wellbeing of both children and animals.”

    “Our animals, like our children, are vulnerable to abuse and neglect in every community and deserve our full protection,” Connecticut Children and Families Commissioner Jodi Hill-Lilly said. “That’s why we’re increasing staff support, improving data collection, and strengthening our cross-reporting partnership with the Department of Agriculture to address The Link between animal abuse and other forms of child abuse and neglect. This includes mandatory training for frontline staff to identify signs of abuse during home visits. We’re grateful to Governor Lamont, the Department of Agriculture, and our advocacy partners for their support in protecting our most vulnerable.”

    Connecticut has seen demonstrated increases in animal cruelty reports over the past several years, due in part to increased education and outreach efforts by both DCF and DOAG. For example, DCF has made cross reporting a part of the agency’s mandated reporter training. More recently, across its 14 offices, DCF has also more than doubled the number of cross-reporting liaisons who are responsible for helping to triage cases between DCF social workers and animal control officers and provide monthly training and educational support to teams of staff.

    In 2024, DOAG sent DCF 90 reports, while in that same year DCF sent a total of 107 reports to DOAG. Last year, “The Link” was apparent in 16 reports that met the standard for an abuse/neglect investigation based on the initial information provided in the written report. Of those 90 reports, 13 were made on families that were already involved with and receiving supports from DCF.

    The partnership between DOAG and the DCF Child Abuse and Neglect Careline continues to be strengthened to ensure reports are received immediately, allowing DCF to proceed as necessary and DOAG to close the loop with local animal control officers.

    “The Connecticut Humane Society has and will always stand as a voice for the voiceless,” James Bias, executive director of the Connecticut Humane Society, said. “We recognize that acts of animal cruelty are rarely isolated and are too often linked to cases of child abuse. It is so important that every report is taken seriously, and every investigation is pursued with urgency. Accountability is essential to ending the cycles of both animal cruelty and child abuse. These are the most vulnerable of our community, and they deserve more.”

    A review of research studies shows that:

    • Animals were harmed in 88% of homes where a child was physically abused.
    • 75% of female survivors of domestic violence report their pets were threatened or intentionally harmed by their partner.
    • Children exposed to domestic violence are three times more likely to be cruel to animals.
    • 45% of caseworkers working with the elderly encountered animal abuse or neglect co-occurring with elder abuse.

    “There is a well-documented link between animal cruelty and child abuse, with studies consistently showing that violence toward animals often occurs with domestic violence, including abuse of children,” Robin “Zilla” Cannamela, president and co-founder of Desmond’s Army Animal Law Advocates, said. “As Desmond’s Army often sees in court, abusers may harm or threaten pets as a mean of controlling victims making it more difficult for them to seek help or leave unsafe situations. Recognizing this critical connection, Desmond’s Army Animal Law Advocates has expanded its mission to support not only animals but also help the people who love them. As part of this effort, our organization now offers to pay up to $300 for the first month of boarding cost for pets of domestic violence victims entering a licensed safe facility. This compassionate initiative helps remove a significant barrier for survivors, giving them the freedom to escape abuse without the fear of abandoning their pets. This initiative also teaches children that pets are important family members deserving protection from harm.”

    Anyone can make a report of animal cruelty by contacting their local animal control department in the town where those concerns have been noted or by contacting DOAG’s Animal Control Office at 860-713-2506 or AGR.AnimalControl@ct.gov. Those making a report can remain anonymous.

    A reasonable suspicion of child maltreatment can be made to DCF’s Child Abuse and Neglect Careline by dialing 1-800-842-2288. The hotline is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Callers can remain anonymous.

     

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Governor Lamont Announces Registration Open for Innovation Made Leadership Event

    Source: US State of Connecticut

    (HARTFORD, CT) – Governor Ned Lamont today announced that registration is now open for the second event in the MADE leadership series — Innovation MADE — taking place on Wednesday, May 28, 2025, at 9:30 a.m. during the prestigious Yale Innovation Summit in New Haven.

    Hosted by the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD) in partnership with Yale Ventures, the Connecticut Business and Industry Association (CBIA), WTNH, and WICC, Innovation MADE will bring together thought leaders, entrepreneurs, innovators, and business executives to explore how innovation drives opportunity and growth across for Connecticut’s economy.

    “Connecticut has always been a state of bold ideas, and today that spirit of innovation is more alive than ever,” Governor Lamont said. “Events like Innovation MADE showcase the talent, creativity, and collaboration that define our identity and ensure we continue to lead for the betterment of humankind.”

    The Innovation MADE keynote address will be delivered by Daniel O’Keefe, Connecticut’s chief innovation officer and commissioner of DECD, followed by an expert panel discussion on the opportunities presented by quantum computing and artificial intelligence, particularly in New Haven’s thriving biotech industry. Featured speakers will include some of Connecticut’s industry leaders, including Vlad Coric, CEO of Biohaven, among others to be announced.

    Attendees of Innovation MADE will not only gain access to the morning’s main stage programming, networking sessions, and “office hours” with state and private sector leaders, but also a full-day pass to the entire Yale Innovation Summit, featuring cutting-edge tracks in arts, biotech, civic, climate, health, and tech.

    The state is also partnering with Yale Ventures to debut the first-ever Connecticut Innovation Pavilion at the summit, an area where attendees can meet state leaders, learn about public resources to grow their business, and enjoy unique experiences that make Connecticut a great place to live, work, and play.

    “Innovation doesn’t happen in isolation — it happens when we connect ideas, people, and resources,” Commissioner O’Keefe said. “Bringing together top minds at the Yale Innovation Summit and creating spaces like the Connecticut Innovation Pavilion is how we power an ecosystem that makes bold opportunities possible for businesses and communities alike.”

    “Connecticut’s innovation economy is stronger when we bring the full weight of the state’s leadership, business community, and entrepreneurial energy to the table,” Josh Geballe, managing director of Yale Ventures, said. “We are excited to kick off this year’s summit with the Innovation MADE event and celebrate the collaboration fueling Connecticut’s next chapter of growth.”

    Space is limited and registration is required. Attendees can register online by visiting connecticut-made.com or through the Innovation MADE Eventbrite page.

     

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI: TSplus International Meeting 2025 Took Place in Bali

    Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

    LYON, France, April 30, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — From April 14–18, TSplus hosted its annual International Meeting in Bali, Indonesia—bringing together more than 100 collaborators and their families from around the world. This major event combined celebration and strategy, reinforcing TSplus’ commitment to rewarding its teams while shaping the path forward as a leading global provider of remote access and cybersecurity solutions.

    Set in a stunning tropical location, this annual gathering serves to strengthen the group’s collective identity as a forward-looking, people-centered tech company.

    The international meeting offered a balance of professional exchanges, cultural discovery, and team-building activities—reflecting the company’s core values of innovation, accessibility, and international collaboration.

    Founder Dominique Benoit opened the event with a strong message: “Let’s be proud of what we are and what we’ve achieved together.” He emphasized the strength of TSplus’ product portfolio, trusted by hundreds of thousands of users worldwide, and the long-term relevance of its focus on applications and cloud delivery solutions in an ever-growing market.

    A Milestone of Unity, Vision and Growth

    Strategic presentations throughout the week highlighted ongoing progress and upcoming priorities. Key themes included expanding presence in high-potential markets such as Japan and Canada, growing customer and partner ecosystems, and improving global brand consistency.

    TSplus also continues to evolve its product and licensing offerings to meet modern IT demands. While permanent licenses remain available, a new subscription-based licensing option will soon be introduced across the entire product line—adding flexibility for customers and partners alike. More details will be shared in an upcoming release around the official launch date in May.

    In line with its mission to make remote support more accessible, TSplus also announced the upcoming release of a simplified, affordable solution designed specifically for individuals—aiming to reach a broader user base with a lightweight, user-friendly approach.

    International Sales Director François Stoop shared a dynamic global expansion strategy focused on both mature and emerging markets, supported by a strong partner network and enhanced training tools like the TSplus Academy.

    Sales and Marketing strategies are being sharpened, with efforts to better align messaging, unify the company’s visual identity, and improve internal communication across regions. Collaborative sessions during the event generated valuable insights to support these goals.

    Marketing and Product leaders showcased the impact of new tools—AI-generated content, improved product videos, and redesigned documentation—all contributing to a stronger, more unified brand presence.

    More than just a strategic summit, the 2025 International Meeting demonstrated TSplus’ strength as a global organization driven by shared values, mutual trust, and long-term vision.

    IT professionals interested in joining TSplus’ growing network of partners can explore the benefits of collaboration at www.tsplus.net/partners.
    All TSplus software is available for free trial download on the website: https://tsplus.net/download/

    About TSplus:

    TSplus is a global software company specializing in secure remote access, application delivery, and IT management solutions. With a presence in over 140 countries and more than 500,000 deployments worldwide, TSplus helps businesses of all sizes enable flexible, cost-effective, and secure digital work environments. Its suite of products—including Remote Access, Remote Support, Advanced Security, Server Monitoring —offers a comprehensive, user-friendly alternative to complex and expensive solutions. TSplus is committed to innovation, customer success, and making remote work technology accessible to everyone.

    Press Contact:

    Caleb Zaharris

    Marketing Director for TSplus

    Caleb.zaharris@tsplus.net

    Photos accompanying this announcement are available at: 
    https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/90bd50c7-fdbf-458f-bf14-676617ebc5ce
    https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/dafa60e5-ec43-4f7b-a1e0-3daa1e3f4b9e
    https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/16c4596c-f924-4705-b846-aa89282917fc
    https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/73fbbe29-e5fa-4cdd-bc71-b8a3d37bc96b

    The MIL Network –

  • MIL-OSI Global: People with neoliberal views are less likely to support climate-friendly policies – new research

    Source: The Conversation – UK – By Felix Schulz, Research Fellow, Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies, Lund University

    Sambulov Yevgeniy/Shutterstock

    Donald Trump won the US election on a campaign that included rolling back environmental laws. In the UK, Conservative party leader Kemi Badenoch has called the national net zero target “impossible”. And former prime minister Tony Blair has said the current approach of phasing out fossil fuels is “doomed to fail”.

    Meanwhile in Germany, the parties in the most likely incoming coalition government hardly engaged with climate policy during the recent election campaign – and the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), which openly denies human-made climate change, received 20% of the vote.

    With political leaders around the world moving away from progressive climate policy, it’s worth asking: is this what the public wants?

    When it comes to the climate, what people think is influenced by where they live and what else they believe in. In recently published research, we sought to find out just how much people’s ideologies affected their views on climate policy.

    We surveyed representative samples of the public in six countries about their attitudes towards different types of climate policy. We asked about support for regulation (for example, building and vehicle standards or product bans), taxes (like carbon taxes), subsidies (to promote low-carbon alternatives), and information-based policies (such as emission disclosure requirements). Our survey covered policies in transport, housing, energy and industry.

    We also asked respondents about their ideologies: cultural worldviews, personal values, free market beliefs and political trust. Our findings reveal how people’s ideologies shape their support for climate policies.

    We included three high-income countries of the global north (the US, UK and Germany) and three upper-middle income countries from the global south (Brazil, South Africa and China). Together, these six countries are responsible for half of global CO₂ emissions.

    Our definition of global south, which includes countries such as China, is based on work by UN Trade and Development and the UN G-77 countries. It includes Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, most of Asia (excluding Israel, Japan and South Korea) and Oceania (excluding Australia and New Zealand). These countries generally have lower per capita income and are considered “developing” compared to global north countries.

    This comparison is important because, as we will explain, political and economic ideologies that originated in the global north can influence how people view climate policies.

    Across all policy types, we found more support for climate policies in the global south countries. In the global north countries, we found only minority support for regulatory policies and climate-related taxes. In Germany, support for regulatory policies and taxes was as little as 18%.

    Subsidies for the four sectors – for example, to support renewable energy projects or the production of green steel – received 35% support in Germany and 48% in the US. In contrast, the majority of the public in the three countries of the global south supported subsidies and regulatory climate policies.

    As with subsidies, we found strong majority support for information-based policies in the three countries of the global south (74-79%), against only minority support in Germany (36%) and the US (49%). In the UK, 53% supported information-based climate policies.

    Personal values play a role in support for the policies. Our findings show people with stronger biospheric values – the importance people place on the environment and the relationship between humans and nature – are more supportive of climate policies. This is true irrespective of the country they live in. People who are more trusting of political institutions and politicians also support these policies more.

    But demographics such as age, gender, education or income have a negligible effect on attitudes towards these policies, when accounting for other factors in our analysis.

    Neoliberalism and the climate

    We observed a strong link between a neoliberal worldview and lack of support for the climate policies in our study. As a political economic project, neoliberalism originated in the global north. But it continues to take root in the global south, particularly in Latin America.

    The belief that individuals need to take care of themselves and are responsible for their own fortune and problems was associated with less support for climate policies. And in every country we studied, we found a strong relationship between support for the free market and lack of support for climate policies.

    People who believe the free market is best at allocating outcomes efficiently and meeting human needs without government interference, and that it is more important than some local environmental concerns, show less support for the climate policies.

    These two sets of beliefs – individualistic worldviews and support for the free market – are the core principles of neoliberal thought.

    In the Global North countries, we found only only minority support for regulatory policies and climate-related taxes.
    Fotogrin/Shutterstock

    The superiority of the market over governments as an efficient and fair allocation machine has been the mantra of neoliberal politicians, thinktanks and institutions for more than half a century.

    Neoliberalism opposes government regulation and spending, and supports the free market. It also fosters an individualistic worldview. Instead of seeing themselves as workers, citizens or members of a collective, people are persuaded to internalise market logic – to see themselves as individuals who are out to maximise their personal profit.

    The cultural shift from more communitarian and egalitarian ideals towards an ideology based on the self-driven individual and the free market has been quite successful. Empirical evidence from 41 countries shows that individualist practices and values around the world have surged significantly over the past 50 years.

    We know from research that what the public thinks (or votes for) does influence what governments do. This is true even when accounting for the influence of powerful interest groups.

    So, those creating and campaigning for urgently needed climate policies need to take this into account. Support for climate policies isn’t just about whether someone believes in human-made climate change or cares about the planet – there are deeply-rooted ideological factors at play too.

    Felix Schulz receives funding from Formas, a Swedish research council for sustainable development and the Hans-Böckler-Foundation.

    Christian Bretter does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

    – ref. People with neoliberal views are less likely to support climate-friendly policies – new research – https://theconversation.com/people-with-neoliberal-views-are-less-likely-to-support-climate-friendly-policies-new-research-253478

    MIL OSI – Global Reports –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Congressman Morgan McGarvey Introduces American Sovereign Wealth Fund Exploration Act of 2025

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Morgan McGarvey (Kentucky-03)

    April 30, 2025

    Congressman Morgan McGarvey (KY-03) introduced the American Sovereign Wealth Fund Exploration Act of 2025 today, which would create a 25-member commission to study and report on the “feasibility, considerations, limitations, and implications of creating and operating a sovereign wealth fund of the United States.” To provide independence, the commission would be hosted by the Federal Reserve and be composed of members from the Federal Reserve System, Treasury Department, Securities and Exchange Commission, Commerce Department, U.S. Trade Representative, and academics and experts.

    Last year, Congressman McGarvey introduced a similar bill, which was the first legislation ever introduced in Congress explicitly researching the feasibility of an American sovereign wealth fund.

    “To solve today’s problems, we must be bold. An American sovereign wealth fund, with proper congressional authorization and oversight and political independence, could dramatically improve the lives of working families across our country, including helping fund universal child care, an expanded Child Tax Credit, or even universal health care,” said Congressman McGarvey. “If we are going to do this, we have to do it right – and we have to do it through Congress. We must ensure a sovereign wealth fund is used to help working families and is not just a slush fund for billionaires.”

    BACKGROUND:

    General

    • The American Sovereign Wealth Fund Exploration Act of 2025 is built on the premise that a sovereign wealth fund (SWF) is neither good nor bad, it’s a tool.

    • The bill prioritizes objective analysis, political independence, and strong ethics requirements, including requiring the 25-member commission to consult the Santiago Principles – best practices for open, ethical, and transparent SWFs – when drafting their report.

    • The commission would have two years to develop a report to Congress on their findings and recommendations for legislative action.

    • To provide independence, the bill explicitly requires that the commission is housed within the independent Federal Reserve System.

    The McGarvey Commission

    The bill creates a 25-person commission comprising of:

    • 6 representatives from the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System or a Federal reserve bank.

    • 3 representatives from the Department of the Treasury.

    • 3 representatives from the Securities and Exchange Commission.

    • 2 representatives from the Department of Commerce.

    • 1 representative from the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

    • 10 representatives from academia or experts in the fields of economics, monetary policy, fiscal policy, investment policy, industrial policy, or other aspects involving sovereign wealth funds, appointed by the Chair of the Federal Reserve.

    Sovereign Wealth Funds in Other Developed Nations

    According to the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds, over $9 trillion in assets are managed by over 100 SWFs globally, such as: 

    State-Level Funds in the U.S.

    According to the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute, 14 U.S. states have SWFs:

    ###

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Congressman Morgan McGarvey Cosponsors Legislation to Promote Public Trust

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congressman Morgan McGarvey (Kentucky-03)

    April 30, 2025

    Today, Congressman Morgan McGarvery (KY-03) cosponsored legislation to promote public trust in Congress by banning Members from trading or owning individual stocks. 

    “Public trust is essential to our work as elected officials. I am proud to cosponsor the Bipartisan Restoring Faith in Government Act and TRUST in Congress Act to ban Members of Congress from trading or owning individual stocks,” said Congressman McGarvey. “Since my time in the Kentucky state Senate, my wife and I have had an explicit agreement with our financial advisor that we will not direct, approve, or even have knowledge of any stock purchase or sale – effectively creating a blind trust for our retirement accounts and kids’ college funds. But after coming to Washington at a time of historically low trust in Congress, we decided to divest from all individual stocks before the end of my first term in Congress. We no longer own any individual stocks.”

    H.R.253 – Bipartisan Restoring Faith in Government Act would prohibit members of Congress, their spouses, and dependents from owning or trading individual stocks. H.R.396 – TRUST in Congress Act would require a Member of Congress, as well as any spouse or dependent child of a Member, to place specified investments into a qualified blind trust (i.e., an arrangement in which certain financial holdings are placed in someone else’s control to avoid a possible conflict of interest) until 180 days after the end of their tenure as a Member of Congress. 

    MIL OSI USA News –

  • MIL-OSI USA: Statement on Mohsen Mahdawi’s Release

    Source: United States House of Representatives – Congresswoman Becca Balint (VT-AL)

    Washington , D.C.— The Vermont Congressional Delegation, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Senator Peter Welch (D-Vt.), and U.S. Representative Becca Balint (D-VT-At Large) today issued the following statement in reaction to Judge Geoffrey Crawford ordering the release of Mohsen Mahdawi, who was illegally detained by the Trump Administration:  

    “We are relieved that Mohsen Mahdawi was released on bail from ICE detention in Vermont, and that the constitutional right to due process has prevailed. Mohsen Mahdawi is here in the United States legally and acted legally. He should never have experienced this grave injustice,” said Sanders, Welch, and Balint. “The Trump Administration’s actions in this case—and in so many other cases of wrongfully detained, deported, and disappeared people—are shameful and immoral. This is an important first step. We will continue the fight against President Trump’s assault on the rule of law.” 

    Last night, Rep. Becca Balint led a rally at the State Department to demand Mohsen’s release and highlight the unjust abductions across the country. Rep. Balint was joined by Senators Sanders and Welch and others demanding due process for all, ahead of Mohsen’s Wednesday scheduled hearing. Earlier this month, in response to his arrest, Rep. Balint and 67 other House Democrats demanded to know the Administration’s alleged reason for his arrest from Secretaries Rubio and Noem and received no response. 

    Rep. Balint continued, releasing the following statement in reaction to Mahdawi’s release on bail: 

    “Today’s news shows us what we can do when we fight for justice, when we come together and use our voices. Mohsen should have never been detained in the first place. And we won’t let the Trump Administration continue to detain and kidnap people off our streets in our name. The fight doesn’t end here. I want Americans to understand that if the Trump Administration can come for one of us, they will come for all of us,” said Rep. Balint. 

    Link to the livestream of the event here. 

    Photos are linked here. 

    MIL OSI USA News –