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joker 777 WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. — President-elect Donald Trump said Saturday that he wants , father of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, to serve as ambassador to France. Trump made the announcement in a Truth Social post, calling Charles Kushner “a tremendous business leader, philanthropist, & dealmaker." Kushner is the founder of Kushner Companies, a real estate firm. Jared Kushner is a former White House senior adviser to Trump who is married to Trump’s eldest daughter, Ivanka. by Trump in December 2020 after pleading guilty years earlier to tax evasion and making illegal campaign donations. Charles Kushner arrives July 20, 2022, for the funeral of Ivana Trump in New York. that after Charles Kushner discovered his brother-in-law was cooperating with federal authorities in an investigation, he hatched a scheme for revenge and intimidation. Kushner hired a prostitute to lure his brother-in-law, then arranged to have the encounter in a New Jersey motel room recorded with a hidden camera and the recording sent to Kushner's own sister, the man’s wife, prosecutors said. Kushner eventually pleaded guilty to 18 counts including tax evasion and witness tampering. He was sentenced in 2005 to two years in prison — the most he could receive under a plea deal, but less than what Chris Christie, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey at the time and later governor and Republican presidential candidate, sought. Christie blamed Jared Kushner for his firing from Trump’s transition team in 2016, and called Charles Kushner’s offenses “one of the most loathsome, disgusting crimes that I prosecuted when I was U.S. attorney.” Trump and the elder Kushner knew each other from real estate circles and their children were married in 2009. Among President-elect Donald Trump's picks are Susie Wiles for chief of staff, Susie Wiles, 67, was a senior adviser to Trump's 2024 presidential campaign and its de facto manager. Trump to be secretary of state, making a former sharp critic his choice to be the new administration's top diplomat. Rubio, 53, is a noted hawk on China, Cuba and Iran, and was a finalist to be Trump's running mate on the Republican ticket last summer. Rubio is the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “He will be a strong Advocate for our Nation, a true friend to our Allies, and a fearless Warrior who will never back down to our adversaries,” Trump said of Rubio in a statement. The announcement punctuates the hard pivot Rubio has made with Trump, whom the senator called a “con man" during his unsuccessful campaign for the 2016 GOP presidential nomination. Their relationship improved dramatically while Trump was in the White House. And as Trump campaigned for the presidency a third time, Rubio cheered his proposals. For instance, Rubio, who more than a decade ago helped craft immigration legislation that included a path to citizenship for people in the U.S. illegally, now supports Trump's plan to use the U.S. military for mass deportations. Pete Hegseth, 44, is a co-host of Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends Weekend” and has been a contributor with the network since 2014, where he developed a friendship with Trump, who made regular appearances on the show. Hegseth lacks senior military or national security experience. If confirmed by the Senate, he would inherit the top job during a series of global crises — ranging from Russia’s war in Ukraine and the ongoing attacks in the Middle East by Iranian proxies to the push for a cease-fire between Israel, Hamas and Hezbollah and escalating worries about the growing alliance between Russia and North Korea. Hegseth is also the author of “The War on Warriors: Behind the Betrayal of the Men Who Keep Us Free,” published earlier this year. Trump tapped Pam Bondi, 59, to be attorney general after U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz withdrew his name from consideration. She was Florida's first female attorney general, serving between 2011 and 2019. She also was on Trump’s legal team during his first impeachment trial in 2020. Considered a loyalist, she served as part of a Trump-allied outside group that helped lay the groundwork for his future administration called the America First Policy Institute. Bondi was among a group of Republicans who showed up to support Trump at his hush money criminal trial in New York that ended in May with a conviction on 34 felony counts. A fierce defender of Trump, she also frequently appears on Fox News and has been a critic of the criminal cases against him. Trump picked South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, a well-known conservative who faced sharp criticism for telling a story in her memoir about shooting a rambunctious dog, to lead an agency crucial to the president-elect’s hardline immigration agenda. Noem used her two terms leading a tiny state to vault to a prominent position in Republican politics. South Dakota is usually a political afterthought. But during the COVID-19 pandemic, Noem did not order restrictions that other states had issued and instead declared her state “open for business.” Trump held a fireworks rally at Mount Rushmore in July 2020 in one of the first large gatherings of the pandemic. She takes over a department with a sprawling mission. In addition to key immigration agencies, the Department of Homeland Security oversees natural disaster response, the U.S. Secret Service, and Transportation Security Administration agents who work at airports. The governor of North Dakota, who was once little-known outside his state, Burgum is a former Republican presidential primary contender who endorsed Trump, and spent months traveling to drum up support for him, after dropping out of the race. Burgum was a serious contender to be Trump’s vice presidential choice this summer. The two-term governor was seen as a possible pick because of his executive experience and business savvy. Burgum also has close ties to deep-pocketed energy industry CEOs. Trump made the announcement about Burgum joining his incoming administration while addressing a gala at his Mar-a-Lago club, and said a formal statement would be coming the following day. In comments to reporters before Trump took the stage, Burgum said that, in recent years, the power grid is deteriorating in many parts of the country, which he said could raise national security concerns but also drive up prices enough to increase inflation. “There's just a sense of urgency, and a sense of understanding in the Trump administration,” Burgum said. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. ran for president as a Democrat, than as an independent, and . He's the son of Democratic icon Robert Kennedy, who was assassinated during his own presidential campaign. The nomination of Kennedy to lead the Department of Health and Human Services alarmed people who are concerned about . For example, he has long advanced the debunked idea that vaccines cause autism. Scott Bessent, 62, is a former George Soros money manager and an advocate for deficit reduction. He's the founder of hedge fund Key Square Capital Management, after having worked on-and-off for Soros Fund Management since 1991. If confirmed by the Senate, he would be the nation’s first openly gay treasury secretary. He told Bloomberg in August that he decided to join Trump’s campaign in part to attack the mounting U.S. national debt. That would include slashing government programs and other spending. “This election cycle is the last chance for the U.S. to grow our way out of this mountain of debt without becoming a sort of European-style socialist democracy,” he said then. Oregon Republican U.S. Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer narrowly lost her reelection bid this month, but received strong backing from union members in her district. As a potential labor secretary, she would oversee the Labor Department’s workforce, its budget and put forth priorities that impact workers’ wages, health and safety, ability to unionize, and employer’s rights to fire employers, among other responsibilities. Chavez-DeRemer is one of few House Republicans to endorse the “Protecting the Right to Organize” or PRO Act would allow more workers to conduct organizing campaigns and would add penalties for companies that violate workers’ rights. The act would also weaken “right-to-work” laws that allow employees in more than half the states to avoid participating in or paying dues to unions that represent workers at their places of employment. Scott Turner is a former NFL player and White House aide. He ran the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council during Trump’s first term in office. Trump, in a statement, credited Turner, the highest-ranking Black person he’s yet selected for his administration, with “helping to lead an Unprecedented Effort that Transformed our Country’s most distressed communities.” Sean Duffy is a former House member from Wisconsin who was one of Trump's most visible defenders on cable news. Duffy served in the House for nearly nine years, sitting on the Financial Services Committee and chairing the subcommittee on insurance and housing. He left Congress in 2019 for a TV career and has been the host of “The Bottom Line” on Fox Business. Before entering politics, Duffy was a reality TV star on MTV, where he met his wife, “Fox and Friends Weekend” co-host Rachel Campos-Duffy. They have nine children. A campaign donor and CEO of Denver-based Liberty Energy, Write is a vocal advocate of oil and gas development, including fracking — a key pillar of Trump’s quest to achieve U.S. “energy dominance” in the global market. Wright also has been one of the industry’s loudest voices against efforts to fight climate change. He said the climate movement around the world is “collapsing under its own weight.” The Energy Department is responsible for advancing energy, environmental and nuclear security of the United States. Wright also won support from influential conservatives, including oil and gas tycoon Harold Hamm. Hamm, executive chairman of Oklahoma-based Continental Resources, a major shale oil company, is a longtime Trump supporter and adviser who played a key role on energy issues in Trump’s first term. President-elect Donald Trump tapped billionaire professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to be secretary of the Education Department, tasked with overseeing an agency Trump promised to dismantle. McMahon led the Small Business Administration during Trump’s initial term from 2017 to 2019 and twice ran unsuccessfully as a Republican for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut. She’s seen as a relative unknown in education circles, though she expressed support for charter schools and school choice. She served on the Connecticut Board of Education for a year starting in 2009 and has spent years on the board of trustees for Sacred Heart University in Connecticut. Brooke Rollins, who graduated from Texas A&M University with a degree in agricultural development, is a longtime Trump associate who served as White House domestic policy chief during his first presidency. The 52-year-old is president and CEO of the America First Policy Institute, a group helping to lay the groundwork for a second Trump administration. She previously served as an aide to former Texas Gov. Rick Perry and ran a think tank, the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Trump chose Howard Lutnick, head of brokerage and investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald and a cryptocurrency enthusiast, as his nominee for commerce secretary, a position in which he'd have a key role in carrying out Trump's plans to raise and enforce tariffs. Trump made the announcement Tuesday on his social media platform, Truth Social. Lutnick is a co-chair of Trump’s transition team, along with Linda McMahon, the former wrestling executive who previously led Trump’s Small Business Administration. Both are tasked with putting forward candidates for key roles in the next administration. The nomination would put Lutnick in charge of a sprawling Cabinet agency that is involved in funding new computer chip factories, imposing trade restrictions, releasing economic data and monitoring the weather. It is also a position in which connections to CEOs and the wider business community are crucial. Doug Collins is a former Republican congressman from Georgia who gained recognition for defending Trump during his first impeachment trial, which centered on U.S. assistance for Ukraine. Trump was impeached for urging Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden in 2019 during the Democratic presidential nomination, but he was acquitted by the Senate. Collins has also served in the armed forces himself and is currently a chaplain in the United States Air Force Reserve Command. "We must take care of our brave men and women in uniform, and Doug will be a great advocate for our Active Duty Servicemembers, Veterans, and Military Families to ensure they have the support they need," Trump said in a statement about nominating Collins to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs. Karoline Leavitt, 27, was Trump's campaign press secretary and currently a spokesperson for his transition. She would be the youngest White House press secretary in history. The White House press secretary typically serves as the public face of the administration and historically has held daily briefings for the press corps. Leavitt, a New Hampshire native, was a spokesperson for MAGA Inc., a super PAC supporting Trump, before joining his 2024 campaign. In 2022, winning a 10-way Republican primary before losing to Democratic Rep. Chris Pappas. Leavitt worked in the White House press office during Trump's first term before she became communications director for New York Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, Trump's choice for U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Former Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard to be director of national intelligence, keeping with the trend to stock his Cabinet with loyal personalities rather than veteran professionals in their requisite fields. Gabbard, 43, was a Democratic House member who unsuccessfully sought the party's 2020 presidential nomination before leaving the party in 2022. She endorsed Trump in August and campaigned often with him this fall. “I know Tulsi will bring the fearless spirit that has defined her illustrious career to our Intelligence Community,” Trump said in a statement. Gabbard, who has served in the Army National Guard for more than two decades, deploying to Iraq and Kuwait, would come to the role as somewhat of an outsider compared to her predecessor. The current director, Avril Haines, was confirmed by the Senate in 2021 following several years in a number of top national security and intelligence positions. Trump has picked John Ratcliffe, a former Texas congressman who served as director of national intelligence during his first administration, to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency in his next. Ratcliffe was director of national intelligence during the final year and a half of Trump's first term, leading the U.S. government's spy agencies during the coronavirus pandemic. “I look forward to John being the first person ever to serve in both of our Nation's highest Intelligence positions,” Trump said in a statement, calling him a “fearless fighter for the Constitutional Rights of all Americans” who would ensure “the Highest Levels of National Security, and PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH.” Trump has chosen former New York Rep. to serve as his pick to lead the . Zeldin does not appear to have any experience in environmental issues, but is a longtime supporter of the former president. The 44-year-old former U.S. House member from New York wrote on , “We will restore US energy dominance, revitalize our auto industry to bring back American jobs, and make the US the global leader of AI.” “We will do so while protecting access to clean air and water,” he added. During his campaign, Trump often attacked the Biden administration's promotion of electric vehicles, and incorrectly referring to a tax credit for EV purchases as a government mandate. Trump also often told his audiences during the campaign his administration would “Drill, baby, drill,” referring to his support for expanded petroleum exploration. In a statement, Trump said Zeldin “will ensure fair and swift deregulatory decisions that will be enacted in a way to unleash the power of American businesses, while at the same time maintaining the highest environmental standards, including the cleanest air and water on the planet.” Trump has named Brendan Carr, the senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission, as the new chairman of the agency tasked with regulating broadcasting, telecommunications and broadband. Carr is a longtime member of the commission and served previously as the FCC’s general counsel. He has been unanimously confirmed by the Senate three times and was nominated by both Trump and President Joe Biden to the commission. Carr made past appearances on “Fox News Channel," including when he decried Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris' pre-Election Day appearance on “Saturday Night Live.” He wrote an op-ed last month defending a satellite company owned by Trump supporter Elon Musk. Rep. Elise Stefanik is a and one of Trump's staunchest defenders going back to his first impeachment. Elected to the House in 2014, Stefanik was selected by her GOP House colleagues as House Republican Conference chair in 2021, when former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney was removed from the post after publicly criticizing Trump for falsely claiming he won the 2020 election. Stefanik, 40, has served in that role ever since as the third-ranking member of House leadership. Stefanik’s questioning of university presidents over antisemitism on their campuses helped lead to two of those presidents resigning, further raising her national profile. If confirmed, she would represent American interests at the U.N. as Trump vows to end the war waged by Russia against Ukraine begun in 2022. He has also called for peace as Israel continues its offensive against Hamas in Gaza and its invasion of Lebanon to target Hezbollah. A Republican congressman from Michigan who served from 1993 to 2011, Hoekstra was ambassador to the Netherlands during Trump's first term. “In my Second Term, Pete will help me once again put AMERICA FIRST,” Trump said in a statement announcing his choice. “He did an outstanding job as United States Ambassador to the Netherlands during our first four years, and I am confident that he will continue to represent our Country well in this new role.” Trump will nominate former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee to be ambassador to Israel. Huckabee is a staunch defender of Israel and his intended nomination comes as Trump has promised to align U.S. foreign policy more closely with Israel's interests as it wages wars against the Iran-backed Hamas and Hezbollah. “He loves Israel, and likewise the people of Israel love him,” Trump said in a statement. “Mike will work tirelessly to bring about peace in the Middle East.” Huckabee, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008 and 2016, has been a popular figure among evangelical Christian conservatives, many of whom support Israel due to Old Testament writings that Jews are God’s chosen people and that Israel is their rightful homeland. Trump has been praised by some in this important Republican voting bloc for moving the U.S. embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Trump on Tuesday named real estate investor Steven Witkoff to be special envoy to the Middle East. The 67-year-old Witkoff is the president-elect's golf partner and was golfing with him at Trump's club in West Palm Beach, Florida, on Sept. 15, when the former president was the target of a second attempted assassination. Witkoff “is a Highly Respected Leader in Business and Philanthropy,” Trump said of Witkoff in a statement. “Steve will be an unrelenting Voice for PEACE, and make us all proud." Trump also named Witkoff co-chair, with former Georgia Sen. Kelly Loeffler, of his inaugural committee. Trump said Wednesday that he will nominate Gen. Keith Kellogg to serve as assistant to the president and special envoy for Ukraine and Russia. Kellogg, a retired Army lieutenant general who has long been Trump’s top adviser on defense issues, served as National Security Advisor to Trump's former Vice President Mike Pence. For the America First Policy Institute, one of several groups formed after Trump left office to help lay the groundwork for the next Republican administration, Kellogg in April wrote that “bringing the Russia-Ukraine war to a close will require strong, America First leadership to deliver a peace deal and immediately end the hostilities between the two warring parties.” (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib) Trump asked Rep. Michael Waltz, R-Fla., a retired Army National Guard officer and war veteran, to be his national security adviser, Trump announced in a statement Tuesday. The move puts Waltz in the middle of national security crises, ranging from efforts to provide weapons to Ukraine and worries about the growing alliance between Russia and North Korea to the persistent attacks in the Middle East by Iran proxies and the push for a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas and Hezbollah. “Mike has been a strong champion of my America First Foreign Policy agenda,” Trump's statement said, "and will be a tremendous champion of our pursuit of Peace through Strength!” Waltz is a three-term GOP congressman from east-central Florida. He served multiple tours in Afghanistan and also worked in the Pentagon as a policy adviser when Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates were defense chiefs. He is considered hawkish on China, and called for a U.S. boycott of the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing due to its involvement in the origin of COVID-19 and its mistreatment of the minority Muslim Uighur population. Stephen Miller, an , was a vocal spokesperson during the presidential campaign for Trump's priority of mass deportations. The 39-year-old was a senior adviser during Trump's first administration. Miller has been a central figure in some of Trump's policy decisions, notably his move to separate thousands of immigrant families. Trump argued throughout the campaign that the nation's economic, national security and social priorities could be met by deporting people who are in the United States illegally. Since Trump left office in 2021, Miller has served as the president of America First Legal, an organization made up of former Trump advisers aimed at challenging the Biden administration, media companies, universities and others over issues such as free speech and national security. Thomas Homan, 62, with Trump’s top priority of carrying out the largest deportation operation in the nation’s history. Homan, who served under Trump in his first administration leading U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was widely expected to be offered a position related to the border, an issue Trump made central to his campaign. Though Homan has insisted such a massive undertaking would be humane, he has long been a loyal supporter of Trump's policy proposals, suggesting at a July conference in Washington that he would be willing to "run the biggest deportation operation this country’s ever seen.” Democrats have criticized Homan for his defending Trump's “zero tolerance” policy on border crossings during his first administration, which led to the separation of thousands of parents and children seeking asylum at the border. Dr. Mehmet Oz, 64, is a former heart surgeon who hosted “The Dr. Oz Show,” a long-running daytime television talk show. He ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate as the Republican nominee in 2022 and is an outspoken supporter of Trump, who endorsed Oz's bid for elected office. Elon Musk, left, and Vivek Ramaswamy speak before Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump at an Oct. 27 campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in New York. Trump on Tuesday said Musk and former Republican presidential candidate Ramaswamy will lead a new “Department of Government Efficiency" — which is not, despite the name, a government agency. The acronym “DOGE” is a nod to Musk's favorite cryptocurrency, dogecoin. Trump said Musk and Ramaswamy will work from outside the government to offer the White House “advice and guidance” and will partner with the Office of Management and Budget to “drive large scale structural reform, and create an entrepreneurial approach to Government never seen before.” He added the move would shock government systems. It's not clear how the organization will operate. Musk, owner of X and CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has been a constant presence at Mar-a-Lago since Trump won the presidential election. Ramaswamy suspended his campaign in January and threw his support behind Trump. Trump said the two will “pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies.” Russell Vought held the position during Trump’s first presidency. After Trump’s initial term ended, Vought founded the Center for Renewing America, a think tank that describes its mission as “renew a consensus of America as a nation under God.” Vought was closely involved with Project 2025, a conservative blueprint for Trump’s second term that he tried to distance himself from during the campaign. Vought has also previously worked as the executive and budget director for the Republican Study Committee, a caucus for conservative House Republicans. He also worked at Heritage Action, the political group tied to The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. Scavino, whom Trump's transition referred to in a statement as one of “Trump's longest serving and most trusted aides,” was a senior adviser to Trump's 2024 campaign, as well as his 2016 and 2020 campaigns. He will be deputy chief of staff and assistant to the president. Scavino had run Trump's social media profile in the White House during his first administration. He was also held in contempt of Congress in 2022 after a month-long refusal to comply with a subpoena from the House committee’s investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. Blair was political director for Trump's 2024 campaign and for the Republican National Committee. He will be deputy chief of staff for legislative, political and public affairs and assistant to the president. Blair was key to Trump's economic messaging during his winning White House comeback campaign this year, a driving force behind the candidate's “Trump can fix it” slogan and his query to audiences this fall if they were better off than four years ago. Budowich is a veteran Trump campaign aide who launched and directed Make America Great Again, Inc., a super PAC that supported Trump's 2024 campaign. He will be deputy chief of staff for communications and personnel and assistant to the president. Budowich also had served as a spokesman for Trump after his presidency. McGinley was White House Cabinet secretary during Trump's first administration, and was outside legal counsel for the Republican National Committee's election integrity effort during the 2024 campaign. In a statement, Trump called McGinley “a smart and tenacious lawyer who will help me advance our America First agenda, while fighting for election integrity and against the weaponization of law enforcement.” Trump has chosen Dr. Jay Bhattacharya to lead the National Institutes of Health. Bhattacharya is a physician and professor at Stanford University School of Medicine, and is a critic of pandemic lockdowns and vaccine mandates. He promoted the idea of herd immunity during the pandemic, arguing that people at low risk should live normally while building up immunity to COVID-19 through infection. The National Institutes of Health funds medical research through competitive grants to researchers at institutions throughout the nation. NIH also conducts its own research with thousands of scientists working at its labs in Bethesda, Maryland. Trump is turning to two officials with experience navigating not only Washington but the key issues of income taxes and tariffs as he fills out his economic team. He announced he has chosen international trade attorney Jamieson Greer to be his U.S. trade representative and Kevin Hassett as director of the White House National Economic Council. While Trump has in several cases nominated outsiders to key posts, these picks reflect a recognition that his reputation will likely hinge on restoring the public’s confidence in the economy. Trump said in a statement that Greer was instrumental in his first term in imposing tariffs on China and others and replacing the trade agreement with Canada and Mexico, “therefore making it much better for American Workers.” Hassett, 62, served in the first Trump term as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers. He has a doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania and worked at the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute before joining the Trump White House in 2017. Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter.The task force was set up in February by , Gwent Police, Tai Calon Community Housing and Blaenau Gwent Youth Service. It won the Anti-Social Behaviour category at the Wales Safer Communities Awards ceremony, which are held annually to recognise outstanding contributions to community safety from individuals, organisations or partnerships across the public, private and third sectors. Councillor Helen Cunningham, ’s deputy leader, said: “The task force was set up as a response to pockets of anti-social behaviour in our communities here in Blaenau Gwent, and as a recognition that no single agency or organisation could tackle this alone. "We’ve made some real good progress in this work, and I’m pleased that the Wales Safer Communities Award recognises this and praises the true partnership ethos behind it. "The task force has much more work to do, and all partners remained fully focussed on supporting our communities, listening to and acting on their concerns." Chief Inspector Stevie Warden said: "One of the key aims of our taskforce is to reduce anti-social behaviour and protect residents from associated harm and nuisance. Disorderly behaviour of any kind is completely unacceptable, and we'll use every tool we have at our disposal to ensure it is stamped out of our communities."5 top tech gifts for the holidays

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Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE:IRM) Shares Sold by Pathstone Holdings LLCThe Boston Red Sox continued to rebuild their pitching staff, acquiring left-hander Jovani Morán on Tuesday from the Minnesota Twins in exchange for catcher and infielder Mickey Gasper. Read this article for free: Already have an account? To continue reading, please subscribe: * The Boston Red Sox continued to rebuild their pitching staff, acquiring left-hander Jovani Morán on Tuesday from the Minnesota Twins in exchange for catcher and infielder Mickey Gasper. Read unlimited articles for free today: Already have an account? The Boston Red Sox continued to rebuild their pitching staff, acquiring left-hander Jovani Morán on Tuesday from the Minnesota Twins in exchange for catcher and infielder Mickey Gasper. The 27-year-old Morán appeared in 79 games as a reliever for the Twins from 2021 to 2023, posting a 4.15 ERA, striking out 112 with 52 walks and holding opponents to a .208 batting average. He missed all of last season recovering from Tommy John surgery. He originally was chosen in the seventh round of the 2015 draft. In Gasper, the Twins are getting a 29-year-old who made his major league debut last season and appeared in 13 games with Boston. The switch-hitter was selected by the New York Yankees in the 27th round of the 2018 draft. He was picked by Boston in the minor league portion of the 2023 Rule 5 Draft. The Red Sox and Twins both currently have 39 players on their 40-man rosters. ___ AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb Advertisement

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The Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, a private research laboratory, is located on Long Island, New York, where I live. Its outrageous history is detailed in a forthcoming book , “Long Island and the Legacy of Eugenics: Station of Intolerance.” The book, by Mark A. Torres, an attorney as well as an author, will be released by The History Press on January 21st. Torres also wrote the 2021 book “Long Island Migrant Labor Camps: Dust for Blood,” an examination of the plight of migrant farmworkers on Long Island, published, too, by The History Press. Torres is general counsel of Teamsters Local 810, a union that covers Long Island, and as an attorney has long specialized in labor and employment law in federal and state courts. He is also a professor at Hofstra University. As an author, he excels at in-depth research. Earlier this year the Association of Public Historians of New York awarded Torres its Joseph F. Meany Award (named for former New York State Historian Joseph F. Meany, Jr.) for his book on migrant farmworker camps on Long Island. Most Long Island residents know little about the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory although it is off a major highway on Long Island, Route 25A, on 110 acres, and currently employs more than a thousand people. I’ve received an advance copy of Torres’ book. It begins with an “Author’s Note” in which Torres explains: “True to my roots as an author of Long Island history, I have always strived to present topics from the oft-neglected local perspective. Thus, this book is not intended to merely serve as a broad retelling of the history of eugenics. Instead, it focuses on investigating the local origins, characters and stratagems employed by the Eugenics Record Office in Cold Spring Harbor which, for nearly three decades, served as the global headquarters of the eugenics movement.” He relates how his investigative “journey led me to study the archival records at numerous facilities, including the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and Archives...the Rockefeller Archive in Sleepy Hollow, New York; the American Philosophical Institute in Philadelphia; Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri; and the National Museum of Health and Medicine in Silver Springs, Maryland...” “The information I amassed from these meticulously preserved archives provided sharp insight into the origins, inspiration and machinations of the American eugenics movement, while never losing focus on the fact that it all emanated from a small hamlet on Long Island.” “Through it all, I came to understand how eugenics became such an accepted and normalized part of society in the United States and throughout the world during the twentieth century,” writes Torres. He goes on how the book includes “the downfall of the Eugenics Record Office” (part of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory between 1910 and 1939) “and the ultimate discrediting of eugenics as a scientific field. The final section also explores the enduring and cruel legacy of eugenics.” “The quest to perfect our species was not a new one,” Torres writes. “However, the problem with such aspirations: Who decides the standards of perfection? And, more importantly, what is to be done with those who fall below the arbitrarily created standards.” Then the book starts with the 1946 trial in Nuremberg, Germany: United States of America v. Karl Brandt, et al. Brandt, who was “the personal physician of Adolph Hitler,” and other doctors were put on trial in the aftermath of World War II for crimes against humanity, he relates, in connection with the Nazi “euthanasia program.” “Brandt and six others were convicted, sentenced to death and executed. Astonishingly, the information that Brandt and his cohorts so desperately relied on for their defense was not derived from Nazi propaganda,” says Torres. “Instead, their sources came directly from a report published in 1914 by the Eugenics Record Office in Cold Spring Harbor, New York.” “What connection,” asks Torres, “did an administrative office four thousand miles away in a small town on Long Island have with the Nazi regime that plotted and carried out the systematic torture and murder of millions of human beings based on race and disability?” “The connection was eugenics: the pseudoscience that dominated much of the twentieth century and was premised on the racist, classist and misguided belief that mental, physical and behavioral traits of human beings were all inheritable and must be eliminated to save the human race.” “Although it was promoted as cutting-edge science, eugenics was a social philosophy that aimed to develop a master race of human beings with the purest blood and the most desirable hereditary traits,” the book continues. A “component” of eugenics was “’negative eugenics’ which aimed to discourage or outright prevent the reproduction of people who were declared genetically unfit. Negative genetics was driven by the premise that society would dramatically improve if the millions of Americans who were deemed mentally, physically or morally undesirable were ‘eliminated from the human stock’ by means of segregation, sterilization and even euthanasia. This included the ‘feebleminded,’ paupers, criminals, epileptics, the insane, the deformed, the congenitally weak, the blind and the deaf. While human heredity would not begin to be understood by scientists until the 1960s, the social prejudice and practice of eugenics dominated scientific objectivity for more than half a century.” “The legacy of eugenics is undeniably cruel and enduring,” writes Torres. “In the United States alone, more than sixty thousand forced sterilizations were carried out in more than half the states....A multitude of people throughout the country were classified as undesirable and confined to psychiatric centers during their childbearing years. A bevy of marriage restriction and eugenic sterilization laws were enacted for the purpose of preventing the procreation of the unfit. Eugenically driven immigration laws barring the entry of immigrants from many countries into the United States endured for years. Globally, eugenics thrived in countries like Argentina, Canada, China, Japan and Norway, and Nazi Germany used it to commit unimaginable atrocities. In some ways, the ideals of eugenics persist today.” “Despite its global appeal,” Torres goes on, “eugenics was truly made in America, and the epicenter of the movement was not found in some laboratory or government facility. Instead, the science was developed at the Eugenics Record Office...in Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island.” Before the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory became “the global center of the eugenics movement,” eugenics had roots in England, relates Torres. He notes how in 1851 in England, Herbert Spencer penned a book “Social Statics” that “first publicized the phrase survival of the fittest.” And “less than a decade later, Charles Darwin popularized the phrase survival of the fittest in his seminal work “The Origin of the Species.” Yet another Englishman, Francis Galton, a cousin of Darwin, then authored a book “Hereditary Genus” in which he “suggested that the breeding of the best people would evolve mankind into a super species...” “The founding fathers of eugenics in England,” writes Torres, “had formulated the theoretical concepts of human hereditary research. It was only a matter of time before it caught on in the United States, and of the many individuals and groups who helped establish eugenics from theory to practice, none was more influential than an American biologist Charles Davenport who was directly responsible for the establishment and operation of the Eugenics Record Office, which for more than three decades would serve as the eugenics capital of the world.” From the Eugenics Record Office, part of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, “Davenport also led the movement that would ultimately springboard eugenics into a global phenomenon.” “In 1902, the Carnegie Institute of Washington was founded, and Davenport immediately began to lobby the group to invest in the establishment of a center for genetics at Cold Spring Harbor,” Torres continues. And “the forces were beginning to align for the formation of the American eugenics movement, and Charles Davenport would be at the center of it all.” Davenport “developed a plan to collect hereditary information from a multitude of families in order to prove that evolution worked in human beings the way it worked in animals and plants.” In the end, eugenics was thoroughly discredited, as Torres relates in the last chapter of his book, titled “A Reckoning.” “The rise of eugenics was not a random phenomenon,” the chapter begins. “Eugenics presented as a cutting-edge science driven by utopian ideals for the betterment of humanity. It was buoyed by a continuous flow of financial support from wealthy and progressive-minded donors and fully embraced by the leading thinkers of the time before settling into the very fabric of the United States and societies throughout the world. Ultimately, eugenics was discredited as a science and exposed as nothing more than a social philosophy used as a slogan for intolerance, racism, bigotry and classism. It was essentially a means for the wealthy to assert their dominance over the poor, which has been an unfortunate and recurring theme throughout all of human history.” “It took many years for the scientific and corporate communities to accept responsibility for their part in eugenics,” says Torres. Indeed, it was only in 2020 that the president of the Carnegie Institution for Science “issued a formal apology for the group’s support for eugenics.” The statement: “There is no excuse, then or now, for our institution’s previous willingness to empower researchers who sought to pervert scientific inquiry to justify their own racist and ableist prejudices. Our support of eugenics made us complicit in driving decades of brutal and unconscionable actions by the governments in the United States and around the world.” Only in 2023 did the American Society of Human Genetics issue a statement declaring that it “seeks to reckon with, and sincerely apologizes for, its involvement in and silence of the misuse of human genetics to justify and contribute to injustice in all forms,” he continues. Torres closes his book by stating: “In the nearly three decades of its operation, the Eugenics Record Office served as the ultimate vessel to fortify and amplify the pseudoscience called eugenics and transformed it into a global phenomenon. Everything that emanated from this facility served to dominate the poor, the weak and the sick, who were deemed the defectives of society and subject them to mass levels of institutionalization, sterilization, immigration restrictions and even euthanasia. Later, in the hands of the Nazi regime, eugenics was openly used as a scientific excuse to torture and murder a multitude of innocent human beings.” “The Eugenics Record Office and those who directly operated, controlled and funded it are fully deserving of the blame for the entire eugenics movement and the dire atrocities committed under the banner of this false science,” he says. “While we must continue to honor the seemingly countless victims, we must also provide public discourse and educational programs on the subject, for if we fail to do so, we may be in danger of repeating this dark history.” Between the start and end of his book, Torres documents the horrors committed in the name of eugenics—and how an institution on Long Island was the base for it. He names the names—prominent names—including those in government and business in the U.S. who pushed eugenics. “All movements require the support and participation of people with strong public influence” and “there were few greater endorsements than that of president of the United States of America. In fact,” he notes, “every president” of the U.S. from Theodore Roosevelt to Herbert Hoover “was a member of a eugenics organization, publicly endorsed eugenic laws, or signed eugenic legislation without voicing opposition.” As for Roosevelt, whose ”summer White House” at Sagamore Hill was a “mere six miles from the ERO facility in Cold Spring Harbor,” Roosevelt wrote a letter to Davenport asserting: “Someday we will realize that the prime duty of the good citizen of the right type [is] to leave his blood behind him in the world; that that we have no business to perpetuate citizens of the wrong type.” He tells of John Harvey Kellogg, a doctor who with his brother founded the Kellogg company that developed corn flakes becoming a “staunch ally of Charles Davenport and a full-fledged eugenicist....In 1914, he organized the First Race Betterment Foundation Conference in Battle Creek, Michigan, with the stated purpose of establishing the foundations for the creation of a super race.” On its website, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in a section labeled its “History” has an essay on a “historical perspective on genetics” headlined: “Good genes, bad science.” It begins relating how in the early 1900s “the bogus concept of hereditary criminality and a made-up disease known as feeblemindedness became part of some scientists’ so-called studies of genetics. Ideas such as these were the core of the American eugenics movement....in which science got mixed up with racial dogma. Among the results was the destruction of thousands of people’s ability to pass on their ‘defective’ genes through forced sterilization programs.” “Many of Hitler’s beliefs were directly inspired by the eugenics books he read while he was in prison,” writes Torres. (Hitler was jailed for leading in 1923 the Beer Hall Putsch, an attempted coup in Munich involving members of his Nazi Party. Convicted of treason, he was sentenced to five years in jail and served nine months.) Hitler “admired,” Torres continues, “the policies of the American eugenics program, including the efforts that led to the passage of strict immigration laws in the United States.” In 1933, he “seized power,” and “eugenics presented Hitler with a...globally accepted science to support his sinister plans. In July 1933, Germany enacted the ‘Law for the Prevention of Defective Progeny,’ the first eugenic sterilization law in the country....The law also established approximately two hundred genetic courts and managed anyone suspected of having a genetic defect to be reported to the authorities.” A publication put out by the Eugenics Record Office, Eugenical News, featured the law “proudly.” Soon, “German eugenicists began to formulate definitions of Jewishness. Hitler insisted that Jews of all degrees to be identified, including those with at least one drop of Jewish blood.” The “methodology was fully inspired by the family pedigree system created at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory more than two decades before,” writes Torres. With the mass sending of Jews and others to death camps, Hitler “directed...doctors at different concentration camps to conduct a wide range of eugenics-based research.” “Over time, the world began to learn of the Nazis’ atrocities,” writes Torres. “In 1936, the Rockefeller Foundation finally became reluctant to fund any further eugenics-based programs, and nearly all funding ended when the fighting erupted in 1939. Unfortunately, Nazi eugenics programs had already benefited from the foundation’s funding, and the fully developed program continued throughout the war.” The book includes a chapter on the impact of eugenic advocates on U.S. immigration law, titled “’Scientific Racism’ and the Anti-Immigration Movement.” Torres writes about how Harry Laughlin, superintendent of the Eugenics Record Office from its inception to closure, sent a report to the U.S. Congress in 1922 labeling certain immigrants “human waste.” Writes Torres: “Page after page, the report was rife with racial and ethnic slurs and detailed statistics regarding feeblemindedness, insanity, crime, various forms of illness and deformity and ‘all types of social inadequacy.’” Laughlin testified before Congress in 1922 asserting: “These degeneracies and hereditary handicaps are inherent in the blood.” Before Congress again, in 1924, “elaborate charts” were displayed by Laughlin “promoting the link between the so-called inferior races and immoral conduct.” “As a direct result of Laughlin’s tireless efforts, which were driven by his eugenic ideals coupled with lawmakers’ growing racial animus against immigrants, the House and Senate passed the Immigration Act of 1924,” writes Torres. “The law imposed even stricter quotas on immigrants from all non-Nordic nations. For example, the quota on immigration from Italy was dramatically reduced from forty-two thousand per year to just four thousand.” In the U.S., laws were passed to mandate sterilization based on the claims of eugenics. Torres focuses on a 1927 U.S. Supreme Court 8-to-1 decision upholding a “request by the State of Virginia to forcefully sterilize nineteen-year-old Carrie Buck based on a eugenics diagnosis.” She was determined to be “feebleminded.” The ruling, written by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. “has never been reversed,” writes Torres. “It is an enduring legacy left by the Eugenics Record Office and a direct byproduct of the ERO’s work. In the wake of the decision, the number of sterilizations across the country began to grow exponentially.” The Eugenics Record Office activities also included research close to home, “in local communities on Long Island and throughout New York State.” It got involved with psychiatric institutions on Long Island including Kings Park Psychiatric Center, Central Islip State Hospital and Pilgrim State Hospital in Brentwood. The book includes how “Native American reservations on Long Island were targeted” by Davenport and his followers including what is now the Shinnecock Indian Nation and the Unkechaug Reservation, both on Long Island. He tells of how Dr. John Strong, the author of numerous books on Native Americans and long a professor of history at Southampton College on Long Island, said “the eugenically biased data derived from these studies was used by the [U.S.] Bureau of Indian Affairs...to the detriment of the Native American population.” Torres in an interview emphasized how eugenics “was not a fringe movement. It was the rage of the age. It was widely embraced.” Torres writes of how eugenics was embraced by academia in the U.S. “During much of the early to mid-twentieth century, eugenics was taught....at the most prestigious academic institutions in the country, including Harvard, Johns Hopkins, Princeton and Yale.” He cites a 1916 ERO report stating that 254 colleges taught courses about eugenics. He writes: “At Boston University, eugenics was taught to students at the School of Theology.” New York University, Columbia and Barnard “each offered a eugenics-based course....Other New York colleges that taught eugenics” that are listed include Adelphi, Cornell, Colgate, Farmingdale, Fordham, Syracuse University and Vassar. Also, he notes, “eugenics was a regularly offered course in the biology department at San Francisco State University from 1916 to 1951.” The year 1951 was decades after the Eugenics Records Office at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory was shut down. In recent years, what eugenics is about has continued as an issue. In 2007, Dr. James Watson, chancellor of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory and a Nobel Prize winner, was relieved of his post after saying in an interview with the London Times that that there was an intelligence gap between Blacks and whites and this accounted for many of problems in Africa. In 2019, the laboratory stripped Watson of titles he still held including chancellor emeritus after he appeared on a PBS documentary “American Masters: Decoding Watson,” and, asked if he changed his views, said: “No. Not at all....there’s a difference on the average between Blacks and whites on I.Q tests. I would say the difference is....genetic.” Last month, Laura Helmuth, editor-in-chief of Scientific American, resigned after complaints about comments she made including, online, that “Trump’s racist rants are straight-up eugenics.” An article in the magazine in October scored Donald Trump’s statements about immigrants, its headline “Trump’s Racist Rants against Immigrants Hide under the Language of Eugenics.” Helmuth from 2016 to 2018 was president of the National Association of Science Writers. And this month, New York magazine featured an article headlined: “A Rift in the Family, My in-laws gave me a book by a eugenicist. Our relationship is over.”

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