The Washington Post reports: Rep. Anthony Gonzalez (R-Ohio), one of 10 Republicans who voted to impeach former president Donald Trump, on Thursday announced he will not seek reelection in 2022, citing a desire to “build a fuller family life” as well as “the toxic dynamics inside our own party.” Gonzalez, a former professional football player, was once seen as a …

Variety reports: Jane Powell, who starred as an angelically visaged young actress in a number of MGM musicals including “Royal Wedding” and “Seven Brides for Seven Brothers” during the 1940s and 1950s, has died of natural causes. She was 92 years old. The blonde, blue-eyed Powell usually played characters with a gentle mischievous streak in her musical comedies, but she …

Euronews reports: Italy has become the first European country to make COVID-19 health passes mandatory for all workers. The Italian government approved a new measure on Thursday that makes digital vaccine certificates compulsory for both public and private sectors. The obligation is set to begin from October 15 and remain in force until the end of the year. All employees …

Mediaite reports: Former President Donald Trump expressed his support for individuals charged over January 6th, two days before a planned “Justice for J6” rally at the Capitol. Hundreds of people, per the DOJ, have been arrested in connection with the riots at the Capitol. A mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol after the then-president repeatedly stirred up the big …

Ars Technica reports: A hospital system in Arkansas is making it a bit more difficult for staff to receive a religious exemption from its COVID-19 vaccine mandate. The hospital is now requiring staff to also swear off extremely common medicines, such as Tylenol, Tums, and even Preparation H, to get the exemption.Conway Regional Health System noted an unusual uptick in …

“It isn’t just our southern border. It’s come in from anywhere. We don’t care who you are or how dangerous you are, come on in. It’s only the Republicans who are the threat. It isn’t people from other countries, some of whom may want to destroy our country. I mean, that is the attitude of this administration. “And the Somali …

The Arizona Republic reports: Arizona’s largest health system is warning the public against using the antiparasitic drug ivermectin to treat or prevent COVID-19. Misuse of ivermectin has led to 30 calls managed by Banner Health’s Poison and Drug Information Center this year, including 10 cases in August, according to data from the Phoenix-based nonprofit health system. At least seven cases …

The Daily Beast reports: A Fox News spokesperson on Wednesday evening confirmed to The Daily Beast that Lindell’s two, more recently submitted FrankSpeech ads were, in fact, rejected. “I’m going to make another ad this week, and see if they deny that ad,” Lindell promised on Monday. According to Lindell, following Monday’s rejection, he shot yet another new ad on …

The American Independent reports: New York Rep. Elise Stefanik, the third-ranked Republican in the House, began running a series of campaign ads on Facebook on Wednesday invoking a racist conspiracy theory that falsely alleges that immigrants are being invited to the United States to replace white voters. The campaign for Stefanik, who is up for reelection in November 2022 for …

The Kansas Reflector reports: The Kansas Attorney General’s Office has agreed to pay the American Civil Liberties Union and other attorneys $1.9 million in fees and expenses for a five-year legal battle over an unconstitutional restriction on voter registrations. The high-profile lawsuit was filed 2016 in response to former Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s signature law, which required residents to …

The Hill reports: A Newsmax host on Wednesday screamed at a guest on his program after the guest suggested both President Biden and former President Trump’s administrations are to blame for the crisis in Afghanistan. The guest, Joe Saboe, is an Iraq War veteran and founded Team America, an organization aiming to help Americans, allies of the United States and …

Via email from right wing commentator Erick Erickson: I need to submit a proposition to you. What if Joe Biden’s demands for mandatory vaccines at companies of a hundred people or more is not intended to increase compliance with the vaccination rate, but is rather intended to have the effect everyone said it would, for people to dig in their …

The Orlando Sentinel reports: Gov. Ron DeSantis’ political committee is almost $50 million ahead of his major Democratic rivals, and August only brought more big checks from around the country. While DeSantis is doing extremely well with small donations of $25 or less, taking in almost 13,000 such individual contributions, some of his biggest donors are from out of state, …

Louisville’s NBC News affiliate reports: A woman’s emergency order request for a Louisville hospital to treat her husband, who is suffering from COVID, with ivermectin, has been denied by a judge. Angela Underwood said in a lawsuit that Norton Brownsboro refused to give the treatment to her husband, Lonnie, without a court order and supervision by a doctor who has …

The New York Daily News reports: Federal regulators haven’t authorized booster shots of the coronavirus vaccine yet — but Mayor de Blasio is already laying the groundwork for administering them. “We need to be ready to move immediately,” he said at his daily morning briefing. “We are ready.” De Blasio’s plan taps all 1,900 vaccination sites in the five boroughs …

CTV News reports: With less then a week until election day, former U.S. president Barack Obama has waded into the fray to bolster the campaign of Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau, who he describes as his “friend.” Even after Obama left office, the pair have maintained friendly relations, with the former president visiting Trudeau at an Ottawa brewery for a pint …

The Associated Press reports: Pope Francis said Wednesday he didn’t understand why people refuse to take COVID-19 vaccines, saying “humanity has a history of friendship with vaccines,” and that serene discussion about the shots was necessary to help them. Francis noted that children for decades have been vaccinated against measles, mumps and polio “and no one said anything.” “Even in …

Bloomberg News reports: Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich acknowledged that his suit challenging the Biden Administration’s announced Covid-19 vaccine requirements for many U.S. workers is unlikely to succeed because the actual rules haven’t been finalized. “Is it a long shot? Yeah, I recognize that,” Brnovich, a Republican former federal prosecutor who is running for U.S. Senate in 2022, said in …

NPR reports: Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis wed his longtime partner on Wednesday, marking the first same-sex marriage of a sitting United States governor. In 2018, Polis became the first openly gay man ever elected governor in the U.S. A decade earlier, he was the first openly gay man elected to the U.S. House. “Over the course of Jared’s career …

The Associated Press reports: Idaho public health leaders on Thursday expanded health care rationing statewide amid a massive increase in the number of coronavirus patients requiring hospitalization. The Idaho Department of Health and Welfare made the announcement after St. Luke’s Health System, Idaho’s largest hospital network, on Wednesday asked state health leaders to allow “crisis standards of care” because the …