Ted Mann
@thetrough
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reporter @business. lapsed philadelphian. co-author of Lights Out: Pride, Delusion, and the Fall of General Electric https://t.co/aaUWnBuDnr
Joined March 2013
Andrew Cuomo spent $1 billion to build a factory for Elon Musk — a would be solar panel factory that was supposed to save Buffalo. What the state got in return: “the biggest economic development boondoggle in American history.” From @bykowicz and me.
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lol AP got around Microsoft no-commenting them on Bing by asking Bing.
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we know this much: it would be really funny to hear Cuomo’s new position on who is responsible for the subway.
New poll from @slingshotstrat finds former Gov. Cuomo would win a hypothetical election if @NYCMayor steps down. Approval for the mayor among the 600 registered voters polled is at 36% (Quinnipiac polled 1,297 registered voters, for contrast, and he had a 28% approval)
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Our colleague Evan Gershkovich has been unjustly held by Russia for 16 long weeks. With help from the National Press Club, we are reading his work for 24 straight hours. Please tune in, share his story, and join us in demanding that he be set free. #IStandwithEvan.
Here is the link for the next 24 hours of Evan Gershkovich’s colleagues, family and friends reading his excellent journalism - please tune in often to discover his work. #IStandWithEvan
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While we wait to hear what they're going to do to the Wall Street Journal's Washington bureau, a reminder that this isn't a startup that burned through its seed corn with no plan. Dow Jones' publisher was boasting about record profit margins to investors less than a month ago.
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The subways’ vulnerability to rain-driven floods has been painfully obvious at least since the floods in 2007. There has been some improvement, but it’s wild to see how spotty the hardening of the system has been in all this time.
There is only extremely limited subway service available because of heavy flooding caused by rainfall. Service may be suspended on certain stations. Check to see if service is running at your station.
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@nycsouthpaw One interesting thing about having worked this job in this particular lifetime is that some of the crooks I covered when I was young wouldn't *be* crooks today. The corruption laws they broke have been disassembled and tossed in the river.
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POISON IVY: DeSantis and Ramaswamy are the latest Republicans to lambaste higher ed in search of populist clout. They would also really like to remind you that they went to Harvard and Yale. from @bykowicz and me.
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Elon Musk says he can revolutionize tunnel-building. Mayors across the country take note. Hijinks, and not much tunneling, ensue. @bykowicz and me on the Boring Company, and whether there’s anything there.
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RIP Russell Banks. 'The Sweet Hereafter' is perfect. And so is this, which he found abandoned in an upstate library doing research for 'Cloudsplitter,' and which I found procrastinating in the stack on a bad Baldwin thesis. May I present the fountain(s) of youth.
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a truly classic NYC pissing match is unfolding, with all the necessary ingredients involved: real estate, money, political egos, and everyone not wanting James Dolan to be happy if they can help it.
The latest bid to rebuild Penn Station would demolish a theater on the west side of Madison Square Garden and encase the arena in a neoclassical-inspired stone podium. Expected cost: $6B, about a billion less than the MTA's proposal (w/ @danarubinstein) .
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Disgraceful of Carlson to suggest Evan was “breaking [their] law.” He wasn’t. Carlson knows that. Evan is a law-abiding, decent reporter being held hostage for geopolitical leverage. He should be released immediately. #iStandwithEvan.
Tucker Carlson asks Putin if he's willing to release @evangershkovich "and we'll bring him back to the United States." Putin is noncommittal. Carlson: "He's a kid, and maybe he was breaking your law in some way, but he's not a super spy.".
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Among the great details in this deep dive into the Cuellar family: the town of Rio Bravo wouldn't even share its own municipal budget when reporters came calling about the congressman's sister's make-work job. Teensy red flag, that.
Henry Cuellar's sister, Rosie, had a job as a judge where she has heard no cases in a town with no court and no police department. And their brother Martin, a Texas sheriff, was named in a federal subpoena in an investigation into cleaning contracts.
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This one is wild. Either a very strange dodge or evidence of really not understanding how these projects work.
Asked by @bern_hogan for her reaction to the MTA's announced pause on Second Avenue Subway construction, Gov. Hochul said today "the Second Avenue subway would not have started today. Okay, let's be realistic".
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Joe Biden needs a blowout in Philadelphia, where support is lagging among critical blocs of young, progressive and Black voters. It's a bad time for the city's Democratic party to be at war with itself. Checking in on the old machine:.
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imagine stumbling on this scene and thinking the concrete and green paint were in the wrong.
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@nycsouthpaw it was formative for me as a reporter to realize that a core fact in a SC case (assumed true even in the dissent) could be totally false. and this seems substantially worse than that.
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chisel “traits of an armed person” into the wall of the cop speak hall of fame.
NEW: Baltimore Police say the person shot was 17 years old, saying he was displaying traits of an armed person before he took off running. Officers rendered aid and the 17 year old is in critical condition. @wjz
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This paragraph…
NEW @BW feature investigation: Corporate America Never Really Quit Forced Labor. Inmates do billions of dollars of work, touching almost every corner of US life. A trafficking lawsuit claims many are kept in prison because the business is just too good:.
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63 days ago, Russia took our colleague Evan Gershkovich prisoner. It's part of a pattern of cynical hostage diplomacy. Repeat his name, read his work, and join us in demanding that he be free. #IStandwithEvan.
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Oh that.
What’s going to happen to that $3.4 billion from USDOT for Second Avenue Subway Phase 2? Are we sending it back?.
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Our colleague, Evan Gershkovich, has been held by Russia on bogus charges for eight weeks. Share his name, spread his story. Demand that he be freed. #IStandWithEvan
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Well, this is great. Congratulations @bykowicz! No one works harder, thinks more creatively about stories, or more consistently makes her coworkers’ stories better. (I would know.). The Banner is so lucky to have you.
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Apropos of nothing, here is a story about @elonmusk and The Boring Co. in which we tried to find any evidence for their claims they could "solve" traffic. You should read it.
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The debate over congestion pricing in New York City has been going on for a literal human generation. Sitting congressmen from the NYC burbs pretending they don't understand its most basic elements is very weird. (Same goes for not understanding what an operating subsidy is.).
I’m calling for a congressional oversight hearing to demand answers from the @MTA and require testimony, under oath, from the MTA CEO on how $15 billion COVID tax dollars were squandered, & why the MTA is hitting families with the #CongestionTax. @1010Wins.
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To refresh the Acela, Amtrak spent $2 billion for a fleet of brand-new trains. There's a problem: getting them to run on the same old railroad. Why the new Acelas are running *years* late:.
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after Enron, a friend of a friend came back from her job at Arthur Andersen with a box of corporate branded candies. we called them the indict mints.
Silicon Valley Bank cheese boards: now going for $200
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tired: I have a bridge I'd like to sell you. wired:.
Friends of Louisville, imagine an infrastructure project that would transform our Commonwealth’s largest city into the modern age with a tunnel project that will connect Jefferson County, reduce traffic congestion, and will expand our tourism opportunities.
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“They will take down the worst actors here and there, but their bread is buttered by people like Alex Jones. Alex Jones made them a lot of money.” . The quiet battle between Twitter and Facebook and the families of Sandy Hook.
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Former WWE CEO Vince McMahon is facing new legal demands from women who accuse him of sexual assault, including a previously unreported allegation of assault from 2011, and a 1986 allegation of rape. From @joe_palazzolo and me.
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Even in a moment of maximum glee over the Democrats' feud over the family car keys, Republicans continue to be really not great at passing bills in the house of congress they control.
APPROPS: House GOP failed to pass legislative branch spending bill.
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This is a really smart story. Faced with going the long way around, some truckers are taking hazmat placards off their rigs and plowing ahead into Baltimore's highway tunnels. .
Ever since a container ship rammed into the Key Bridge, trucks carrying hazmat on the I-95 corridor have had to take the much longer route around the beltway. Except for those illegally taking the tunnels, at great risk. Great @BaltimoreBanner reporting:
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This new material is going to kill at recess.
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This is really great.
The final episode of my podcast about Putin’s childhood, “About a Boy,” is out today! . I hope you like listening to it as much as I loved making it.
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Opening the door to strikes could give flight attendants and caterers leverage they need in negotiations with airlines. It might also lead to major disruptions in air travel just in time for summer and the height of Biden's reelection campaign.
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Pretty wild to see some of these major projects actually starting to move.
🚄🇺🇸 Another day, another major project milestone. In partnership with @USDOTFRA & @MDOTNews, Amtrak is replacing the 118+ year old Susquehanna River Rail Bridge to upgrade speeds (up to 160 mph!), capacity and reliability for Amtrak and @mtamaryland MARC riders.
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the edit page casually suggesting, based on no evidence, that the president is directing prosecution decisions about charging Donald Trump.
"At least Watergate involved a burglary.".-- WSJ edit page on the superseding indictment alleging Trump plotted to destroy evidence
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You could be forgiven for thinking Amtrak’s plans to overhaul Baltimore’s Penn Station would remain the stuff of renderings and wishful thinking. But here, as elsewhere, a trickle of investment has become a flood, and a new station is rising.
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Chuck Schumer, a bit unintentionally, with the sad truth of what gets built and why in American infrastructure:. “With so much money already there, there’s virtually no chance it won’t be completed,” Mr. Schumer, the Democratic majority leader, said in a brief interview.
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"This is not really the M.O. in D.C., a town where careerism enabled by professional childcare is the norm. I can count with the fingers on one, maybe two hands the number of times a male colleague has brought his kid to a 'grown-up' political event.".
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Vince McMahon has been accused of abuse and sex trafficking by a former WWE employee he offered $3 million for her silence. Suing to break her NDA, she alleges a pattern of coercion, battery and degrading acts. from @khadeeja_safdar w @joe_palazzolo and me.
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One day I hope to be as flexible as a New Jersey politician's understanding of the verb "exonerate.".
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It's an admirable goal, but my goodness, "straightening" is doing a lot of lifting here. You and whose property acquisition fund.
If the necessary upgrades were made (straightening and route wide electrification) NYC to Montreal would become extremely popular. Average speed of 90mph would easily make it more desirable than plane or driving. NYC to Albany is already one of Amtrak’s most popular routes.
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Important context to the UFT trying to kill congestion pricing (and a huge new stream of mass transit funding) on behalf of the tiny minority of workers who drive into Manhattan -->.
And for those with long-ish memories, six years ago: "Time for some more parking problems in the Big Apple. In an election-year gift, the de Blasio administration is issuing up to 50,000 more car placards to [DOE workers]"
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the stars, they’re just like us.
Putin says Prigozhin was a “talented person” who “made serious mistakes.”
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“If I have my health and strength, I’m going to be the most appalling old lady.”. legend.
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seems like a call for a trans-Pacific partnership of some sort.
China has signed up 155 Countries (out of 195) and 32 International Organizations for the BRI -Bridges – Roads Initiative. This accounts for half the world populations and half the world’s GDP. When will America Stand Up and Take Notice?
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.@NewsCorp's Dow Jones unit, which publishes @WSJ, has seen nice revenue growth in recent years. Employees, not so much. I’m supporting the @IAPE1096 proposal to bring our wages back to where they were before the pandemic! $NWSA #IAPEStrong
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Someone had an accident.
Found on a baby changing table in restroom underneath House floor: . “Declaring the office of Speaker of the House of Representatives to be vacant,” from Rep. @mattgaetz, Sept. 15, 2023, 11:22am
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@adamlisberg @2AvSagas @MTA for less than $11 billion they should have combined the two railroads they own or at least made them share the largest train station in the world.
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@WesleyLowery I know you know, but to be clear, the actual newsroom isn’t engaged in crisis comms for anybody.
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Smart campaigns don't do this.
Harris campaign is blocking reporters from talking to voters outside the press pen here at Whitmer/Shapiro event in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania.
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The president of the Teamsters bashing Amazon for putting profits over the interests of the common man and hitting “corporate elites,” from the lectern of the Republican National Convention.
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Just finished my friend @NKingofDC’s American Ramble, a book about a guy who walked out of his house in Washington and didn’t stop until he reached New York. Which is to say it is a book about a lot of thoughts and people, and the marks both of those leave on the land.
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hmm. "He had a genius for victimization, which he would fall back on in response to criticism of his policies or of his personal behavior or to investigations into accusations that swirled around him".
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inspector general generally inspected.
A federal regulator has suspended its inspector general after an oversight body found that he engaged in “substantial misconduct,” including wasting government funds, outing whistleblowers and disparaging employees
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Don’t look away. Russia has taken our friend and colleague hostage. #FreeEvan.
Such an outrageous, upsetting situation.
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poverty is a barely escapable racket, part one million or so. nothing makes it clearer than the policy choices that compel low-income workers to own cars.
An auto-dependent society puts tremendous pressure on low-income people to own cars. A car can eat up someone’s budget, expose them to predatory lenders who hurt their credit, or worse. And they're getting more expensive. My latest for @voxdotcom
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Really great reporting on the outsized toll fentanyl and opioids have taken on the people of Baltimore.
People in Baltimore have been dying of overdoses at a rate never before seen in a major American city. In the past six years, nearly 6,000 lives have been lost.
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“He has never cared about America, its citizens, its future or anything but himself." Smart @jdawsey1 look at all the former Trumpers who fear his return to power, and how little his supporters seem to care.
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"Among the requirements during her 30-day review period: produce a scoop a week.". To rig the game is bad enough, but to be this obvious about it just makes the bosses look stupid. What a shameful way to treat a great reporter.
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Karen was the epitome of the happy warrior: so kind and so dedicated to the cause.
Karen Hobert Flynn, Common Cause leader and CT reformer, dies
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strange but true!.
Time for another installment of, "The Man Who Wrote This Paragraph For The WSJ Edit Page Used to Run The WSJ Newsroom, Believe It Or Not." .
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@tomgara the Hazy center is essentially a monument to Dad Vibes. so much plaque reading, so much opportunity for half remembered history channel riffing. huge ass things all over the place. Daddymandias.
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the take we were waiting for, setting up the tree now.
wild that Michael Caine was in The Muppet Christmas Carol and it's still not even close to the best Christmas movie he was in, which is obviously Children of Men
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@joe_palazzolo McMahon has told people he isn't going to pay, fumed about being advised to retire, and talked about making a comeback.
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the cringey rapping character in a mandatory corporate don't-get-phished training video.
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furthermore:. She preferred, she said, to remain unmarried, explaining that “men are awfully hard work for very little reward.”.
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I can’t believe I’m learning that our style is “the c-word” from something other than a Preet Bharara wiretap in Albany.
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@semaforben Surely Bill Ackman wouldn’t speak with total certainty about the operations of an industry in which he has never worked.
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“Everyone’s having to do layoffs.”. Really? Why?
"Everyone's having to do layoffs" is never a valid justification for layoffs. #WSJHongKong
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Happy Earth Day to Oklahoma Republicans, who got mad at banks over ESG, banned the big ones for being oil "boycotters," and thereby racked up $185 million in excess municipal borrowing costs in less than two years. (They are, now, um, rethinking things.)
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“It’s too soon to negotiate about AI” when every creative industry’s workers are trying to determine how much economic damage it will do to their people. Come on.
That moment when mgmt says it can't respond to your contract proposal on AI, because the company is still reviewing the effects of AI, and then announces a new EVP of AI. 🤔
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Kyrsten Sinema Gets a Look From GOP as Kari Lake Stirs Drama. via @bykowicz and @elizacollins1
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@2AvSagas Can't remember an MTA head showing up the governor -- especially by repeatedly invoking her political motivations -- like this.
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News business bean counters keep doing dumb things. This is a huge loss for New York.
Two mayors, two govs, two MTA chairs and god knows how many budgets — proud of the stories on billion dollar stations, unequal COVID and mpox vaccine access, kids left in lead-tainted apartments, and unsafe shelters. It’s been a good run. Got laid off. Will be at the bar.
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It’s about protecting the kids, you see.
“A Black reporter from the Beacon Journal assigned to cover the event left, for his own safety, after being called a racial slur several times by protesters.”
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@daveweigel this was a funny line to listen to after spending part of the day in a room full of remember-that-guy Trump minor characters nodding sagely at abolishing the FBI and the ATF. oh, there’s policy all right….
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The Ivy League is what they need it to be, depending on the crowd. From a while ago:
NGL, I did not expect "Yale" to appear at all, much less 3 times, in Trump's VP announcement. But I guess that's just what plays well in Rust Belt diners . .
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LOL good luck with that.
Earlier this week, @WSJopinion published an op-ed about @ProPublica's tax coverage. We don't typically comment on our newsgathering process, but this opinion essay has factual errors in the headline and in the essay that should be corrected by @WSJ. We've submitted the
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an AR-15 salesman contemplates the slaughter of 20 children with his product:
Americans own more than 20 million AR-15 rifles. How did a once-disdained weapon become an icon of the culture wars—and a huge moneymaker for the gun industry?
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can we get a preemptive industry-wide ban on “Boy Meets X” headline constructions. the threat is real, we must act.
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New trains parked in the yard. Old ones idled to be stripped for parts. The new Acela is running late. It has cost Amtrak $140 million and counting….
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Tip generously!.
BREAKING: A 6-3 Supreme Court rules a federal bribery law doesn’t cover gratuities, or gifts given to public officials for acts they’ve already taken. Sotomayor, Kagan & Jackson dissent. (Snyder v. U.S., No. 23-108) #SCOTUS.
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