Education dept. opens civil rights inquiry into Harvard’s legacy admissions
The Education Department has opened a civil rights investigation into Harvard University’s legacy admissions policy. The inquiry will examine allegations that Harvard’s practice of showing preference for relatives of alumni and donors discriminates against Black, Hispanic and Asian applicants in favor of white and wealthy students who are less qualified. The process could lead to a settlement with Harvard or trigger a legal battle like the one that led to the Supreme Court’s decision to severely limit race-conscious admissions last month. A spokesperson for Harvard said the university was already reviewing admissions policies to ensure it is in compliance with the law after that decision.
Booksellers move to the front lines of the fight against book bans in Texas
A group of booksellers, publishers and authors filed a lawsuit Tuesday to stop a new law in Texas that would require stores to rate books based on sexual content, arguing the measure would violate their First Amendment rights and be all but impossible to implement. The law, set to take effect in September, would force booksellers to evaluate and rate each title they sell to schools, as well as books they sold in the past. If they fail to comply, stores would be banned from doing business with schools. The lawsuit is the latest attempt to push back on book bans, which have surged in the past two years in the U.S.
Ohio will vote on abortion rights
Ohio voters will decide in November whether to amend their state constitution to establish a right to abortion, after state officials said Tuesday that proponents had submitted more than enough valid signatures from voters to put the question on the ballot. The measure’s supporters face another hurdle, however. Republicans in the state Legislature have put up a ballot question of their own that would raise the threshold of voters required to amend the state constitution to 60% instead of a simple majority. That question is on the ballot in a special election on Aug. 8; early voting on that amendment is already in progress.
Serial killing suspect’s home held a 279-weapon arsenal and a walk-in vault
The Long Island architect charged in the Gilgo Beach serial murder case kept 279 weapons in his rundown home, most of them in a basement vault, authorities said Tuesday. At a news conference outside Rex Heuermann’s house, where authorities have been collecting evidence since Heuermann’s July 13 arrest, Suffolk County district attorney Raymond A. Tierney said his team was wrapping up its search after more than a week. Heuermann is facing charges in connection with the killings of three women whose bodies were dumped along a road on the South Shore of Long Island, and is the prime suspect in a fourth killing. He is being held without bail and has pleaded not guilty.
Biden creates monument to Emmett Till
In 1955, the mother of Emmett Till wrote to President Dwight Eisenhower pleading for justice for her 14-year-old son, whose murder galvanized the Civil Rights Movement. On Tuesday, 68 years later, President Joe Biden established the Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument, which includes three protected sites — one in Illinois, where Till was born, and two in Mississippi, where he was tortured and killed after being accused of whistling at a white woman. The Rev. Wheeler Parker Jr., Till’s cousin and the last living witness to his abduction, said, “Back then in the darkness, I couldn’t have imagined a moment like this, standing in the light of wisdom, grace and deliverance.”
Both sides plan for next battles over Israel’s court overhaul
After frenzied days capped by Israeli lawmakers voting to limit judicial power and protesters clashing with police, doctors went on strike Tuesday, the military tried to stave off resignations and all sides girded for a longer fight over the government’s court overhaul. The far-right governing coalition’s plan to weaken the courts has set off months of unrest that threatens to widen Israel’s social fissures into yawning chasms. Monday’s vote in parliament enacted the first piece of that program — the stripping of the Supreme Court’s ability to block government actions and appointments as “unreasonable” — prompting an eruption of late-night street protests.
China’s foreign minister is removed after a month of silence
Only five weeks ago, China’s foreign minister, Qin Gang, was at the center of an important restoration of high-level diplomacy in U.S.-China relations: He shook hands with Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Beijing and accepted an invitation to visit the United States. But in a sign of the capriciousness of China’s elite politics, Qin was abruptly removed as foreign minister Tuesday after having disappeared from public view for 30 days. The move ended the career of a diplomat who had leaped to the top as one of President Xi Jinping’s most trusted rising stars. His spot was taken by former Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
34 killed in Algerian wildfires as heat waves parch Mediterranean region
Wildfires devouring swaths of Algeria’s Mediterranean coast have killed 34 people over two days, Algerian authorities said Tuesday, as an extreme heat wave sears North Africa, Southern Europe and the sea between them. The dead include 10 soldiers who were aiding rescue efforts across Algeria’s forested Kabylia region, the Algerian Interior Ministry said. Another 16 people died in the fires in the village of Ath Oussalah, according to Berber TV, a local broadcaster. The fires forced more than 1,500 households to evacuate and caused at least 1,700 homes to lose power, state-run radio reported. Plumes of smoke rose from at least 16 cities east of the capital, Algiers.
An investigation into Mexico’s 43 missing sudents ends in ‘falsehoods and diversions’
A panel of international experts investigating the 2014 abduction of 43 students in southern Mexico said Tuesday that it was ending its inquiry after being repeatedly lied to and misled by the Mexican armed forces. Members of the Mexican military misrepresented their whereabouts during the crime, denied access to key documents and withheld details about their involvement in the disappearance and cover-up, the experts said in a report released Tuesday. “It hurts to see how a case that could have been solved in the first few weeks ended up entangled in lies, falsehoods and diversions of the investigation,” the report said.
By wire sources