NEWS OF THE DAY
AntiSemitic attacks: American Jews were targets of more antiSemitic incidents in 2019 than any other year over the past four decades, a surge marked by deadly attacks on a California synagogue, a Jewish grocery store in New Jersey and a rabbi’s New York home, the AntiDefamation League reported Tuesday. The Jewish civil rights group counted 2,107 antiSemitic incidents in 2019, finding 61 physical assault cases, 1,127 instances of harassment and 919 vandalism acts. That’s the highest annual tally since the New York Citybased group began tracking antiSemitic incidents in 1979, and a 12% increase over 1,879 incidents in 2018.
Biden campaign: Former Vice President Joe Biden on Tuesday rejected the notion that he is “hiding” at his Wilmington, Del., home amid the coronavirus pandemic, arguing that he is complying with public health guidelines and declaring that he is “winning” against President Trump. Biden has faced mounting concerns from Democratic donors, former Obama administration officials and aides to former 2020 primary rivals that his fromthebasement campaign has left him far less visible to U.S. voters than Trump.
Trump fundraising: President Trump’s fundraising pace slowed slightly for the second straight month as the nation reeled from the coronavirus outbreak, but he still holds a substantial cash advantage over presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden. The Republican National Committee and Trump’s reelection campaign announced Monday that they raised more than $61.7 million in April. It brings Trump’s total haul for the election cycle to over $742 million. That’s $288 million more than the Obama reelection effort had at this same point, the campaign and the RNC announced in a joint statement. The campaign raised $63 million in March, down from the $86 million raised in February.
Runway death: Police investigators are trying to determine how a man with apparently no security clearance ended up on a runway at a Texas airport where he was struck and killed by a landing commercial jet. Junin Ko, 22, died Thursday night when a Southwest Airlines plane struck him as it landed at AustinBergstrom International Airport, authorities said. Pilots had reported seeing a person while landing. The Boeing 737 aircraft was arriving from Dallas with 53 passengers and five crew members, airport spokesperson Bryce Dubee said. The man didn’t have a security badge, which would have cleared him to enter the airport’s secure side, Dubee told the AustinAmerican Statesman for a report published Monday. 1976 slaying: Prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed to a plea deal that would have freed a Georgia man who was convicted in a murder case decades ago, but a judge disagreed with the terms, keeping the man behind bars. Johnny Lee Gates, 63, was convicted of murder, rape and robbery in the 1976 slaying of Katharina Wright, 19, in an apartment in Columbus. Earlier this year, the state Supreme Court ruled Gates deserved a new trial after recent DNA tests cast “significant doubt” on his guilt. The hearing was held online due to the coronavirus pandemic.