Extra! Extra! 10/22 🎉

Thanks to the Status Kuo for this one!

Hi, all, and happy Sunday.

The world continues to be in devastating turmoil, so it’s perhaps more important than usual to take a bit of time to celebrate the things that *also* happened to go well this week. There were, ironically, a lot of them.

Focussing only on the horrible stuff will depress, paralyze, and drain us, friends. So let’s pause to turn our attention—if only for a moment—to the many victories occurring around us.

Hang in there. This is a tough time. Remember—we’re tougher, when we stick together.

Have a good Sunday.

Jess

P.S. —If you enjoyed this list please share it with as many folks as you can. There’s never been a bigger need for good news.

P.P.S. I’m putting an 🪓 next to items that citizen activists like you helped make possible, either through direct advocacy or by helping us win elections!

Celebrate This! 🎉

Australian authorities have hit X, formerly known as Twitter, with a $384,000 fine for balking at requests for information on child exploitation on the platform.

The Biden administration has significantly expanded its loans to Latino-owned businesses. As a result we are seeing a small business boom and the fastest creation rate of Latino-owned businesses in over a decade. 🪓

The U.S. agreed to a settlement that would allow migrant families separated at the border by the Trump administration to apply for asylum.

A judge imposed a limited gag order on Donald Trump, barring him from publicly attacking witnesses or prosecutors in his federal election case.

More than 42,000 people have applied for the 20,000 jobs the American Climate Corps is funded for. More than two-thirds of respondents are between the ages of 18-35. 🪓

Team Biden-Harris announced a haul of over $71 million raised with a historic nearly $91 million cash on hand.

The Biden campaign joined Truth Social.

Major shipping companies are collaborating to demonstrate how high-tech sails can be retrofitted to conventional cargo ships, slashing their greenhouse gas emissions. 

Debbie Lesko, a Trump-allied Republican in Arizona, announced she will not seek re-election in 2024. Bye!

Kaiser Permanente reached a tentative deal with the unions! Kaiser will raise wages by 21% over four years and establish a new $23 per hour minimum wage in all states (except California, where it’s $25). 🪓

The United States will provide $100 million in humanitarian assistance for the Palestinian people in Gaza and the West Bank. 🪓

Murders fell 6.1 percent in 2022 after rising considerably in 2020 and 2021.

Sidney Powell took a plea deal in the Georgia election interference case. She will now provide “honest testimony,” presumably to the detriment of her co-conspirators. Good!

A new CAP Action study finds that more than 83 percent of total private sector chip investments are being made in areas with large Latino populations. 🪓

Authoritarianism was defeated at the ballot box in Poland. A HUGE deal! 🪓

The Biden administration will be announcing a new legal immigration pathway for immigrants from Ecuador. 🪓

After nearly two years of negotiations, a coalition of solar companies, conservationists and other groups has come to terms on a set of principles that could speed up the construction of badly needed renewable energy projects while also protecting wildlife habitat, preserving treasured landscapes and benefiting nearby communities. 🪓

The Biden Administration announced awards of more than $100 million from the Department of Housing and Urban Development through the Inflation Reduction Act to help renovate the homes of more than 1,500 low-income families to be zero energy and climate resilient. 🪓

The DOE announced $3.46 billion in grants for 58 projects across 44 states to strengthen electric grid resilience and reliability across America. 🪓

Crash and fatality rates for drivers under 21 years old have fallen sharply in the U.S. in the past 20 years. 

The EPA announced it has determined that lead emitted from airplanes is a danger to public health, opening the door for the agency’s first limits on lead fuel in aviation. 🪓

Seven in ten Americans now disapprove of the way Republicans in Congress are handling their jobs, including – for the first time – a plurality of Republicans.

The FTA announced it will provide approximately $197 million this year to replace aging railcars improving reliability, safety, and accessibility on the nation’s rail transit systems. 🪓

The Supreme Court ordered two internet sellers of gun parts to comply with a Biden administration regulation aimed at "ghost guns," firearms that are difficult to trace because they lack serial numbers.

Florida has dropped all felony voter fraud charges against Marsha Ervin, who was arrested in late September and charged with felony voter fraud. At the time, the Tallahassee woman told investigators that she believed she was allowed to vote. But Ervin was on probation after incarceration, and her voting rights were not yet restored.

The Department of Commerce and NOAA announced that $26 million in funding will be invested over four years in the National Weather Service and the National Integrated Drought Information System to provide improved early warning for drought, flooding, fire and other natural hazards. 🪓

The U.S. Department of Energy's Office of State and Community Energy Programs awarded $30 million in clean energy funding through the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant (EECBG) Program to 28 state, local, and Tribal governments. 🪓

Sen. Laphonza Butler is slated to fill the late Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s seat on the Judiciary Committee! Woot!

The Biden Administration announced the nominations of Sara E. Hill and John D. Russell to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma! When confirmed, Hill will be the only sitting indigenous federal judge in Oklahoma and make history as the first indigenous woman to sit on the state’s federal bench. 🪓

We also had two federal district court confirmations this week: Jennifer Hall to the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware and Julia Munley to the Middle District of Pennsylvania. 🪓

Joe Harding, a former Florida state representative made infamous by his authorship of the so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill, was sentenced to four months behind bars after he pleaded guilty to fraudulently obtaining a $150,000 COVID-19 relief loan.

Kenneth Chesebro took a plea deal!

The Supreme Court blocked restrictions on Biden administration efforts to remove contentious social media posts.

The judge presiding over the civil fraud trial of Donald J. Trump fined the former president $5,000 for a “blatant violation” of a gag order imposed this month.

Hamas released two American hostages.

The Massachusetts House of Representatives on Wednesday voted overwhelmingly to pass a comprehensive new gun reform package that would make the state's already renowned gun control laws even stricter. 🪓

Election denier and former AZ Attorney General candidate Abe Hamadeh must pay attorneys fees to Kris Mayes and Adrian Fontes because Hamadeh’s lawyers “misrepresented’’ information to justices on the case.

The government filed notice that it was appealing the sentences of the five members of the far-right Proud Boys group convicted in the Jan. 6 attack, presumably because they’re too short. 🪓

President Biden announced nominees for U.S. Attorney, U.S. Marshal, and the U.S. Sentencing Commission. To date, the President has announced 74 nominees to serve as U.S. Attorneys and 24 nominees to serve as U.S. Marshals. 🪓

The U.S. Supreme Court left in place a lower court order blocking a Missouri law that invalidates federal gun restrictions.

General Motors has agreed to include its electric vehicle and battery factories in its forthcoming contract, ensuring that some 6,000 workers at electric battery plants will also receive union protections. 🪓

The U.S. military began draining jet fuel from 20 World War II-era storage tanks in Hawaiʻi, which are filled with more than 100 million gallons of petroleum. It’s a victory for Native Hawaiian activists and environmentalists who have for years warned of the risks the tanks pose to a critical source of drinking water on Oʻahu. 🪓

Amazon said it has doubled the size of its electric delivery van fleet since July, to 10,000.

The Biden Administration announced it had awarded $15 million in grants for the Las Vegas area to add trees, green spaces to fight climate change. 🪓

World Central Kitchen has already helped to feed 30K people displaced in the Israel-Hamas War—and they did it in partnership with Anera, to whom some of you have given through this newsletter! 🪓

The Supreme Court of Mauritius just overturned an 1898 law criminalizing same-sex relationships. 

France has put an end to automatically printing hard-copy thermal receipts in most businesses—did you know they’re loaded with BPAs? 🪓

The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the dismissal of an Arizona lawsuit brought by current U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake and failed secretary of state candidate Mark Finchem.

California has passed a new law that will ban over-the-counter sales of lawn and garden neonicotinoid pesticides by 2025, limiting their use to trained professionals in the heavily agricultural state. 🪓

Mike Pence’s campaign is low on cash and more than $600,000 in debt.

By a 20-point margin, a majority of Americans continue to want military support for Ukraine.

Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker is launching a new abortion rights organization focused on pro-choice ballot measures. 

The European Union is launching a humanitarian air bridge operation consisting of "several flights" to Egypt aiming to bring supplies to humanitarian organisations on the ground in Gaza.

After years of organizing, public hearings, and strong opposition to the expansion of CPV Woodbridge power plant in New Jersey, the project is officially halted. This is a major win for environmental justice and communities across New Jersey. 🪓

Wisconsin Republicans admitted that they do not have the power to remove the state's top election official, Meagan Wolfe, and their vote to do so was only "symbolic." 

A Minnesota judge dismissed charges against three Native women for peacefully protesting an oil pipeline. The three activists, from the Mississippi band of Anishinaabe were arrested in January 2021 for protesting the Enbridge Line 3 pipeline while dancing to a drumbeat.

Run For Something alum Leonardo Williams won first in the primary for mayor of Durham, NC - he’ll move on to the general. Another RFS alum, Samantha Perlman, moved out of her primary for mayor of Marlborough, MA. 🪓

Russia has agreed to free four Ukrainian children — ranging in age from 2 to 17 — and allow them to return them to their families in Ukraine after Qatar intervened as a mediator.

Jim Jordan was finally defeated in his bid to become Speaker of the House. 🪓

Starting in 2024, most baby food sold in California will have to be tested for arsenic, cadmium, lead, and mercury (yes, they contain them!) due to new legislation that was signed into law on Tuesday by Gov. Gavin Newsom. 🪓

South Korea has virtually eliminated food waste thanks to a compulsory curbside composting program.

New Jersey just made history as the first state in the U.S. to establish an Office of Climate Education. 🪓

The Internal Revenue Service announced the launch of its first-ever Direct File pilot program on Tuesday, the first step to creating a free, easy way for millions of Americans to file all of their taxes online. 🪓

A report out this week from a climate think tank projects that carbon emissions from electricity generation could finally peak this year, because of major investments in renewable energy infrastructure. 

The federal government issued an enforcement advisory with detailed recommendations on how regulators should prosecute financial wrongdoing such as insider trading, market manipulation, and fraud. 🪓

Columbus City Hall approved a sweeping landmark deal to wipe out $335 million of medical debt, providing financial relief to more than 340,000 moderate-income residents in Columbus, Ohio.

Three smalltooth sawfish pups were born at Sea World Orlando over the summer, marking the first successful birth of the endangered species at a U.S. aquarium.

Five trailblazing women will be featured on the back face of quarters to be minted for 2025, including Ida B. Wells! 🪓

George Santos’s campaign is hemorrhaging cash.

Watch This! 👀

If you missed this week in the US House of Representatives, here’s a quick recap from Rep. Jared Moskowitz using ⁦⁦Disney. [H/T

Jay Kuo

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