(NewsNation) — Days after what officials called a targeted attack on power substations in North Carolina, NewsNation has exclusively obtained a recent federal law enforcement memo that warned of something strikingly similar.

The memo reads in part:

Power companies in Oregon and Washington have reported physical attacks on substations using hand tools, arson, firearms and metal chains possibly in response to an online call for attacks on critical infrastructure. … In recent attacks, criminal actors bypassed security by cutting the fence links, lighting nearby fires, shooting equipment from a distance or throwing objects over the fence and onto equipment.

Federal Law Enforcement officials

Officials told NewsNation Tuesday it is too early to know a motive for the gunfire damage that caused widespread power outages in Moore County, North Carolina, but there have been similar cases of vandalism and plots in North Carolina and across the country in recent months.

On Nov. 11, for example, sheriff’s deputies in Jones County, North Carolina, reported that criminal vandalism had caused 12,000 people to lose power for days.

That investigation remains ongoing and authorities say no suspects have been identified or arrested.

In another instance back in February, the Department of Justice secured guilty pleas from three men accused of plotting to shoot substations across the country with powerful rifles.

Federal officials said the defendants were white supremacists and planned to cause millions in damage and social unrest.

Federal authorities have warned of domestic terrorism-related threats to critical infrastructure for years. The Department of Homeland Security renewed that concern in a terrorism alert bulletin issued publicly on Nov. 30.

It reads, in part:

Targets of potential violence include: public gatherings, faith-based institutions, the LGBTQI+ community, schools, racial and religious minorities, government facilities and personnel, U.S. critical infrastructure, the media, and perceived ideological opponents.

The Department of Homeland Security

Officials called the North Carolina outages over the weekend a set of coordinated attacks on power substations.

“It appears to be an intentional, willful and malicious act and the perpetrator will be brought to justice and prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” said Sen. Tom Mcinnis, R-N.C.

The outages — at their peak affecting around 45,000 homes — caused residents to lose heat, schools to close and some to turn to charities to cook them food.

“And I said I’m gonna stop out there and get me something to eat. Because eating out of the can all the time just don’t get it,” one North Carolina resident said.

According to The News and Observer of Raleigh, Duke Energy was the company that had its electrical substations damaged, affecting tens of thousands of Moore County residents.

As of Tuesday, about 73% of the more than 47,000 Duke Energy customers served in the county were reportedly still without power.

The company said Tuesday evening it “anticipates having nearly all customers restored by 11:59 p.m. Wednesday.”

Additionally, Moore County Schools announced Tuesday afternoon that schools will be closed Wednesday and Thursday due to the outages.

(Reuters) – An Oklahoma man was charged with four counts of murder in the killing and dismemberment of four men he believed were stealing from his salvage yard, according to court documents.

Joseph Lloyd Kennedy, 67, was charged in Okmulgee County court on Monday. If convicted of any of the murders, he could face the death penalty. Authorities said they believe Kennedy acted alone. It was not known if Kennedy had an attorney.

Kennedy is being held in the Okmulgee County jail without bond for the murders of Billy Jack Chastain, 30; Mark Chastain, 32; Mike Sparks, 32; Alex Stevens, 29. Mark and Billy Chastain were brothers. Kennedy and all the murdered men were from Okmulgee, a city of 11,000 people about 35 miles (56 km) south of Tulsa.

Kennedy was already on probation for shooting a man in 2012 who he believed was stealing from his salvage yard. The man survived the gunshot wound.

When the four men’s bodies were found and identified in October, Okmulgee police chief Joe Prentice said he believed the men were out to “commit some sort of criminal act.”

Okmulgee County district attorney Carol Iski, who announced the charges against Kennedy on Monday, was asked by reporters whether the men were stealing from Kennedy’s salvage yard. She replied that it would not matter as “we don’t have a death penalty in Oklahoma for stealing.”

Court documents indicate that based on cell phone data, it is believed the men had been inside Kennedy’s salvage yard on Oct. 9, the day they were shot and killed with a rifle.

Bullet fragments were pulled from a tree just north of the yard, and blood was found along with personal items of some of the murdered men. The men were reported missing on Oct. 10.

On Oct. 14, the bodies were discovered and Kennedy fled to Daytona Beach Shores, Florida, where he was later arrested on suspicion of driving a stolen vehicle and returned to Oklahoma.

A woman with whom Kennedy had a romantic relationship told police officers on Oct. 18 that Kennedy confessed to her that he shot the men and cut up their bodies, according to court documents.

Taiwanese chipmaker TSMC (2330.TW) on Tuesday said it would more than triple its planned investment at its new Arizona plant to $40 billion, among the largest foreign investments in U.S. history, as President Joe Biden visited and hailed the project.

The expanded investment is a big win for Biden after supply chain issues disrupted the U.S. economy early in his presidency.

“American manufacturing is back, folks,” Biden said in a speech against the backdrop of the new factory draped with an American flag and a large banner reading “A Future Made in America Phoenix, AZ.”

Biden’s recent trip to Asia convinced him the United States is in a better position to lead the world economy in the years ahead “if we keep our focus,” he said.

Mark Liu, chairman of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd, known as TSMC, estimated annual revenue of $10 billion when the two planned chip fabrication plants open, adding that customers would have annual sales of $40 billion from products using chips made there. read more

Apple Inc (AAPL.O), Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD.O), all major TSMC customers, said they expected their chips to be made in the new plants.

“We work with TSMC to manufacture the chips that help power our products all over the world. And we look forward to expanding this work in the years to come as TSMC forms new and deeper roots in America,” Apple CEO Tim Cook said in a speech.

Also joining Biden at the facility’s opening ceremony was TSMC founder Morris Chang, chipmaker Micron Technology Inc (MU.O) CEO Sanjay Mehrotra and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, among others.

The plant, scheduled to be operational in 2024, will make a more advanced chip than initially announced.

TSMC’s Taipei-listed shares were flat in early trade on Wednesday following the announcement, tracking the broader market (.TWII).

TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker, is a leading supplier to major U.S. hardware manufacturers. Its $40 billion funding for the two facilities is the company’s largest investment outside of Taiwan.

“Bringing TSMC’s investment to the United States is a masterstroke and a game-changing development for the industry,” Nvidia’s Huang said in remarks prepared for Tuesday’s event.

TSMC’s expanded investment in Arizona is the latest in a string of major investments announced by chipmakers since the CHIPS and Science Act passed this summer. These include International Business Machines Corp (IBM.N), Micron Technology Inc (MU.O) and Wolfspeed Inc (WOLF.N).

TSMC said it would build a second facility nearby to produce so-called “3 nanometer” chips by 2026, the most advanced currently in production.

TSMC also said it was planning to build an industrial water reclamation plant. Chip making is a water-intensive process, and Arizona, which is largely desert, is increasingly struggling with water shortages.

TSMC’s Liu said its Phoenix factories are expected to create 13,000 high-tech jobs, including 4,500 under TSMC and the rest filled by suppliers.

Biden has sought to boost semiconductor production after the pandemic caused supply chain problems that led to shortages of chips for vehicles and many other items.

U.S. semiconductor production accounts for just 12% of the global total, down from 37% two decades ago, said a White House report on supply chain problems last year.

Taiwan’s dominant position as a maker of chips used in technology from cellphones and cars to fighter jets has sparked concerns of over-reliance on the island, especially as China ramps up military pressure to assert its sovereignty claims.

China claims Taiwan as its territory but the democratically elected government in Taipei rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims.

The $52.7 billion Chips and Science Act, signed into law by Biden in August, is aimed at preventing a resurgence of supply chain woes.

Biden’s trip to Arizona marks “a significant milestone that TSMC is reaching in bringing the most advanced semiconductor manufacturing back to the U.S.,” said Brian Deese, director of the White House National Economic Council.

Biden’s victory in Arizona in the 2020 presidential election helped catapult him to the White House. Republican Donald Trump had won the state in 2016.

Biden has said he intends to seek a second four-year term in 2024.

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More than 1,100 union employees at the New York Times Co (NYT.N) are set to walk out on Thursday for 24 hours as negotiations with the news publisher for a “complete and equitable contract” failed on Tuesday, the union said in a tweet.

The NYTimes NewsGuild last week had pledged to walk out on Dec. 8 if a contract was not reached by then.

The NYTimes NewsGuild has sought “complete and equitable contract” wages that “keep up with inflation” as well as to preserve and enhance health insurance and retirement benefits that were promised during hiring, according to a letter signed by 1,036 members last week. The number of signatories has since topped 1,100, the union said on Tuesday.

“Unless the company changes their tune and a deal is reached before Thursday, the work stoppage will officially start from midnight on December 8th and go for 24 hours,” the union said in a statement posted on Twitter.

The union said the New York Times during a meeting earlier in the day refused to meet for additional negotiating sessions to resolve the contract dispute by Thursday.

The New York Times in an emailed statement to Reuters said the union’s claims were inaccurate and negotiations were ongoing.

The union said that the walkout would be the first full-day work stoppage at the New York Times since the late 1970s.

The Times Guild represents journalists as well as ad sales workers, comment moderators, news assistants, security guards and staffers at The Times Center, the company’s events venue and virtual production studio.

Tech employees of the Times voted last March to unionize and have been trying separately to negotiate their first contract.

The GOP has done it. They’ve finally reached the point of no return. Look –everyone has a point of no return, a point where they lay their sanity firmly on the shores to be swept away and never heard from again.

Thankfully, most of us do not reach that place. That’s because most of us have this little thing called logic. And critical thinking skills. We know when to call out betrayal. Not so, GOP. They have reached their breaking point of no return. At this point, I doubt they could even find their sanity, if they dived into the depths of hell to find it.

Trump called for an end to our Constitution. Now anybody with a brain would call that out — because what he did was wicked and, dare I say, traitorous. But not most republicans. Case in point:

Ohio Rep. Dave Joyce spoke to anchor George Stephanopoulos this Sunday. And he just couldn’t do it. He couldn’t denounce Trump. Joyce tried to wiggle out of talking about Trump’s latest deranged statement, but George was relentless and would not let him off the hook so easily.

Joyce finally said that he would have no problem supporting Trump were he to be the nominee in 2024. Now — he won’t be. But Joyce’s statement was stunning in the face of it all, and nobody seemed more stunned than Stephanopoulos himself.

“That’s a remarkable statement,” he said. And he continued. “You just said you’d support a candidate who’s come out for suspending the constitution.”

“Well, you know he says a lot of things,” Joyce answered. “I can’t really be chasing every one of these crazy statements that come from any of these candidates.”

“You can’t come out against someone who’s for spending the Constitution?” an incredulous Forge pushed back.

“He says a lot of things, but that doesn’t mean that it’s ever going to happen.”

Oh God. This was so very painful it made one want to cover their eyes. It’s a train wreck. Does the GOP have a breaking point with Trump? It appears not. Many other republicans are being silent as well. It’s — it’s a shitshow. There really is no other way of looking at this.

The GOP has passed a point of no return. They can’t come back from this. Everyone will be hounding them about it. The party is in splinters. That’s what you get when you lose your spine.

The post Point of no return appeared first on Palmer Report.

Justice Samuel Alito made a joke during oral arguments Monday, a seemingly innocuous exchange that caused liberals to call for his impeachment.

Liberals lambasted Alito and called for him to be impeached for employing “outlandish hypotheticals” involving black children dressed in Ku Klux Klan robes. Vanity Fair dubbed the justice “the biggest sleazebag on the Supreme Court,” and at least one Twitter user called for the impeachment of Alito and, inexplicably, Justice Clarence Thomas.

“How can anyone—especially Gen Z who saw this court literally overturn the right to an abortion—take this court seriously with people like Alito & Thomas on the bench?” said Victor Shi, the self-proclaimed youngest 2020 Democratic delegate for Joe Biden. Another Biden delegate said, “Anyone surprised Alito … is also racist & cracks KKK jokes?”

“Klan jokes aren’t funny under any context,” tweeted Columbia law professor Katherine Franke.

Supreme Court justices frequently use hypotheticals to test a particular jurisprudence. Bloomberg earlier this year hailed then-retiring justice Stephen Breyer as the “king of hypotheticals,” referencing a case in which he described a mob of mutant “tomato children” terrorizing Boston.

Alito’s comments came as the justices debated the limits of government-compelled speech. Justice Elena Kagan said that a black Santa Claus should not by law have to entertain a child dressed in a Klan outfit, “whether the child was black or white or any other characteristic.” In response, Alito quipped that “you do see a lot of black children in Ku Klux Klan outfits, right?” drawing laughs inside the courtroom.

The justices were hearing arguments in 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, which centers on a Colorado web designer who says the state’s public-accommodation law compels her to design wedding websites for same-sex couples, in violation of her religious beliefs.

Kagan and Alito were each responding to Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who compared Smith to a mall photographer who only photographs white children on Santa’s lap. According to Jackson, both are engaged in unlawful discrimination.

But Smith’s attorney Kristen Waggoner argued the Court has an obligation in the case to uphold its ruling in Obergefell v. Hodges, the landmark 2015 case legalizing same-sex marriage, which included protections for religious proponents of traditional marriage.

“The Court’s promise in Obergefell is to protect those who would believe marriage is between a man and a woman from having to express a view that violates their conscience,” Waggoner said on Monday.

Smith has also expressed in interviews that she is comfortable serving same-sex couples as clients as long as she is not forced to promote a message that violates her conscience.

Alito expressed at a Federalist Society event in 2020 that his remarks often get twisted by the press.

The post Not Funny: Liberals Are Furious Conservative Supreme Court Justice Has Sense of Humor appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

In the early days of the pandemic, Dr. Anthony Fauci often dismissed the theory that the coronavirus came from a biological lab in China. He testified last week his reluctance was out of fear that speculation about the virus origins would “increase tensions” with China.

Fauci’s comments came during a seven-hour deposition at the center of a lawsuit filed by the attorneys general of Missouri and Louisiana against the Biden administration. Fauci stated throughout the deposition that he was troubled by “wild speculation and allegations” that the Chinese government either deliberately or accidentally leaked the virus from a biological lab in Wuhan. He also said he was “afraid” that “blaming the Chinese” for the outbreak would “increase tensions and reduce cooperation” with Beijing to prevent future pandemics.

“There was no evidence of that at the time, and that’s what I was concerned about,” said Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Fauci’s reluctance to entertain the lab leak hypothesis may have slowed the United States government’s efforts to investigate the origins of the pandemic. A growing body of evidence points to a lab leak as the most likely explanation for the outbreak. Republicans on the Senate Intelligence Committee released a report in October that said an accidental leak from the Wuhan lab was the “most likely” cause of the pandemic.

Fauci has come under scrutiny for not only dismissing the lab leak theory, but also because the National Institutes for Allergy and Infectious Diseases has funded research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The lawsuit alleges that the Biden administration colluded with social media companies to censor politically sensitive content. The attorneys general have accused the administration of pressuring social media companies to censor content that questioned the origins of the virus, and the efficacy of masks and the coronavirus vaccines.

They have also alleged that the FBI worked closely with Facebook and Twitter to block access to an October 2020 news article that revealed emails from Hunter Biden’s abandoned laptop. The Washington Free Beacon reported that two FBI officials who met with the Big Tech companies are Democratic donors.

Fauci denied coordinating with social media companies on their virus-related content, but revealed that his daughter worked as a software engineer at Twitter until last year. He also said he met with Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg on a campaign to promote the coronavirus vaccines.

The post Fauci Says He Dismissed Lab Leak Theory to Placate China appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

Former President Donald Trump’s namesake company was found guilty on Tuesday of scheming to defraud tax authorities.

Alan Futerfas, a lawyer for the Trump Organization, said the verdict would be appealed.

Here are some of the way in which prosecutors said the company and executives cheated on their taxes.

– The Trump Organization gave executives free, cheap and reduced-rent apartments that were not reported as income.

– Bonuses were paid as if executives were independent contractors, not salaried employees.

– Trump himself signed bonus checks from his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, the Trump International Golf Club in Florida, and other Trump entities that could benefit from the deductions. Trump was not charged in the case and has called it politically motivated.

– The Trump Organization leased luxury cars for executives and their wives.

– The company paid for beds, TVs, carpeting and furniture for the Florida home of Chief Financial Officer Allen Weisselberg, and for utilities, cable and parking garage fees in Manhattan.

– Trump himself paid the private school tuition for his chief financial officer’s grandchildren.

– Checks were made out to an employee in the mailroom to cash and were booked as “Holiday Entertainment” but given to the CFO for personal tips.

– Tax statements were issued that did not disclose executives’ Manhattan living quarters so they did not pay city taxes.

– The personal expenses were not added to employees’ taxable income. But some expenses were subtracted from salaries and bonuses, leaving the executives with less taxable income and the company with less payroll taxes.

– The scheme was a way to limit raises, while giving executives more money.

– CFO Weisselberg estimated that $100,000 worth of personal expenses he received was worth double that to him – $200,000 – in salary.

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Democratic Senator Raphael Warnock jumped to an early lead over Republican former football star Herschel Walker in a runoff election in Georgia that will determine whether Democrats can expand their razor-thin Senate majority.

With 31% of the estimated vote tallied, Warnock led Walker by 63% to 37%, according to Edison Research. Many of those early results were from absentee ballots, which tend to lean Democratic. Final results were not expected until later in the evening.

The race is a last test of Donald Trump’s clout with midterm voters as he seeks the Republican nomination to challenge President Joe Biden in 2024. The former president, who endorsed Walker, had a mixed record in his most competitive endorsements for Congress in this year’s elections.

Walker’s campaign was plagued by repeated gaffes and a variety of allegations, including claims by former girlfriends that he paid for their abortions, even though he has campaigned for the procedure to be outlawed. He has denied the accusations.

Retired firefighter Keith Fields, 58, showed up an hour before polls opened in Smyrna to cast his ballot for Walker because of his stance on immigration, taxes and abortion without exceptions.

“It’s not so much Herschel as the man – but I do like the man – but I’m also voting for the policies that he is going to vote for,” Fields said.

The runoff set early voting records in Georgia in a race that has become the most expensive of the 2022 U.S. midterm election season, with more than $400 million spent so far. The contest went to a runoff after neither candidate secured 50% of the vote on Nov. 8.

A victory by Warnock would give Democrats a 51-seat majority in the 100-seat Senate, which would make it slightly easier to advance Biden’s nominees for judicial and administrative posts. Most legislation would still require Republican support.

A Walker win, on the other hand, would keep the Senate at its current 50-50 split, with Democrats controlling the chamber thanks to Vice President Kamala Harris’s tie-breaking vote.

On a wider scale, a Warnock victory could solidify Georgia as a battleground in presidential elections. It also would be another midterm defeat at the polls for a protege of Trump, who spurred Walker to run.

At least 1.9 million people cast their votes before Election Day, equal to 47% of the Nov. 8 turnout, and state election official Gabe Sterling has said he expected 1 million more would vote on Tuesday.

Analysts say the early votes likely tilted Democratic, which means Walker will need strong Election Day turnout from his supporters to overcome the gap.

“We should not rest on our laurels. The job is not done. The truth is my opponent could still win this election,” Warnock told a crowd in Norcross, Georgia, on Tuesday.

Warnock is pastor of the historic Atlanta church where assassinated civil rights leader Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. preached. Both Warnock and Walker are Black.

Along with the abortion claims, former girlfriends have accused Walker of domestic abuse. He has also faced accusations that he maintains his primary residence in Texas, not Georgia.

Walker has denied the charges, but they may have discouraged some Republican voters. Warnock edged him 49.44% to 48.49% in November, even as Republican Governor Brian Kemp and other statewide Republican candidates easily won re-election.

Cobb County resident Guri Ben-Hashal, 60, who works in real estate, said he cast a vote against Walker. “I feel that Herschel Walker is unsuitable for the job, to say the least,” he said.

At a diner in Marietta, Walker deflected questions about his character, which Warnock has made a centerpiece of his campaign.

“Right now I put my character up against Raphael Warnock any day,” Walker said on Tuesday.

This is the third Senate runoff in two years in the state – and the second for Warnock, who first won the seat in a runoff in January 2021. Republicans won a narrow majority in the U.S. House of Representatives in the Nov. 8 election, but fell short of the “red wave” that some in the party had forecast, despite flagging approval ratings for Biden.

In a Reuters/Ipsos poll finished on Tuesday, Biden’s approval rating dipped to 38%, down 2 points from a week earlier. The poll has a credibility interval — a measure of precision — of 4 percentage points either way.

While Biden did not campaign for Warnock, former President Barack Obama rallied for him in Atlanta last week.

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