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Good evening. Here’s the last one at the end of Monday.
1. The Jan. 6 Committee Will Focus Tomorrow On Donald Trump’s Connections to domestic extremist groups.
During a hearing, the panel is expected to charting the rise of far-right groups who attacked the Capitol and how the former president amassed and inspired the crowd. The panel also plans to detail known connections and conversations between political actors close to Trump and extremists. The session will take place at 1:00 PM Eastern.
For the first time since the surprising, explosive testimony last month by Cassidy Hutchinsona junior-level aide who gave a damning account of the president’s actions on January 6, 2021.
Her account accelerated a shift in the Justice Department’s investigation: Officials spoke openly about the pressure that the testimony was prepared to investigate Trump’s possible criminal culpability and whether he intended to break the law.
2. A poll shows that most Democratic voters do not want President Biden to run for office in 2024.
More than three quarters of registered voters see the country going the wrong way, and Biden’s job-approval rating is a paltry 33 percent, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll. Only 26 percent of Democratic voters said the party should reappoint Biden by 2024.
3. Traveling to states where abortion is still allowed has become a complicated legal matter.
Judge Brett Kavanaugh wrote in a unanimous opinion on the decision to end the constitutional right to abortion that the “constitutional right to interstate travel” would allow people to cross state lines for abortion without penalty. But such a right is not written in the Constitution†
The real issue, our Supreme Court reporter writes, is what would happen if someone traveled for an abortion — “to the women, to those who helped them travel, and to out-of-state abortion providers.”
4. Across Eastern Ukraine, Russian attacks have killed, maimed and terrified dozens of citizens in recent days.
At least eight people have been killed in the last 24 hours. The death toll in a Russian rocket attack late on Saturday on an apartment complex in a village in eastern Donetsk province has risen to 30, according to Ukrainian authorities.
The weirs seem almost random. They escalate as Russia tries to replace fresh troops for exhausted soldiers and several military analysts have noted that Russia is in the midst of an operational hiatus.
After each attack on a civilian target, Russia has denied or denied responsibility. The Times has taken a closer look at some of the deadliest strikes and Russian explanations for them†
6. The largest space telescope ever built is ready to show us what it’s been looking at for the past six months.
President Biden, speaking from the White House, revealed a “deep field” image † the first of five captured by the James Webb Space Telescope to be released by NASA. The image features a huge cluster of galaxies about four billion light-years from Earth that astronomers use as a sort of cosmic telescope, revealing light from galaxies not seen before.
“We’ll be able to answer questions that we don’t even know the questions are yet,” said Bill Nelson, the space agency’s administrator.
The telescope, which has the ability to look at the oldest stars in the universe, dates back to 2002, but was finally launched on Christmas Eve last year. We spoke to the NASA scientist who finally got it off the ground†
7. Our correspondent in Brazil has traveled 100 miles in the Amazon rainforest to follow the latest journey of a journalist and an activist.
Dom Phillips, a British journalist, and Bruno Pereira, a Brazilian expert on indigenous groups, disappeared last month at the end of a trip down the Itaquaí River after being repeatedly threatened by poachers. Their bodies were later found and three men were arrested for the murders.
During his journey, the correspondent, Jack Nicas, noted that the near abandonment of the region by the Brazilian government, coupled with President Jair Bolsonaro’s calls to develop the Amazon, have encouraged illegal fishermen, hunters and criminal networks. The few federal officials left in the increasingly lawless region complained of being abandoned, while others wore body armor due to mounting threats.
8. There is some drama in the theater world.
The actress Lea Michele will take over as Fanny Brice in the Broadway revival of “Funny Girl” on September 4, after Beanie Feldstein abruptly announced she was leaving the role earlier than expected. Feldstein said in an Instagram post that the production had decided to steer the show in a different direction.
It’s no secret that Michele, who starred in the original Broadway production of “Spring Awakening,” took an interest in the role; it was also a central storyline for her character in the TV show ‘Glee’.
In other theater news, our reviewer loved the revival of “Into the Woods.” The fairytale Stephen Sondheim musical arrives on Broadway with his humor, wonder and humanity intact†
9. In 1933, a handful of renegade teachers opened a college in rural North Carolina. It shaped American arts and arts education for decades to come.
Like ancient Athens, the Harlem Renaissance and Vienna during the heyday of Mozart and Freud, Black Mountain College was the site of a genius cluster† The school has spawned a network of artists in the world of contemporary art: Jacob Lawrence, Walter Gropius, Robert Rauschenberg, Susan Weil, and Cy Twombly, to name a few.
10. And finally, gophers can be farmers.
Species in the animal kingdom are concerned with agricultural behavior. In a paper published today, two University of Florida researchers argued that the southeastern pocket gopher, a small burrowing rodent, could be considered a rudimentary type of farmer†
The gophers stimulate root growth through their burrows and then nibble on the roots. Whether the gophers, or other non-human animals that grow their food, are actual farmers is a matter of debate.
Make it a rich evening.
Brent Lewis has assembled photos for this briefing.
Your evening briefing will be posted at 6:00 p.m. Eastern.
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