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Ronna McDaniel's challenger for RNC chair says after unsuccessful leaders 'typically move on'

January 5, 2023 Published by

Ronna McDaniel has served three terms as chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, but a rising conservative figure believes it’s time for new leadership.

Harmeet Dhillon, a civil rights attorney and national committeewoman for the RNC, is challenging McDaniel after a string of GOP losses in the 2020 presidential election and 2022 midterm elections. 

“I think we really need to focus on our party where we’re all working in the party together. This is not personal. I have no personal issue with Ronna,” Dhillon tells Fox Digital. 

McDaniel would become the one of the longest serving RNC chairs in over 100 years if she were elected to a fourth term. Since her announcement, roughly 73% of GOP voters want the RNC to move on from McDaniel, according to a December poll by the Convention of States Action.

RNC CHAIR RONNA MCDANIEL SAYS HER SUPPORT IS ‘PRETTY SOLID’ AS SHE FACES CHALLENGERS IN RE-ELECTION BID

“You’re the head of an organization and the job of the organization is to elect Republicans and you don’t elect Republicans… normally people do step down and move on.”

— Harmeet Dhillon

After losing the White House and missing what some Republicans predicted would be a “red wave” in the midterms, a chorus of conservative voters are asking what went wrong within the RNC.

Attorney Harmeet Dhillon California's national committeewoman for the Republican National Committee poses for a photograph at her office in San Francisco, Calif., on Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2017. (Anda Chu/Bay Area News Group) (Photo by MediaNews Group/Bay Area News via Getty Images)

Attorney Harmeet Dhillon California’s national committeewoman for the Republican National Committee poses for a photograph at her office in San Francisco, Calif., on Wednesday, Sept. 20, 2017. (Anda Chu/Bay Area News Group) (Photo by MediaNews Group/Bay Area News via Getty Images)
(Anda Chu/MediaNews Group/Bay Area News via Getty Images)

“We don’t have the White House now, we don’t have the presidency. So, you know, we are effectively the leaders of the party,” said Dhillon. “If we’re not clearly articulating what our message is, why voters should vote for us, then we are losing. And in fact, we are always playing catch up with the Democrats.”

RNC NAMES MILWAUKEE AS 2024 GOP CONVENTION HOST CITY

The RNC raised over $327 million and spent about $391 million in the 2021-2022 election cycle. 

Despite calls for changes in leadership at the RNC, McDaniel says she has instituted several changes that has enhanced the party’s outreach.

“I think I have provided a lot of change under my leadership,” McDaniel told Fox Business’ Stuart Varney in December. “I’m always open to new ideas and ways to move forward.”

Republicans spent nearly twice as much money as Democrats on fundraising efforts during the 2022 midterm elections, according to Open Secrets. But Democrats outspent the GOP by more than $100 million in media while Republicans spent $93.4 million on campaign strategy and communications consulting.

“We pay hundreds of thousands of dollars this year to messaging consultants who are not providing good messaging,” said Dhillon. “We have our small dollar donor program, which I think is sometimes…quite abusive to our donors. They’re kind of harassing messages. I think we need to really change our tone and welcome people back into the party.”

Republican National Committee Chairwoman, Ronna McDaniel, gavels the call-to-order at the opening of the first day of the Republican National Convention Monday, Aug. 24, 2020, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

Republican National Committee Chairwoman, Ronna McDaniel, gavels the call-to-order at the opening of the first day of the Republican National Convention Monday, Aug. 24, 2020, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

Critics of McDaniel argue November’s midterm losses and the current fight over who will lead the RNC reveal deeper issues about the ambitions of the party’s leadership. 

“I trust most of the members of the RNC to vote not in their self-interest, but rather in the interest of the party,” said Dhillon. “Ronna has a large staff at the RNC that she’s using in this campaign. I think that’s somewhat questionable, but she is doing that.”

The candidacy of Dhillon and McDaniel is problematic for former President Trump. Dhillon played a key role in the former president’s legal feuds with the January 6th committee. But Trump hand-picked McDaniel to be his RNC chair in 2017. Trump says that he likes both candidates and is declining to endorse either. 

“I don’t think anybody can doubt my integrity,” said Dhillon, about whether her relationship with the former president would impact her decisions as RNC chair — which has bylaws that require an even playing field in the 2024 presidential primary. 

“The idea that I’m ‘in somebody’s pocket’ because I represent them on a separation of powers matter involved in…I think that’s also kind of a crude type of analysis.” 

— Harmeet Dhillon

Dhillon denies that she is leaning on her relationship with Trump trying to win the chair. She says she plans to better deliver the party’s message on social issues like abortion and not rely heavily on consultants while boosting small dollar donations.

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While McDaniel has sought to claim success in broadening the party’s appeal to minority voters, Dhillon says the RNC chairwoman must bare responsibility for Republicans’ failure to win the Senate and have an even larger House Majority. 

“Life is unfair in many ways. However, when you have successive losses, be it and a sports team or being in a corporation or being as a leader of the party too, people typically move on.”

Lacey Christ is a producer with “Fox News @ Night.”

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Back to work not business as usual for Damar Hamlin’s peers

January 5, 2023 Published by

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Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow speaks with the media, Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2023, in Cincinnati. Damar Hamlin was taken to the hospital after collapsing on the field during the Bill’s NFL football game against the Cincinnati Bengals on Monday night. (Kareem Elgazzar/The Cincinnati Enquirer via AP)

Football fans held vigils outside of the hospital that is treating Damar Hamlin, and outside of the Buffalo Bills home stadium. Hamlin was listed in critical condition in Cincinnati after he had a cardiac arrest during Monday night’s NFL game. (Jan. 4)

For Damar Hamlin’s teammates, peers and everyone in the NFL community, going back to work is not business as usual.

Players returned to practice with heavy hearts on Wednesday, two days after Hamlin went into cardiac arrest and needed to be resuscitated on the field during Buffalo’s game at Cincinnati.

Hamlin, the 24-year-old Bills safety, remains hospitalized in critical condition, but his teammates are set to play the Patriots on Sunday, and all games for Week 18 remain on schedule.

Some players across the league have expressed concern about playing this weekend because they’re still processing what happened to Hamlin. Many were in tears watching him receive medical attention on the field. They’re praying for his recovery and are dealing with emotions they’ve never experienced playing a sport.

“I’m sure if you polled the locker room there would be mixed votes on that,” Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow said about playing against the Baltimore Ravens on Sunday. “Personally, I think playing is going to be tough. But there’s people that want to play, and there’s people that don’t. Personally, I probably want to play. I think getting back to as normal as you can as fast as you can is how I deal with these kind of things. But like I said, everybody has a different way of dealing with it.”

Hub peek embed (NFL) – Compressed layout (automatic embed)

The league and the NFL Players Association have shared with teams, players and coaches the mental health-related resources available to them. Each team has a licensed behavioral health clinician on staff, as well as a pain management specialist.

The players’ union makes a directory available to all players to help them locate a clinician near them, be it a psychiatrist, psychologist, social worker or counselor.

“I think it is certainly key that we acknowledge how great a strain this places on everyone involved,” said the NFL’s chief medical officer, Dr. Allen Sills. “Certainly, the teams, the medical care providers, the staffs — and this is not just for Buffalo and Cincinnati — but across all our teams. … We have resources at each of our clubs, and we’ve emphasized preparation in this way. Our clubs have deployed those resources with their counselors and their mental health professionals. And that support extends throughout the entire NFL family, and it will be an ongoing need. This is something that will continue and it’s something we will continue to emphasize.”

The Bills held team meetings and a walkthrough practice without any media availability on Wednesday. They are scheduled to resume practice on Thursday, with coach Sean McDermott and some players expected to speak to reporters.

Philadelphia Eagles defensive tackle Fletcher Cox said he couldn’t play this weekend if Hamlin was his teammate.

“That’s too hard, man,” Cox said. “You think about this game, you think about all the guys that were right there when it happened. You always think about those guys. What’s going through their mind. You know that those guys are going through it. Everybody that was right there seeing what was going on, they’re going through it.”

Cleveland Browns cornerback Greg Newsome II said it will be challenging to play the season finale in Pittsburgh — Hamlin grew up in the area — given the extraordinary circumstances.

“It’s definitely going to be tough to finish out this last game and just go on the field knowing that there’s somebody out there that is in a life-or-death situation,” Newsome said before practice Wednesday. “It’s definitely going to be very tough and hopefully that’s why we got our guys around us and we can all talk through it and things like that, but it’ll for sure be tough.”

The New Orleans Saints had the team psychologist present when they gathered for a meeting Wednesday.

“It’s OK to admit if you need a little help,” coach Dennis Allen said.

Allen experienced firsthand the death of a teammate. He was a safety at Texas A&M in 1991 when kicker James Glenn died of heart failure on the field while warming up for practice.

“It still sticks with you to this day. Any time you have somebody that’s, especially a young guy, that in every other sense, you expect is fully healthy, and to see something like that happen, it’s hard to deal with,” Allen said. “I know what kind of effect it had on our team. So, I can only imagine the guys that were on the field at that point in time, how that emotionally affects them.”

Ready or not, the Bills, Bengals and 30 other NFL teams are returning to the field this week. Players must be mentally prepared for action in a sport that requires full attention.

“You can’t compartmentalize it,” Green Bay Packers wide receiver Randall Cobb said. “That was really tough to watch. It was really difficult to see. … You always prepare your mind for how physical and how violent of a game it is. It’s a tough sport we play, but I never thought I would see or witness anything like that. I can’t help but just think about him and his family and hope that they are holding up well and pray that he comes out on the other side of it and comes back and is in full health.”

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AP Sports Writers Brett Martel, Tom Withers, Steve Megargee, Dan Gelston and Mitch Stacy contributed to this report.

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Follow Rob Maaddi on Twitter at https://twitter.com/robmaaddi

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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/nfl and https://twitter.com/AP_NFL

 

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Edward Norton discovers real-life Pocahontas is his 12th great-grandmother

January 5, 2023 Published by



CNN
 — 

American actor Edward Norton has discovered that the real-life Pocahontas, the romanticized and mythologized 17th century daughter of a Native American chief, is his 12th great-grandmother.

The Oscar-nominated star learned of his family connection to the woman who married Virginia settler John Rolfe on Tuesday’s episode of the PBS genealogical history show “Finding Your Roots.”

Historian and host Henry Louis Gates Jr. confirmed the longstanding family rumor to be fact, telling Norton: “You have a direct paper trail, no doubt about it, connection to your 12th great-grandmother and great-grandfather, John Rolfe and Pocahontas.”

According to Gates, the couple married on April 5, 1614 in Jamestown, Virginia – at a time when William Shakespeare was still alive. He added that documents revealed that Pocahontas died three years later in Gravesend, England, while Rolfe died around March 1622.

Pocahontas married John Rolfe in 1614.

“It just makes you realize what a small … piece of the whole human story you are,” Norton remarked following the revelation.

Pocahontas welcomed English settlers to the current-day US in the early 17th century. Legend holds that she saved the life of Captain John Smith, stopping his execution by laying her head upon his.

The show, which traces the ancestral histories of celebrities, also uncovered that Norton’s third great-grandfather, John Winstead, owned a family of slaves including a 55-year-old man, a 37-year-old woman and five young girls, aged 4, 6, 8, 9 and 10.

Norton, 53, who said he had researched his own ancestry before his appearance on “Finding Your Roots,” expressed that that part of history didn’t sit well with him.

Asked what it was like to see a census that confirmed his relative was a slave owner, the “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” and “Fight Club” actor, said: “The short answer is these things are uncomfortable. And you should be uncomfortable with them.”

“It’s not a judgment on you in your own life but it’s a judgment on the history of this country and it needs to be acknowledged first and foremost and then it needs to be contended with.”

Norton went on to say that he personalized the details of the census and “when you read ‘slave aged eight,’ you just want to die.”

The first episode of the show’s ninth season also delved into “Pretty Woman” actor Julia Roberts’ lineage.

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Biden and McConnell’s visit to Kentucky signals White House roadmap for next 2 years under split Congress

January 5, 2023 Published by

The rare joint appearance in Covington, Ky., represented an early effort to signal the White House’s eagerness for cooperation ahead of a politically combative next two years.

It was also an attempt at political inoculation. The White House specifically invited McConnell along with other senators and governors from Kentucky and Ohio, and used the event as a chance for Biden to highlight the $1.6 billion slated to rebuild a bridge between the two states as a bipartisan success story.

Biden aides and allies say they’re counting on the minority leader to remain something of a bulwark against the GOP’s riskier impulses — hammered home this week by chaos on the House floor over the election of a new speaker. The White House recognizes the need to avoid a government shutdown, keep aid to Ukraine flowing and stave off a catastrophic breach of the debt ceiling. They see McConnell as key to all those items.

“There’s still going to be strong partisan differences on a large majority of issues,” said an adviser to the White House. “But they both understand that when you can agree, you should if it’s in the best interest of the country and it serves your political purpose.”

Speaking to a crowd along the Ohio River, McConnell called the infrastructure law a “legislative miracle.” And though he declined to address Biden by name, the Republican praised the effort to find common ground “no matter who gets elected.”

“The country needs to see examples like this of coming together and getting an outcome,” he said.

Biden was far more direct.

“Mitch, it’s great to be with you,” he said, joking that he’d “asked permission” to compliment McConnell. “I said I’d campaign for him or against them — whichever would help him the most.” But the president quickly noted: “When he gives you his word you can take it to the bank, you can count on it.”

The Biden-McConnell relationship is, to a degree, an anachronism. The two men served for decades together in the Senate. And they have a history of cutting deals dating back to the Obama era, when they reached agreements on extending the Bush tax cuts, lifting the debt ceiling and the so-called fiscal cliff, which averted an economic meltdown. Biden, as vice president, appeared at the McConnell Center in Louisville in 2011, where he lavished praise on the senator at a time when the Kentucky Republican was openly trying to dislodge his boss from power. Four years later, McConnell was the lone Republican to attend the funeral for Biden’s son, Beau.

“They’ve known each other for decades,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), a close McConnell ally. “And Joe Biden is a hard guy not to like, even though you may disagree with him on policy.”

Since Biden was elected, aides to both men said, the two have maintained a working relationship as well as a shared belief that the Senate can still get things done. McConnell helped pass last Congress’ bipartisan infrastructure law and backed bills to boost semiconductor manufacturing and improve gun safety.

“His support, in my view, of the infrastructure bill itself was critically important to our being here today,” former GOP Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio, who led the legislation, said of McConnell, adding that the Republican leader had “showed political courage.”

Biden on occasion has gone so far as to refer to McConnell as a “friend,” and sought his advice in crafting U.S. policy toward Myanmar, an area in which the Republican leader maintains a deep interest. At one point last year, the White House planned to nominate an anti-abortion judge favored by McConnell to Kentucky’s district court — a scheme halted only after fellow Republican Sen. Rand Paul refused to sign off on what he called the “secret deal.”

The event was part of a broader administration blitz to promote Biden’s legislative accomplishments across the country and portray him as an enthusiastic cross-aisle collaborator. McConnell greeted Biden on his arrival in Kentucky and rode with him in the motorcade.

Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine and Democrats Sen. Sherrod Brown and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear were also among those in attendance.

Paul and newly sworn-in GOP Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio were also invited to appear with Biden on Wednesday, a White House official said, but opted against it.

For Biden and McConnell, the event came at a political crossroads for both men, with Biden having one eye on a likely reelection campaign and McConnell picking up the pieces of a failed effort by Republicans to win back control of the Senate.

It is a particularly opportune time for the administration, offering a split screen moment with House Republicans who spent a second day feuding over who they should pick to lead them. By highlighting the investment in McConnell’s state, officials are explicitly seeking to broaden Biden’s cross-aisle appeal with voters — and draw a clear contrast with the partisan hostility that the White House anticipates from the newly GOP-controlled House.

As he departed the White House on Wednesday morning, Biden told reporters the House speaker drama was “embarrassing” but “not my problem.”

“Biden is absolutely sending a message to the American people that there are people you can trust to govern,” the adviser to the White House said of the calculations behind the event. “And then there’s the House Republican caucus.”

But while McConnell’s appearance may represent the possibilities of bipartisanship over the next two years, the standoff in the House underscores the challenges facing Biden. As he prepares for a series of showdowns on critical issues like the federal budget, funding for Ukraine and the debt ceiling, there is little to suggest that the White House will have any luck moving legislation through a GOP-led House chamber.

Administration officials have sought to play up Biden’s record in reaching compromises — and make clear to McConnell and other deal-minded Republicans that they’re open to bipartisan coalitions aimed at finding even small areas of agreement.

“I think that will begin to reach people there: Look what bipartisanship looks like,” Brown said prior to the event. “This is a $1.6 billion investment. It took a new president and a new Senate to do it.”

Though McConnell has opposed much of Biden’s agenda, he’s resisted the most extreme demands of the GOP’s conservative base — including flatly rejecting the idea of impeachment.

Both Biden and McConnell allies, however, cautioned against reading too much into Wednesday’s joint appearance. There’s little expectation on either side that Biden and McConnell will immediately find a slew of other shared legislative goals. The Brent Spence Bridge event, they noted, serves to benefit their respective interests.

For McConnell, funding for the project will help break a lengthy impasse over how to pay for repairs to a critical roadway between Kentucky and Ohio — and deliver a win for a lawmaker who has reinforced his political power over decades by consistently delivering for his constituents.

“This is a bridge that has been a major national issue for 25 years, and my top transportation project for decades,” McConnell said in a brief interview Tuesday. “And it’s going to be fully funded by the infrastructure bill, which I supported.”

The White House, for its part, is using the occasion to kick off what’s likely to be an extended campaign to emphasize the impact of infrastructure legislation that aides believe most voters haven’t yet fully grasped. Biden advisers view that public relations effort as crucial to the president’s popularity ahead of an anticipated reelection bid, especially with his policy ambitions likely limited by the GOP blockade in the House.

“President Biden at the end of 2022 spoke to the country about how his most significant achievements of his first two years of his term were bipartisan achievements,” said Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), who added that Wednesday’s event with McConnell demonstrates the president “understands that we make our best progress as a country when we do it together.”

Burgess Everett contributed to this report.

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[World] Idaho suspect agrees to extradition to face murder charges – lots of questions remain

January 5, 2023 Published by

A lawyer for the suspect, Jason LaBar, told US media that Mr Kohberger’s father had flown to Idaho to drive back to Pennsylvania with him after his semester at Washington State University ended in December. He told NBC that he had spoken to the father about the cross-country drive. “Everything was ordinary, and he saw nothing unusual about it,” he said.

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Beijing threatens response to 'unacceptable' virus measures

January 5, 2023 Published by

BEIJING (AP) — The Chinese government sharply criticized COVID-19 testing requirements imposed on visitors from China and threatened countermeasures against countries involved, which include the U.S. and several European nations.

“We believe that the entry restrictions adopted by some countries targeting China lack scientific basis, and some excessive practices are even more unacceptable,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said at a daily briefing Tuesday.

“We are firmly opposed to attempts to manipulate the COVID measures for political purposes and will take countermeasures based on the principle of reciprocity,” she said. Mao did not specify what steps China might take.

The comments were China’s sharpest to date on the issue. Australia and Canada this week joined a growing list of countries requiring travelers from China to take a COVID-19 test prior to boarding their flight, as China battles a nationwide outbreak of the coronavirus after abruptly easing restrictions that were in place for much of the pandemic.

Other countries including the U.S., India, Japan, South Korea and several European nations have announced tougher COVID-19 measures on travelers from China amid concerns over a lack of data on infections in China and fears that new variants may emerge.

China has had some of the toughest entry requirements for people arriving from abroad. It is about to drop a mandatory five-day quarantine for all arrivals but will still require a negative COVID-19 test within 48 hours of the flight.

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said “there’s no cause for retaliation” by Beijing for countries “taking prudent health measures to protect their citizens” with COVID-related restrictions on travelers coming from China. She added that restrictions were “based on public health and science.”

“This is something that all of us, (and) other countries are doing to make sure that we are protecting our citizens here,” Jean-Pierre said.

French Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne defended the tests. Starting Wednesday, anyone flying from China to France will have to present a negative virus test taken within the previous 48 hours and be subject to random testing on arrival.

“We are in our role, my government is in its role, protecting the French,” Borne said Tuesday on France-Info radio.

The U.K. will require that passengers from China take a COVID test before boarding the plane from Thursday. Transport Secretary Mark Harper said the requirement is for “collecting information” because Beijing isn’t sharing coronavirus data.

Health officials will test a sample of passengers when they arrive in the U.K., but no quarantine is required for those who test positive, he said.

“The policy for arrivals from China is primarily about collecting information that the Chinese government is not sharing with the international community,” Harper told the LBC radio station on Tuesday.

Sweden’s Public Health Agency said Tuesday that it had urged the government to require travelers from China to present a recent negative COVID-19 test.

The statement from the agency comes as Sweden, which has taken over EU’s rotating presidency, has called a meeting of the EU’s crisis management mechanism for Wednesday to try to agree on a common European line.

The Swedish government “is preparing to be able to introduce travel restrictions. At the same time, we are conducting a dialogue with our European colleagues to get the same rules as possible in the EU,” Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer said in a statement.

Austria, too, plans to test the wastewater of all planes arriving from China for new variants of the coronavirus, the Austria Press Agency reported Tuesday, following a similar announcement by Belgium a day earlier.

Chinese health officials said last week that they had submitted data to GISAID, a global platform for sharing coronavirus data.

The versions of the virus fueling infections in China “closely resemble” those that have been seen in different parts of the world between July and December, GISAID said Monday.

Dr. Gagandeep Kang, who studies viruses in the Christian Medical College of Vellore in India, said that the information from China, albeit limited, seemed to suggest that “the pattern was holding” and that there wasn’t any sign of a worrisome variant emerging.

Mi Feng, the spokesperson for China’s National Health Commission, said authorities have been open and transparent since the start of the pandemic three years ago. China held technical exchange meetings twice with the WHO last month on the overall situation, medical treatment, vaccination and other issues, he said Tuesday.

A senior Hong Kong official also criticized the steps taken by some other countries. Some have applied the requirements to passengers from Hong Kong and Macao, both semiautonomous Chinese territories, as well as mainland China.

Hong Kong Chief Secretary Eric Chan said in a Facebook post that the government had written to various consulates on Monday to express its concerns over the “unnecessary and inappropriate” rules.

Some experts have questioned the effectiveness of the testing. Kerry Bowman, assistant professor at the University of Toronto’s Temerty Faculty of Medicine, said that people can test positive long after entering the country.

The requirement is “not based on science at this point,” he said after Canada announced measures last weekend.

China, which for most of the pandemic adopted a “zero-COVID” strategy that imposed harsh restrictions aimed at stamping out the virus, abruptly eased those measures in December.

Chinese authorities previously said that from Jan. 8, overseas travelers would no longer need to quarantine upon arriving in China, paving the way for Chinese residents to travel.

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Associated Press writers John Leicester in Paris, Sylvia Hui in London, Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Kanis Leung in Hong Kong and Frank Jordans in Berlin contributed to this report.

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Walmart Makes a Green Move Some Customers Will Hate

January 5, 2023 Published by

If you ask a group of friends which big-box retailer is the most successful these days, most likely one (or a few) of them will say Amazon  (AMZN) – Get Free Report. 

Thanks to its Prime services and the advent of two-day and same-day shipping, Amazon is a ubiquitous presence in the lives of many.

But the folks who say that would be wrong because Walmart  (WMT) – Get Free Report has held the No. 1 spot in revenue for a very long time. Walmart’s 2021 revenue was more than twice what Amazon took in that year, per the National Retail Foundation.


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Apple supplier Luxshare rises after reportedly winning contract to produce luxury iPhones

January 5, 2023 Published by

US Top News and Analysis 

In this article

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The Apple iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Pro, and iPhone Pro Max on sale at the company’s Fifth Avenue store in New York, US, on Friday, Sept. 16, 2022. Photographer: Jeenah Moon/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Shares of Luxshare Precision Industry, one of Apple’s Chinese contract manufacturers, rose more than 3% in Asia’s trade after the Financial Times reported the supplier is set to sign a contract to produce premium iPhones.

The move comes after rival Foxconn halted production lines in Zhengzhou following protests over China’s stringent Covid measures over a month ago.

The Financial Times reported Luxshare has already produced “small amounts” of the iPhone 14 Pro Max since November to make up for Foxconn’s lost production.

Apple and Luxshare did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

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The rise in Luxshare’s Shenzhen-listed stock on Thursday comes after it dropped nearly 10% on Wednesday. That decline followed a Nikkei report that Apple asked multiple suppliers to build fewer components for its products – including AirPods, the Apple Watch and MacBooks for the first quarter due to weakened demand.

Risks around China have contributed to investor jitters around U.S. tech giants including Apple, which earlier this week fell under $2 trillion in market capitalization as its shares hit a 52-week low.

Luxshare was founded in 2004 and became an Apple supplier in 2011.

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Glassfrogs hide their blood to sleep in camouflage

January 5, 2023 Published by

Glassfrogs make themselves transparent while they rest by taking red blood cells from circulation and concealing them in their livers, research finds.

It’s easy to miss a glassfrog in its natural environment. The northern glassfrog, Hyalinobatrachium fleischmanni, measures no more than a few centimeters, and they are most active at night, when their green skin helps them blend in with the surrounding leaves and foliage.

But these amphibians become true masters of camouflage during the day when they’re asleep.

shapes of two frogs barely visible through leaf
Sleeping mated glassfrogs. (Credit: Duke)

“When glassfrogs are resting, their muscles and skin become transparent, and their bones, eyes, and internal organs are all that’s visible,” says Carlos Taboada, a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University and a co-first author of the paper. “These frogs sleep on the bottoms of large leaves, and when they’re transparent, they can perfectly match the colors of the vegetation.”

Many animals in the sea can change the color of their skin or become completely transparent, but it’s a far less common skillset on land. One reason transparency is so difficult to achieve is because of red blood cells in the circulatory system. Red blood cells are adept at absorbing green light, which is the color of light usually reflected by plants and other vegetation. In return, these oxygen-rich cells reflect red light, making blood—and by extension the circulatory system—highly visible, especially against a bright green leaf.

Glassfrogs are some of the only land-based vertebrates that can achieve transparency, which has made them a target for study. Taboada first began studying glass frogs as a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Sönke Johnsen, a professor of biology at Duke who specializes in studying transparency. Working with Jesse Delia, who traveled around the world collecting different glassfrogs for the study, they observed that red blood cells seemed to be disappearing from the circulating blood whenever the frogs became transparent.

They conducted additional imaging tests on the animals, proving via optical models that the animals were able to achieve transparency because they were pushing red blood cells out of their vessels. He suspected that the cells were being stored in one of the frog’s inner organs which are packaged in a reflective membrane. The finding appears in the journal Science.

For a see-through animal, its biology was shockingly challenging to decipher. The research drew on the expertise of biologists and biomedical engineers at Duke and at the American Museum of Natural History, Stanford University, and the University of Southern California.

“If these frogs are awake, stressed, or under anesthesia their circulatory system is full of red blood cells and they are opaque,” explains Delia, now a postdoctoral fellow at the American Museum of Natural History. “The only way to study transparency is if these animals are happily asleep, which is difficult to achieve in a research lab. We were really banging our heads against the wall for a solution.”

But Taboada had learned about an imaging technology called photoacoustic microscopy, or PAM, when he was studying biliverdin, the compound that gives certain species of frogs their signature green color. PAM involves shooting a safe laser beam of light into tissue, which is then absorbed by molecules and converted into ultrasonic waves. These sound waves are then used to make detailed biomedical images of the molecules. The imaging tool is non-invasive, quiet, sensitive, and, in a stroke of luck, available at Duke.

“PAM is the ideal tool for non-invasive imaging of red blood cells because you don’t need to inject contrast agents, which would be very difficult for these frogs,” explains Junjie Yao, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering at Duke who specializes in PAM technologies. “The red blood cells themselves provide the contrast, because different types of cells absorb and reflect different wavelengths of light. We could optimize our imaging systems to specifically look for red blood cells and track how much oxygen was circulating in the frog’s bodies.”

In their imaging set-up, the frogs slept upside down in a petri dish, similar to how they would sleep on a leaf, and the team shined a green laser at the animal. The red blood cells in the frog’s body absorbed the green light and emitted ultrasonic waves, which were then picked up by an acoustic sensor to trace their whereabouts, with high spatial resolution and high sensitivity.

The results were startlingly clear: When the frogs were asleep, they removed nearly 90% of their circulating red blood cells and stored them in their liver.

In further tests, the team also saw that red blood cells flowed out of the liver and circulated when the frogs were active, and then re-aggregated in the liver while the frogs were recovering.

“The primary result is that whenever glassfrogs want to be transparent, which is typically when they’re at rest and vulnerable to predation, they filter nearly all the red blood cells out of their blood and hide them in a mirror-coated liver—somehow avoiding creating a huge blood clot in the process,” says Johnsen. “Whenever the frogs need to become active again, they bring the cells back into the blood stream, which gives them the metabolic capacity to move around.”

According to Delia and Taboada, this process raises questions about how the frogs can safely store almost all their red blood cells in their liver without clotting or damaging their peripheral tissues.

One potential next step, they say, could be to study this mechanism and how it could one day apply to vascular issues in humans.

This work also introduces glassfrogs as a useful model for research, especially when paired with the state-of-the-art photoacoustic imaging. As long-time glassfrog researchers, they are excited about the new avenues of study now available to them and interested collaborators.

“We can learn more about the glassfrog’s physiology and behavior, or we can use these models to optimize imaging tools for biomedical engineering,” Delia says.

This work had support from National Geographic Society; the Human Frontier Science Program postdoctoral fellowship; the Gerstner Scholars Fellowship provided by the Gerstner Family Foundation and the Richard Gilder Graduate School at the American Museum of Natural History; start-up funds from Stanford University and start-up funds from Duke University; the National Institutes of Health; the National Science Foundation CAREER Award; the Duke Institute of Brain Science Incubator award; the American Heart Association Collaborative Sciences award; and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

Source: Duke University

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Democratic Sen. Stabenow of Michigan won’t run again in 2024

January 5, 2023 Published by

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Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., speaks outside the state Capitol in Lansing, Mich., Jan. 1, 2023. Stabenow announced on Jan. 5, she will not run for reelection in 2024. (AP Photo/Al Goldis, File)

LANSING, Mich. (AP) — Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a member of the Democratic leadership, announced Thursday that she will not run for a fifth term in 2024, opening up a seat in the key battleground state.

The news likely comes as a shock to many Democrats in the state because Stabenow had not previously indicated that she would not seek reelection.

“Inspired by a new generation of leaders, I have decided to pass the torch in the U.S. Senate. I am announcing today that I will not seek reelection and will leave the U.S. Senate at the end of my term on January 3, 2025,” Stabenow said in a statement.

Democrats will face a test to find a candidate with the broad support of Stabenow, first elected to the Senate in 2000. She has easily won reelection since then.

She joined the House in 1996. In 2000, she made history by becoming the first woman to be elected senator in Michigan, defeating a Republican incumbent. She turned back GOP challenges in 2006 and 2012 and defeated political newcomer John James, by 6.5 percentage points in 2018. James was elected to the House in November.

The 72-year-old Stabenow, of Lansing, is the longest-serving member of the state’s congressional delegation. She recently was elevated to chair of the Democratic Policy and Communications Committee, making her the No. 3 ranking party leader, and heads the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee.

Hub peek embed (2022Midtermelections) – Compressed layout (automatic embed)

Stabenow most recently has been involved in bipartisan legislation aimed at increasing oversight of cryptocurrencies. She has also led efforts to expand and increase funding for mental health care both nationally and in Michigan.

The announcement is expected to make Michigan’s 2024 Senate race one of the most competitive in the country.

While the current political climate in Michigan favors Democrats following a midterm election where they flipped the state House and Senate, the state is still expected to be one of the nation’s premier battlegrounds in the 2024 presidential election.

Only one Michigan Republican has held a seat in the Senate in the past 40 years.

The date of Michigan’s primary is yet to be finalized after the Democratic National Committee rule-making arm voted to move Michigan up in the party’s presidential primary calendar for 2024. If the full DNC approves the plan, as expected, Michigan would be the fifth state to vote in the primary process on Feb. 27.

The Republican National Committee has already set their primary schedule and Michigan is not in the first five states. If Michigan Republicans were to move their primary before March 1 to match the Democrat’s plan, they could be significantly penalized by the national Republican Party.

 

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