All posts by nedhamson

Activist, writer, researcher, addicted to sharing information and facts.

Statement from President Joe Biden on Declaring a Federal Emergency in Texas | The White House – Biden on the job

I spoke today with Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell.

On the call, I raised the need for an emergency declaration and immediately approved a Major Disaster Declaration for the damage sustained from the hurricane, which ripped through Texas’ Gulf Coast and Houston yesterday.

FEMA has had resources on the ground since well before the storm and will support the needs of the state.

The greatest concern right now is the power outages and extreme heat that is impacting Texans. As you all know, extreme heat kills more Americans than all the other natural disasters combined.

As part of the federal support, we pre-positioned generators and are moving in additional ones to support any power outages, which will help Texans as the extreme heat arrives.

With this Major Disaster Declaration in place, we will provide life-saving and life-sustaining activities, and any other Federal resource that Texas needs. We will be with the people of Texas for as long as it takes to recover. Source: Statement from President Joe Biden on Declaring a Federal Emergency in Texas | The White House

Joint Statement on Strengthening Ukraine’s Air Defenses by U.S. President Joseph R. Biden, Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy | The White House

…As we strengthen Ukraine’s air defenses, we are grateful to the coalition of more than 50 countries that continues to provide security assistance to Ukraine, as well as to the Immediate Action on Air Defense Initiative – to which partners have pledged more than $1 billion in support of air defense for Ukraine – and the Integrated Air and Missile Defense Capability Coalition, co-led by Germany and France. We also welcome NATO’s work to support Ukraine’s efforts to develop a NATO-interoperable integrated air and missile defense architecture. Our message to Moscow and the world is clear: Our support for Ukraine is strong and unwavering.

Source: Joint Statement on Strengthening Ukraine’s Air Defenses by U.S. President Joseph R. Biden, Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy | The White House

US justice department says it disrupted Russian social media influence operation | Social media | The Guardian

The US Department of Justice said on Tuesday that it disrupted a Russian operation that used fake social media accounts enhanced by artificial intelligence to covertly spread pro-Kremlin messages in the United States and abroad.

The news comes four months before the US presidential election, which security experts widely believe will be the target of both hacking and covert social media influence attempts by foreign adversaries. Senior US officials have said publicly they are monitoring for schemes intended to disrupt the vote

The justice department secured court approval to seize two domain names and search nearly 1,000 social media accounts allegedly associated with the effort.

“With these actions, the justice department has disrupted a Russian-government backed, AI-enabled propaganda campaign to use a bot farm to spread disinformation in the United States and abroad,” the US attorney general, Merrick Garland, said in a statement…

Source: US justice department says it disrupted Russian social media influence operation | Social media | The Guardian