NEWS OF THE DAY
From Across the Nation
_1 Lincoln statue: Boston’s arts commission voted unanimously this week to remove a statue that depicts a freed slave kneeling at Abraham Lincoln’s feet. The commission had fielded escalating complaints about the Emancipation Memorial, also known as the Freedman’s Memorial, as a nation confronting racial injustice rethinks old imagery. The statue has stood in a park just off Boston Common since 1879. It’s a copy of an identical monument that was erected in Washington, D.C., three years earlier. The copy was installed in Boston because the city was home to the statue’s white creator, Thomas Ball.
_2 Detroit shootings:. A 19yearold Detroit man has been sentenced to three life terms in prison for gunning down two gay men and a transgender woman who authorities believe were targeted because of their sexual orientation. A Wayne County jury convicted Devon Kareem Robinson of first degree premeditated murder in March in the May 2019 killings. Robinson was also sentenced to 10 to 20 years for each of two counts of assault with intent to murder.
_3 Voting ruling: A federal appellate court has stayed a lower court ruling that gave impoverished Florida felons the right to vote. The order issued Wednesday disappointed voting rights activists and could have national implications in November’s presidential election. In May, a federal judge ruled that Florida law can’t stop an estimated 774,000 disenfranchised felons from voting because they can’t pay back any legal fees and restitution they owe. The ruling called the law a “paytovote system.” Gov. Ron DeSantis appealed that ruling to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, requesting a stay of Hinkle’s ruling and a review of the case by the full appeals court. The appellate court, in a threesentence order Wednesday, granted both requests.
_4 Election upset: A pistolpacking restaurant owner who has expressed support for a farright conspiracy theory has upset fiveterm U.S. Rep. Scott Tipton in Colorado’s primary elections. Tipton became the fourth House member to lose renomination bids this year. Fellow Republican Reps. Steve King of Iowa and Denver Riggleman of Virginia, and Democrat Daniel Lipinski of Illinois, have already been ousted by challengers. Tipton lost Tuesday to Lauren Boebert, the owner of a gunfriendly restaurant in a western Colorado town called Rifle. Earlier this year, Boebert said in an interview that she was “very familiar” with the QAnon conspiracy theory, but she stopped short of saying she was a follower.
_5 Weinstein settlement: Harvey Weinstein and his former studio’s board have reached a nearly $19 million settlement with dozens of his sexual misconduct accusers, New York’s attorney general and lawyers in a classaction suit said. The deal, if approved by judges in federal courts, would permit accusers to claim from $7,500 to $750,000 from the $18.8 million settlement. The former Hollywood producer was convicted of rape and sexual assault and was diagnosed with the coronavirus in March, just days after he began serving his 23year prison sentence.
Chronicle News Services