Open Newswire

Sheriff Bill Waybourn discussed how to protect America’s borders during a panel with Mercy Culture leaders.

(The Center Square) - Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs’ office is opposing a bill that seeks to prevent the distribution of child pornography and revenge porn, according to state Rep. Nick Kupper, R-Yuma, sponsor of House Bill 2133. The Center Square reached out to the Democratic governor for comment, but Hobbs and her staff did not respond before press time despite multiple requests this week for comment. Kupper told The Center Square that he anticipates House Democrats who originally supported his bill in the state House will switch their votes when representatives vote on the amended version on Monday. He added he thinks Hobbs will veto the bill and has been trying to persuade Democrats to reject his legislation so the governor can “argue it’s a partisan bill.” “ I think she's afraid of what it looks like to veto a bill that protects children from being in porn and protects nonconsensual adults from being in porn against their will,” he said. “[Hobbs] or her people think that if they can label it as a partisan bill that's anti-free speech, they can justify going against it.” Kupper said the bill does not violate free speech, noting child pornography and revenge porn are not protected speech. HB 2133, also known as the Protect Act, requires online commercial websites that publish or distribute sexual materials to receive age verification and consent from everyone involved in the material. The bill also requires commercial websites to use reasonable measures to stop the uploading of unverified sexual material, such as automated detection tools. Arizona’s state House passed the bill 41 to 16, with nine Democrats voting with Republicans in favor of the bill in February. The state Senate passed the amended bill 16-12 along party lines. Kupper told The Center Square this week that when the bill went to the Senate Judiciary Committee, numerous concerns were raised, including that it would block satire and impede record-keeping. He said he amended his bill to address these concerns. The Senate’s amended version of HB 2133 included a provision that says the law would not apply to digitally manipulated images or to images that are for parody, comedy, artistic expression or public criticism. Furthermore, the amended bill included a new provision for content created before 1988, which does not need to undergo the verification process. The reason this year was chosen is that it was when the federal government passed a law requiring the adult content industry to begin keeping records of age and consent. HB 2133 also now allows for data to be shared with federal, state and local governments. While Kupper was working on changes to his billl, he said someone from the governor's office reached out to him and started a conversation about the bill. He said the only concern raised was about the satire clause. Kupper said he sent the governor’s office the added language that exempted satire. A few days later, the state representative said Hobbs’ office got back to him, saying the added language to his bill did not fully address the office's concern. Kupper said he asked the governor’s office to send him the language it wants added to the bill. The governor’s office ended up sending him a strike-everything amendment that removed “every single word of [his] bill except for the title,” according to Kupper. “They wrote a completely different bill that did not do at all what my bill did,” he said. The state representative said he told the person from Hobbs' office that he worked with Meta, Google and the Free Speech Coalition on the bill. He added that it had a supermajority of votes in the state House. The woman who approached Kupper about running this bill said she was a victim of revenge porn. Uldouz Wallace, an actress, said she was a victim of the 2014 iCloud hack/leak, where she and more than 100 other celebrities, including Jennifer Lawrence, Kate Upton and Selena Gomez, had private images leaked online by hackers. Wallace told The Center Square that after this occurred, it “basically destroyed every part of [her] life.” Wallace said the hacker leaked private photos of her, which caused her “whole world” to come “crumbling down.” “Throughout that time, I experienced severe bullying, harassment, gang stalking and targeting, Wallace said. The actress added that a lot of the “bullying and harassing” came from other actresses and influencers. After her photos were leaked, Wallace said she remained silent for eight years. During this time, she said she asked adult websites to take down her nonconsensual content. According to Wallace, she spent millions of her own dollars attempting to have these websites take down the items. “I didn’t see any results from it; it was a bottomless pit, and it was never-ending. I was just wondering why nobody has done anything about this,” she said. Wallace told The Center Square that she quickly realized how much time was wasted attempting to take down these images, along with how much money and effort it took to remove the content from websites. She questioned why it was up to the “survivors” to have to take down all this content when “it should not have happened in the first place.” Wallace said she decided to share her story with the public and also try to change the law. She said she worked with federal lawmakers to come up with a federal bill to require platforms that host pornography to obtain verified consent from people uploading content or appearing in the content. It would also require these websites to remove nonconsensual images from their platforms. Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah, introduced the Protect Act of 2024. The bill was read twice on the Senate floor and referred to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary. Lee’s bill never made it to the Senate floor for a vote. Wallace also started a nonprofit called Foundation Ra, which “supports children, women and men that are victims of online image-based sexual abuse,” according to its website. At the state level, she has had the Protect Act introduced in California, Massachusetts, South Carolina and in the United Kingdom. Wallace also had the Protect Act introduced in the United Kingdom, where the House of Lords passed Amendment 300 last week. The actress also said she is working with the United Nations, Canada, the European Union and the African Union. “The real solution is prevention,” she said. Wallace called Kupper's HB 2133 an “easy common sense bill” because these online platforms already have the technology to prevent nonconsensual content from getting uploaded.

Cîgirê Serokê Amerîkayê JD Vance sibeya roja Yekşemê di konferanseke rojnamevanî de ragihand ku danûstandinên bi Îranê re bê rêkeftin bi dawî bûne, û piştrast kir ku ew vedigerin Amerîkayê bê ku rêkeftinek bi Îranê re çêkin. Vance, ku serokatiya şandeya Amerîkayê li Pakistanê dikir, got ku danûstandin 21 demjimêran dom kirin, lê "Îran nehate pêş ku mercên Amerîkayê qebûl bike." Wî di konferanseke rojnavanî ya kurt de got, hêjî "Tu rêkeftin nehat kirin", û tekez kir ku serederîya şandeya...

La Corte de Apelaciones de Concepción confirmó la prisión preventiva del “Titoté“, un conocido delincuente en Lota, formalizado por homicidio...

(The Center Square) – Candidates for various elected offices spoke Friday and Saturday about priorities regarding affordability, public safety and other statewide issues at the California Republican Convention in San Diego. The annual convention is being held this weekend at the Sheraton San Diego Resort. Party leadership and delegates were to continue discussions about races for governor, lieutenant governor, treasurer and other positions on Saturday night. Ahead of the meeting of delegates, some candidates spoke in scheduled sessions at the convention about their platforms or talked exclusively with The Center Square about their take on taxpayer issues. Steve Hilton The leading Republican candidate for governor, Hilton earned the endorsement President Donald Trump on Monday, which he spoke about to an audience at the convention on Friday. The former Fox host also spoke about some of his priorities if he were elected governor to an audience of Central Valley Republicans on Saturday morning. “Here’s what’s going to happen starting a few months from now,” Hilton said to the crowd. “The water will be flowing to our farmers. The oil will be flowing to our refineries. The forests will be managed.” Hilton, in response to a question from The Center Square on Friday, said he doesn’t see how a Democrat can win the governor’s race in November. “I don’t understand how a Democratic candidate has a chance of winning,” Hilton told The Center Square. “After 16 years of one-party rule that’s ending in the highest poverty rate in the country, the highest unemployment rate in all 50 states, the highest cost of living. After all of this, the Democrats are asking for another four years of one-party rule? No way. They don’t deserve another four minutes.” A recent University of California, Berkeley poll showed Hilton and fellow Republican gubernatorial candidate Chad Bianco, who's the Riverside County sheriff, ahead of all other candidates, Republican or Democrat, with 17% and 16% of the vote respectively. Campaign signs and merchandise for both candidates were seen at the convention. Gretha Solorzano Former businesswoman Gretha Solorzano, a Republican candidate for governor, told The Center Square in an exclusive interview on Friday that she’s focused on issues of affordability and solving California’s budget woes. The state faces a $35 billion a year budget deficit starting in fiscal year 2027-28, and the state’s total bond debt stands at $99 billion. Republican lawmakers in Sacramento have said that California doesn’t have a revenue problem, but a spending problem. But Solorzano believes that the state has problems on both fronts. She said she wants to see the billions of dollars the state spends importing oil into the state pay for development of the oil industry instead. “We are in a deficit because companies are leaving, 40% of our taxes are paid by the 1% of the population, so we are creating this environment in which wealth is leaving California,” Solorzano told The Center Square. “How about we invest instead of shutting down our refineries and shutting down our wealth, how about actually using some of that money and invest it right here in California?” Solorzano said she would invest money the state collects in oil revenue to help spur job creation in the oil industry and manufacturing, which she wants to see come back to the state. Solorzano also wants to use state money to pay for development of the state’s water infrastructure, similar to Democratic Sen. Anna Caballero’s 2025 bill, Senate Bill 72, which aims to develop 9 billion new acre-feet of water by 2040. “Look what that would do to our economy,” Solorzano said. “Housing prices would come down and food prices would come down. It would continue to sustain jobs in California.” Caballero told The Center Square in recent weeks that she envisions that bonds would pay for the development of additional water infrastructure. But Solorzano emphatically doesn’t believe the state needs to go into additional bond debt to pay for water infrastructure development. “No, no, absolutely not,” Solorzano said when told Caballero wants to pay for SB 72 with bonds. “We have plenty of money. We need to bring revenues back to California and use our money.” Unlike her rivals in the governor’s race, Solorzano did not know what Proposition 36 was. Prop. 36 was passed by California voters in 2024 and elevated certain drug-related and theft crimes from misdemeanors to felonies. The ballot measure passed by 68.4% of the vote statewide in November 2024. Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom opposed the measure and allocated no new funding to enforcing Prop. 36 in his 2026-27 budget. When asked if she would allocate money to enforcing Prop. 36, Solorzano asked for more information about what Prop. 36 was. “I think I would need to read more about it before I answered that,” Solorzano said. Rep. Jay Obernolte U.S. Rep. Jay Obernolte, R-Hesperia, spoke to a room full of Republicans from California’s Central Valley on Saturday morning, saying that a challenge Republicans in Congress face now is narrow margins by which to pass legislation. Obernolte noted the Republican-Democratic margin in Washington is still 218-214. Three of the 435 seats are vacant. That means Republicans can pass legislation even if one Republican votes with Democrats - assuming the Democrats vote together. All 435 seats will be voted on during the Nov. 3 midterm election. David Serpa Serpa, a candidate for state treasurer, told The Center Square on Saturday morning in an exclusive interview that he is concerned about fraudulent or wasteful spending in the state’s budget. Serpa adopted the California Republican party’s oft-quoted phrase, “California doesn’t have a revenue problem. It has a spending problem.” “They’re not doing anything well, yet they keep increasing their budget without any sort of accountability,” Serpa said. The California Air Resources Board and programs and regulations instituted under the California Environmental Quality Act would be two of the first things Serpa would cut if he were elected to State Treasurer, he said. “We already have federal oversight and federal regulations,” Serpa said. “Why do we need more state oversight and regulations, and why do we need county oversight and regulations on top of that?” He also wants to develop the state’s oil industry, and looks on the continual shutting down of the state’s remaining oil refineries as an economic harm to the state. Regulations that limit drilling don’t just drive oil refineries out of the state, but also increase gas prices for the Golden State’s drivers. “We have deep oil reserves, some of the deepest oil reserves in the world, yet we’re paying the most for gasoline,” Serpa said. “We’ve been shutting down oil refineries, we’ve been shutting down nuclear power plants, and we can’t be surprised when we’ve got $6 gas and no one can afford their energy bill.” If he wins the election, Serpa said he wants to lower gas prices by allowing private businesses the chance to solve the problem he says government created by instituting too many regulations. Tony Strickland State Sen. Tony Strickland, R-Huntington Beach, also told The Center Square on Saturday afternoon that while he sees California has a spending problem, not a revenue problem, there are certain programs he would like to cut to reduce government spending besides cutting waste and fraud. “There’s going to be some programs I can definitely cut,” Strickland told The Center Square. “High-speed rail is at the top of the list. Health care to undocumented immigrants. BART, because that should be a local thing that is done.” BART - the San Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit District - received a $590 million loan in legislation signed by Newsom, a former San Francisco mayor. Strickland also said he would like to see more concrete measures of success or failure in homelessness spending, which he would also cut. According to the U.S. Department of Justice and news reports, millions of dollars were fraudulently spent on homelessness programs in California. One case involved a man who was accused of obtaining $23 million of taxpayer money that was meant to pay for homelessness services in Los Angeles and taking millions of dollars for himself. Strickland also told The Center Square this weekend that a number of bills he introduced are aimed to reduce the cost of living in California and address issues of affordability. One bill, Senate Bill 1035, would suspend the state’s gas tax for one year. The bill failed in the Senate Environmental Quality Committee in a bill hearing on March 19. California has consistently had the highest gas prices in the nation for several years, and it has risen over a $1 a gallon since the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran started. On Saturday, the average was $5.90 a gallon, above the national average of $4.14. Another bill Strickland introduced, SB 926, aims to allocate $400 million of general fund money to funding enforcement of Proposition 36. “I can’t recall the last initiative that passed all 58 counties,” Strickland said of the popular measure. “We’re gaining ground, actually. Not only did I introduce my bill, but I sent a letter to the budget lead, [Senator John] Laird, to fully fund that $400 million.” Another letter by Umberg, Blakespear and Richardson asked for the same amount of money to fund Prop. 36, Strickland said. “We’re gaining momentum to get law enforcement the tools they need to keep us safe,” Strickland said. “Democrats, independents and Republicans voted overwhelmingly to get this done. It shouldn’t be this hard to get this funded – it should be the first thing funded, not the last.” Laurie Davies Assemblymember Laurie Davies, R-Oceanside, told The Center Square on Friday that she doesn’t want to cut any state agencies or programs to reduce state spending. “We do not have a revenue problem,” Davies said. “It’s where the revenue is going and how it’s being used. I think it’s really important we stop the fraud, and we need to know what our budget is, get the accountability and then we know who the good actors are and who are actually performing and actually getting good results and what we need and those that aren’t.” When asked who the bad actors are who waste taxpayer dollars, Davies couldn’t answer the question. “When we put money into programs, the programs are supposed to be doing something, whether it’s health, education, whatever it may be, to better someone’s life,” Davies told The Center Square. “You have to look at them individually. I never want to put them under one label.” Davies also said that Prop. 36 funding could come from the general fund revenue or other funds allocated to public safety. Just days after Trump endorsed Hilton for governor of California, Davies added that a Republican governor could still face the challenge of seeing any veto overridden by what will still likely be a Democratic supermajority in the legislature. “I’m not afraid of it,” Davies said when asked if she is concerned that a Republican governor would have any veto overridden. “It would depend on whatever the legislation was.” Assemblymember Leticia Castillo, R-Corona, who is also running for re-election in November, declined to be interviewed on Saturday morning. Many of California’s Republican state senators and Assembly members did not attend the conference in San Diego this weekend.

پاکستان؛ کشوری که سال‌ها با بحران‌های اقتصادی و اتهام ناامنی دست‌ و پنجه نرم کرده، حالا در کانون یک تحول بزرگ دیپلماتیک قرار گرفته است: میزبانی مذاکرات مستقیم میان تهران و واشینگتن. بسیاری معتقدند اسلام‌آباد با این حرکت، به دنبال بازتعریف نقش خود در نظام بین‌الملل است.

جی‌دی ونس، معاون رئیس جمهوری آمریکا، صبح جمعه به وقت اسلام‌آباد در یک کنفرانس خبری کوتاه به خبرنگاران گفت با واشنگتن با جمهوری اسلامی به توافق نرسید و هیئت آمریکایی به ایالات متحده باز می‌گردد.

Autoridades dieron a conocer la identidad de la menor que falleció durante este sábado en un recinto del Molino Río...