WTF Just Happened Today

Monday, December 5, 2022

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1/ Early turnout in Georgia’s Senate runoff between Raphael Warnock and Herschel Walker has broke daily voting records three times since polls opened. Ahead of the Tuesday runoff, more than 1.85 million Georgians have voted early, including more than 76,000 who didn’t turn out in the general election. Although Democrats have already secured control of the Senate, the party is seeking an outright majority instead of a 50-50 split and power-sharing agreement that’s currently in place. Polls indicate that Warnock is leading Walker by a margin of 52% to 48%. (NBC News / ABC News / Politico / CNN / Bloomberg)

2/ The Supreme Court seemed sympathetic to an evangelical Christian graphic designer in Colorado who doesn’t want to create wedding websites for same-sex couples despite the state’s anti-discrimination law. The case concerns Lorie Smith, who wants to create customized wedding websites the tell the stories of heterosexual couples “through God’s lens.” Smith claims that the state’s law barring discrimination based on sexual orientation is a violation of her First Amendment right because it forces her to provide services to gay and lesbian couples and engage in speech she doesn’t agree with. The conservative justices have viewed the case through the lens of free speech and suggested that Smith, who sees themselves as artists, could not be forced to create speech that violates her religious belief that marriage is only between a man and a woman. (NPR / Politico / Washington Post / New York Times / CNN / Bloomberg)

3/ Chinese government-linked hackers stole at least $20 million in U.S. Covid relief benefits. The Secret Service accused the Chengdu-based hacking group known as APT41 of defrauding Covid-related unemployment insurance funds and Small Business Administration loan money in more than a dozen states. The theft of taxpayer funds by APT41 is the first time the Secret Service has publicly connected pandemic fraud tied to foreign, state-sponsored cybercriminals. The agency says it has seized over $1.4 billion in stolen funds since 2020. (NBC News / CNN)

4/ The Manhattan district attorney hired a former Justice Department official who led the New York attorney general’s civil inquiry into Trump and the Trump Organization. Alvin Bragg said that Matthew Colangelo will work on the office’s “most sensitive and high-profile white-collar investigations.” In addit...

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