
On This Day, July 7: London transit attacks kill 52
In 1846, U.S. Navy Commodore J.D. Sloat proclaimed the annexation of California by the United States.
In 1865, four people convicted of conspiring with John Wilkes Booth in the assassination of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln were hanged in Washington.
In 1898, U.S. President William McKinley signed a joint resolution of Congress authorizing the annexation of Hawaii by the United States.
In 1930, construction began on the Giant Boulder Dam, which in 1947 was renamed the Hoover Dam.
In 1946, Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini (1850-1917) became the first American to be canonized a saint in the Roman Catholic Church.
In 1976, the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in New York enrolled female cadets for the first time in the institution's then-174-year-old history.
In 1981, Sandra Day O'Connor was chosen by U.S. President Ronald Reagan to become the first woman on the U.S. Supreme Court. She was unanimously approved by the Senate.
File Photo by Roger L. Wollenberg/UPI
In 1999, a Miami-Dade County jury held the leading tobacco companies liable for various illnesses of Florida smokers. The class-action lawsuit, filed in 1994, was the first of its kind to reach trial.
In 2005, terrorists struck the London transit system, setting off explosions in three subway cars and a double-decker bus in coordinated rush-hour attacks. Fifty-two people were killed and more than 700 injured.
In 2010, a Paris court sentenced former Panamanian ruler Manuel Noriega to seven years in prison for money laundering. He was convicted of funneling about $3 million of Colombian drug money into French bank accounts.
In 2012, U.S. Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts married his longtime partner, Jim Ready, in a ceremony officiated by Gov. Deval Patrick. He was the first member of Congress to publicly come out as gay and first to marry a same-sex partner while in office.
File Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI
In 2013, Andy Murray became the first British player in 77 years to win the men's singles title at Wimbledon, defeating Serb Novak Djokovic in straight sets in the championship match.
In 2016, a gunman opened fire at an otherwise peaceful Black Lives Matter rally in Dallas, killing four police officers and one transit officer, and injuring seven others. Police killed the gunmen, who was holed up in a parking garage, using a robot strapped with an explosive.
In 2017, Elon Musk's Tesla Motors produced its first mass-market vehicle, the Model 3.
In 2022, after months of scandal and calls for his resignation, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson agreed to step down.
In 2024, the Transportation Security Administration screened more than 3 million people, a new record for clearing passengers for air travel in the United States. The TSA most recently broke the record again in June 2025.
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Chicago Tribune
22 minutes ago
- Chicago Tribune
Today in History: Chicago police torture report released
Today is Saturday, July 19, the 200th day of 2025. There are 165 days left in the year. Today in History: On July 19, 2006, prosecutors reported that Chicago police beat, kicked, shocked or otherwise tortured scores of Black suspects from the 1970s to the early 1990s to try to extract confessions from them. FBI releases records from its decades-old probe of torture allegations against Chicago police Cmdr. Jon BurgeRead the FBI's records of torture allegations against Jon Burge, dating back to the early 90sAlso on this date: In 1812, during the War of 1812, the First Battle of Sackets Harbor in Lake Ontario resulted in an American victory as U.S. naval forces repelled a British attack. In 1848, the first 'Convention to discuss the social, civil and religious condition and rights of Woman' convened at the Wesleyan Chapel in Seneca Falls, N.Y. In 1969, Apollo 11 and its astronauts, Neil Armstrong, Edwin 'Buzz' Aldrin and Michael Collins, went into orbit around the moon. In 1975, the Apollo and Soyuz space capsules that were linked in orbit for two days separated. In 1979, the Nicaraguan capital of Managua fell to Sandinista guerrillas, two days after President Anastasio Somoza fled the country. In 1980, the Moscow Summer Olympics began, minus dozens of nations that were boycotting the games because of Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan. In 1989, 111 people were killed when United Air Lines Flight 232, a DC-10 which sustained the uncontained failure of its tail engine and the loss of hydraulic systems, crashed while making an emergency landing at Sioux City, Iowa; 185 other people survived. In 1990, baseball's all-time hits leader, Pete Rose, was sentenced in Cincinnati to five months in prison for tax evasion. In 1993, President Bill Clinton announced a policy allowing gays to serve in the military under a compromise dubbed 'don't ask, don't tell, don't pursue.' In 2005, President George W. Bush announced his choice of federal appeals court judge John G. Roberts Jr. to replace Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. (Roberts ended up succeeding Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, who died in Sept. 2005; Samuel Alito followed O'Connor.) In 2013, in a rare and public reflection on race, President Barack Obama called on the nation to do some soul searching over the death of Trayvon Martin and the acquittal of his shooter, George Zimmerman, saying the slain Black teenager 'could have been me 35 years ago.' In 2018, a duck boat packed with tourists capsized and sank in high winds on a lake in the tourist town of Branson, Missouri, killing 17 people. In 2021, Paul Allard Hodgkins, a Florida man who breached the U.S. Senate chamber on Jan. 6, 2021, carrying a Trump campaign flag, received an eight-month prison term in the first resolution of a felony case arising from the U.S. Capitol insurrection. (In 2025, President Donald Trump pardoned, commuted the prison sentences or vowed to dismiss the cases of all 1,500-plus people charged with crimes in the riot.) In 2022, Britain shattered its record for the highest temperature ever registered amid a heat wave that seared swaths of Europe. Today's Birthdays: Civil rights activist and educator Rachel Robinson, widow of baseball's Jackie Robinson, is 103. Blues singer-musician Little Freddie King is 85. Singer-musician Alan Gorrie (Average White Band) is 79. International Tennis Hall of Famer Ilie Nastase is 79. Rock musician Brian May (Queen) is 78. Rock musician Bernie Leadon is 78. Movie director Abel Ferrara is 74. Movie director Atom Egoyan is 65. Actor Campbell Scott is 64. Actor Anthony Edwards is 63. Ukrainian politician and former boxing champion Vitali Klitschko is 54. Actor Benedict Cumberbatch is 49. TV chef Marcela Valladolid is 47. Actor Trai Byers (TV: 'Empire') is 42.


American Military News
22 minutes ago
- American Military News
Sexual LGBT books revealed in list of 596 books banned by Pentagon
A list of 596 books banned from use at the Department of Defense's military schools under President Donald Trump's administration was recently released by a U.S. district court. The list includes numerous books on graphic LGBTQ topics, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) topics, and other left-wing topics. According to The Daily Caller, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia released a list on July 11 of the books the Pentagon has banned from its military schools. The list was released as part of the lawsuit brought against the Department of Defense Education Activity by the American Civil Liberties Union. The Trump administration's Department of Defense was sued by the American Civil Liberties Union, military students, and the family members of military students in April following multiple book bans and curriculum changes implemented by the administration to remove DEI policies and curriculum from the military. 'Our DoDEA schools are not playgrounds for left-wing activists pushing race-baiting, gender confusion, and anti-American propaganda,' DOD Watch Executive Director Nicole Kiprilov said in a statement to The Daily Caller. 'This isn't about banning ideas; it's about stopping the deliberate indoctrination of military children with a radical ideology that directly contradicts the values that should be shaping our children's growth and development.' READ MORE: Defense Department sued over Trump admin's alleged 'book bans' 'The Trump administration is fighting for military families by making sure DoDEA schools reflect the values of service, sacrifice, and country, and not the woke agenda of activist bureaucrats,' Kiprilov added. The Daily Caller reported that a significant number of the books included in the list feature sexual LGBTQ themes aimed at minors, while other books on the list feature DEI and other left-wing topics. One of the books on the list is a children's book titled 'My Dad Thinks I'm a Boy?!: A Trans Positive Children's Book.' According to a description on Amazon's website, 'This powerful and uplifting book for children aged 6 – 9 and their families humorously portrays a situation that is often too common, where a trans child is forced to negotiate between their true self and their parents' love.' Another book on the list is titled 'Dude, You're a Fag: Masculinity and Sexuality in High School.' A description of the book claims that it explains 'how the 'specter of the fag' becomes a disciplinary mechanism for regulating heterosexual as well as homosexual boys and how the 'fag discourse' is as much tied to gender as it is to sexuality.' Other books included as part of the Pentagon's ban include 'Sex Is a Funny Word: A Book about Bodies, Feelings, and YOU, 'ABC's of LGBT+,' 'Auntie Uncle: Drag Queen Hero,' and 'Baby Drag Queen.'


USA Today
22 minutes ago
- USA Today
Of course Trump lied about Project 2025. Now he's enacting it.
The similarities between what Project 2025 proposed and what Trump's second administration has unleashed on Americans is striking, but now is not the time to be complacent and simply hope for change. A year ago, as delegates to the Republican National Convention gathered in Milwaukee to nominate Donald Trump for president, I sent an urgent warning to voters about an innocent enough sounding proposal – "Project 2025" –punctuated by this admission: "Honestly, it scares me." The 922-page report from a conservative think tank outlined the first 180 days of a second Trump presidency. At the time, then GOP-nominee Trump claimed to know nothing about it, despite his name being mentioned 312 times in the document. While Trump tried to distance himself from its politically unpopular ideas, I recognized that if he won, Trump would support many of its radical plans that could disrupt nearly every aspect of our lives, including healthcare, education, taxes and civil rights. The question looms: Was I right? I was right, and it's so much worse than I thought The short answer is yes, and in ways even more frightening than I first feared, but you don't need to take my word for it. Just ask Maurice Cunningham, a retired professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts Boston, who studied politics for decades and is well-versed in Project 2025. When I asked Cunningham if the policies outlined in the document implemented by Trump are hurting the average American as much as I suspected, he responded: "It's not just bad; it's possibly worse than you could have imagined.' Although the situation may seem dire, Cunningham warned that now is not the time to be complacent and simply hope for change. Instead, it is crucial for people to organize, protest and hold their elected officials accountable. Opinion: I'm exhausted by attempts to pretend discrimination doesn't exist in America Trump appointed Project 2025 authors to administration posts The similarities between what Project 2025 proposed and what Trump's second administration has unleashed on Americans is striking, and it would be unwise to dismiss them as mere coincidence. And keep in mind, we still have another 3.5 years to go. In the first 100 days since he took office alone, nearly 45% of his executive orders closely resemble the policy recommendations advocated by Project 2025, according to an analysis conducted by the Hearst Television Data Team. And that was just the beginning. A number of Trump administration appointees were contributors to the project, including Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt, Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Vought, Senior Counselor for Trade and Manufacturing Peter Navarro, FCC Chairman Brendan Carr and border czar Tom Homan. Cunningham said Trump's policies, put into place by the people behind Project 2025, are beginning to take a toll on the most vulnerable sectors of society. This alignment appears to be a key component of his overall strategy. We saw this at work with the passage of Trump's "big beautiful" budget bill where cuts to Medicaid alone could cause as many as 20 million people to lose their health coverage over the next decade. This will happen despite Trump's repeated promises not to cut Medicaid benefits as recently as March. That fits a familiar pattern. Lie. Deny. Enact. Repeat. Opinion: How much of Project 2025 has been implemented? Enough to break us beyond repair. It's worth noting that Project 2025 proposed significant changes to Medicaid, including work requirements, limiting eligibility and possibly imposing lifetime caps or time limits on coverage, while also weakening reforms from the Affordable Care Act. As we look back on the past five months under the Trump administration, the key question is whether we're better off now or if we've fallen further into hardship. "I think that's easy to answer and it will only get worse,' Cunningham said. This will be a slow burn. Tax cuts under the bill happen immediately while Medicaid changes are phased in. In other places, the pain is already being felt from mass layoffs of federal employees and DOGE budget cuts. Education and social safety net endure DOGE chainsaw Education is place where changes outlined in Project 2025 will begin making a major impact this fall. It called for allowing discrimination against LGBTQ+ students, redirecting taxpayer money to private schools, eliminating Title 1 funding and making cuts to Head Start, which would affect 800,000 preschoolers. U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon has promised to dismantle the department and has pushed to cut the Education Department's budget by $12 billion. This reduction would seriously impact minority and low-income children and their families in public schools and rural communities. The administration already cut and delayed funding for Head Start programs for preschoolers from low income families, which assists 16,000 children in Wisconsin alone. Project 2025 proposed to make it even more difficult for low-income individuals to afford food. The proposal aims to reverse the Biden administration's initiative to increase SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits over the next decade, a measure designed to keep pace with rising food costs. Under Trump's budget bill, SNAP will face its largest cut in history, resulting in an estimated 3.2 million adults losing food benefits each month, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Opinion: Senate just passed Trump's Big Beautiful Bill – and made it even uglier Picture this: young students stepping into their classrooms, their bellies empty and growling, struggling to concentrate and absorb knowledge as the shadow of budget cuts hovers ominously over their futures. And it doesn't stop there. Then came Alligator Alcatraz Trump's mass deportations align directly with Project 2025's plan to increase executive power and undermine the U.S. immigration system. It proposed implementing asylum procedures at the border, reducing access to legal immigration options, utilizing local resources for mass deportations and detention, and separating immigrant children from their families. Trump's budget bill allocates $170 billion to deport 1 million people each year. ICE officials have gotten more aggressive, arresting undocumented immigrants at their homes, workplaces, protests, churches, near schools, and even at the Milwaukee courthouse. On April 18, Milwaukee County Judge Hannah Dugan was taken into custody by FBI officials after she allegedly assisted Eduardo Flores-Ruiz, an undocumented Mexican immigrant, in escaping federal agents following his appearance in her courtroom. Flores-Ruiz, 31, was arrested after a brief foot chase outside the courthouse. A week later, Dugan, 65, was also arrested at the courthouse. She was charged on April 25 with two federal counts: obstructing a U.S. agency and concealing an individual to prevent an arrest. University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee political science professor Kathleen Dolan called the arrest of Dugan an 'intimidation tactic.' 'If a judge can be handcuffed on their job, what do you think will happen to you?' she said. The ongoing mass deportations continue to rip families apart, leaving a trail of profound emotional devastation in their wake. It's disheartening to witness the stark absence of compassion among Republicans regarding this crisis. Just this month, a migrant detention facility opened in the Florida Everglades. Some Republicans have dubbed the facility 'Alligator Alcatraz,' due to its isolated location and the fact that it's surrounded by lurking alligators and slithering pythons. The term "Alligator Alcatraz" not only evokes a sense of danger but also highlights the callousness that the Trump administration is willing to exhibit to drive home its message. Disturbingly, they are even merchandising T-shirts that mock what I would call a modern-day concentration camp. This tumultuous situation sends shockwaves through immigrant communities, escalating fear and uncertainty at every turn. But when you have a president who has continuously labeled immigrants as sex offenders, murderers, and gang members or suggested that many came to America from insane asylums, one can only imagine the atmosphere of dread that permeates these communities. This is not the time to become complacent or tune out news While Trump may seem to have the upper hand, it doesn't mean that everything is bleak. Both Cunningham and Dolan emphasized that now is not the time for people to become complacent. Dolan urged individuals to stay engaged in politics, even when it feels confusing and tedious. Cunningham stressed the importance of making one's voice heard through protests and by challenging both Republican and Democratic leaders to address the public's needs. Opinion: White House wants us to see Trump as Superman. We all know he's the villain. These are remarkable times with head spinning twists. One time ally and now enemy of Trump, Elon Musk, poised the idea of an third political party on Tuesday. Musk said the "America Party," would be the place for those not happy with the Republican or Democratic parties. While I agree something needs to change, Musk, who was Trump's largest donor for his campaign is not the right person to lead such a party, especially given Musk's brutal and haphazard spending cuts in his time at the poorly named Department of Government Efficiency and considering Trump said he would look at having Musk deported to his native South Africa. Besides, Americans don't have time for a new political party. I think a better idea would be for people to unite for a new nationwide "Poor People's Campaign," similar to the one led by the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1968. This campaign would tackle issues like wealth inequality, poverty and racism, which continue to divide our society. A group in North Carolina has taken up this mantle. It's astonishing that issues from 57 years ago persist today, including the lack of access to health care and education, as well as inadequate wages. I know there are people who don't believe that marching has an impact, but when you consider that Project 2025 was designed for a specific type of individual – one who doesn't look like me – and that Trump aligns with that inherently racist, sexist and classist document, it is clear that something drastic needs to change. This moment presents an opportunity to unite everyone – from diverse backgrounds, races, religions and socioeconomic statuses – around a shared mission. Too many people are still on the sidelines, watching as individuals are deported, others lose their healthcare and civil rights continue to be eroded. We can either sit back and hope we aren't the next ones affected by the issues on Trump's long list, or we can fight to not only protect what we have but also to help those who have already lost so much. James E. Causey is an Ideas Lab reporter at the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, where this column originally appeared. Reach him at jcausey@ follow him on X @jecausey.