NoneA developer’s plan to build on the empty lot at the corner of E 3rd Street and River Drive in downtown Davenport hit a roadblock on Tuesday evening. Davenport City Council denied a tax incentive that would have provided the developers a portion of the city’s hotel-motel taxes for 15 years after it’s completed. The agreement also included an Urban Renewal Tax Exemption, which offers temporary tax breaks on increases in property value resulting from new construction. The vote was voted 5-4-1, but the issue needed 6 votes to pass. At-Large Ald. Jazmine Newton abstained from voting, saying she did not get requested information back in time to fully review it. “At this point in time, I don’t feel that I have sufficient information,” Newton said. If she were to have voted against the proposal, Mayor Mike Matson would had the power to break the tie. Those who voted no were alderpersons Rick and Tim Dunn, Jade Burkholder and Tim Kelly. Alderpersons Marion Meginnis, Ben Jogben, Kyle Gripp, Mhisho Lynch and Paul Reinartz voted in favor. People are also reading... A rendering of a proposed new hotel, restaurant, office space and event center at 227 LeClaire St., Davenport. The agreement primarily focused on the hotel portion of the project though it included both projects. A group of developers, led by Pete Stopulos, have proposed two buildings at 227 LeClaire Street . One is a $19 million, 88-room, four-story Marriott TownePlace Suites Hotel with a pool and rooftop patio. The hotel is designed to be an extended stay hotel with kitchenettes in the rooms. The second building is an $11 million four-story commercial building with a restaurant, two floors of office space and an event center on the top floor. A rendering of a proposed new restaurant and event center at 227 LeClaire St., Davenport. The two buildings will have different owners. For the first 10 years of the tax incentive, the developers would have been rebated 75% of the city’s portion of hotel-motel taxes generated from that specific hotel. In years 11 through 15, half of the taxes generated would be collected. Stopulos said they knew this site was going to be challenge but there is a plan in place. He brought up other developments he had a hand in helping development that faced significant challenges such as The Last Picture House. “These things happen because we make sure we do our developments the right way and that everything is accounted for throughout the process,” Stopulos said. “You got to trust me when I say we do it the right way — the proof is in the pudding.” Stopulos told the Quad-City Times/Dispatch-Argus that they do plan on exploring all other options. “We are resolute in our desire to get this project done,” he said. The lot was once home to the site of a hotel before it was demolished nearly a decade ago and has been used as a parking lot and for staging equipment. An empty lot at LeClaire and Third streets on Tuesday, Oct. 15, in Davenport. Kyle Carter, Downtown Davenport Partnership director, told the Quad-City Times/Dispatch-Argus that there is still an opportunity to work with council to get this done because it is a “welcome mat” to downtown Davenport for people who come here on the riverboat cruises. It’s also rare, he said, that someone comes forward to develop one of the most difficult parcels of land in the city. “I’m hopeful they can find a resolution to get this project done,” Carter said. Rick Dunn, 1st Ward, and Burkholder, 4th Ward, shared concerns about having uncertainty of both buildings being built. “I’m not against the project,” Dunn said. “But we were told that two projects would get done.” Burkholder shared similar sentiments, saying she was having a difficult time with these incentives they are being asked for now that they are two separate projects. No upfront cash incentive was being asked for in the project proposal, and the hotel-motel tax rebate would not have started until after the hotel was built and operating. Paul Reinartz, 8th Ward, voted in favor and said it’s a big mistake to only look at the tax base and that the project would bring in a secondary revenue stream associated with occupancy. People are going to come in, spend money in Davenport’s restaurants, casino and wherever else and that money will come back to the city. At-Large Ald. Kyle Gripp said there is no risk to the city with this project and that if the developer is successful, they are successful. If the developer is unsuccessful, then they either try a different method to develop it or sell to somebody else to take a stab at it. “I think this is a good project and one the city should support,” Gripp said. “I think it makes a lot of sense financially from a tax revenue standpoint and this is a highly visible parcel of land in the city and one that a lot of people kind of measure the progress of the city on.” Community and Economic Director Bruce Berger said the hotel-motel tax is only attributable to the hotel but both projects can apply for the Urban Renewal Tax Exemption. If the second building as proposed doesn’t happen, Berger said, it is possible that something else can be built. The Quad-City Times/Dispatch-Argus previously reported that in the 1980s, environmental work identified as “coal tar” — sludgy material that contained benzene — on the current site of the Quad-City Times building, 500 E. 3rd St., across the street from the proposed development. Dunn and Burkholder also shared concerns with potential contaminants and environmental hazards at the site. According to a city memo about the project, city staff spoke with Mel Pins with the Iowa Department of Natural Resources earlier this month and Pins categorized the site as “garden variety” and that is only has “residual contamination,” based on data previously submitted about the site and the Quad-City Times building site. City staff said liability is of minimal concern if the developers were to encounter any contamination on the site because nothing in the agreement would transfer ownership to the city. Floodwaters from the Mississippi River and other environmental hazards have also posed a challenge for redevelopment. The city was awarded federal funding to raise portions of LeClaire and E. 3rd Street and to improve the intersection adjacent to the project, all which is expected to complicate construction timing, according to the agreement. In response to her colleagues environmental concerns, Mhisho Lynch, 7th Ward, said the environmental facet of the project is no concern to her. “I could not fathom that a project as exuberant as this one, as in your face of downtown Davenport as this one, that the professional firms that are hired to do their jobs are not going to do them,” Lynch said. Reporter Sarah Watson contributed to this story. Photos: Alternating Currents 2024 Kids dance hand in hand to Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard during Alternating Currents on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. The band encouraged the audience to dance for its physical and mental benefits. Scenes from Alternating Currents on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. A young boy is geared up Alternating Currents on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Diplomats of Solid Sound performs at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Kids fill out the "Before I die I want to..." blackboard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. A couple dances to Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Alexa Deen interprets Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Diplomats of Solid Sound preforms at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. A man records Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Regan Hatfield of American Devil Sound performs at Kaiserslautern Square on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Regan Hatfield of American Devil Sound performs at Kaiserslautern Square on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Regan Hatfield of American Devil Sound performs at Kaiserslautern Square on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos fans crowd out Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos perform at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos perform at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. A Post Sex Nachos fan models her t-shirt at Alternating Currents on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos before their performance at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos pose for a portrait after their Daiquiri Factory performance on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos relax after their Daiquiri Factory performance on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Kids dance to Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Belt performs at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Belt plays at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Belt performs at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. CJ Parker performs Friday, Aug. 16, at Quad Cities' Got Talent at the Redstone Room at Common Chord in Davenport. A look at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Comedian Kristin Lytie performs Friday, Aug. 16, at Quad Cities' Got Talent at the Redstone Room at Common Chord in Davenport. Luke Swinney, the casting producer for "America's Got Talent," watches Quad Cities' Got Talent on Friday, Aug. 16, at the Redstone Room at Common Chord in Davenport. Comedian Chris Schlichting performs Friday, Aug. 16, at Quad Cities' Got Talent at the Redstone Room at Common Chord in Davenport. Soutru performs at Quad Cities' Got Talent on Friday, Aug. 16, at the Redstone Room at Common Chord in Davenport. Belly Dancing Samantha performs Friday, Aug. 16, at Quad Cities' Got Talent at the Redstone Room at Common Chord in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos before their performance at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos perform at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos relax after their Daiquiri Factory performance on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Belt performs at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos before their performance at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos perform at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos relax after their Daiquiri Factory performance on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Belt performs at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos before their performance at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos perform at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos relax after their Daiquiri Factory performance on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Belt performs at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos before their performance at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos perform at Daiquiri Factory on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Post Sex Nachos relax after their Daiquiri Factory performance on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Belt performs at Armored Gardens at Alternating Currents on Friday, August 16, in Davenport. Alexa Deen interprets Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Alexa Deen interprets Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. Alexa Deen interprets Diplomats of Solid Sound's performance at the Skybridge Courtyard on Saturday, August 17, in Davenport. The new Fairmount Community Center, near the Fairmount Library in Davenport, is complete. The City held a ribbon cutting for the community center on Thursday, Aug. 30, 2024. It features a half-court gym, activity space, and kitchenette. Get Government & Politics updates in your inbox! Stay up-to-date on the latest in local and national government and political topics with our newsletter. Multimedia Editor/Reporter {{description}} Email notifications are only sent once a day, and only if there are new matching items.
Are you better off: question at heart of next election
PetVivo to Exhibit Spryng with OsteoCushionTM Technology at the American Association of Equine Practitioners Convention on December 8-10, 2024THEOPHILUS Adeleke Akinyele, officer of the order of Niger (OON) and Bobajiro of Ibadanland, was both an exemplary personality and a model public servant. This biographical statement is significant in administrative archiving of the trajectory of the Nigerian administrative history, and this is not just because biographies and autobiographies of eminent public servants and administrators fill some crucial gaps in political and administrative histories of any state. More than this, the biographical statement I began with constitutes a narrative entry point into not only the understanding of what administrative scholars are calling the golden age of Nigeria’s public service system, but also a leeway into understanding how the present rot and decline in the system could be arrested through a thoroughgoing institutional reform that is both backward and forward looking. Pa Akinyele served humanity all his life. He was an administrator and a fine gentleman. After completing a most exemplary career as a public servant in the old western state and Oyo State, he then served as the registrar at the Obafemi Awolowo University before finally transiting through retirement into consultancy services and then the organized private sector. This distinguished career, and the lessons he learnt as a public servant were collected into his 2002 magnus opus, Beyond Pushing Files. The title alone speaks to the core of what is involved in the recuperation and revitalization of the institutional integrity of the public service in contemporary Nigeria. The nodal strength of the autobiography is that it embodies a contextual exemplification of the historical trajectory of evolutionary insights that led to our understanding of what an effective, efficient and competent public service is. And how we can begin to rethink reinventing it. Public administration has come a long way. Indeed, it predates the idea of the modern state because it consisted of a body of government officials who are in charge of ensuring the continuity of the administrative mechanism. With the ancient pharaonic society, it was this administrative necessity that facilitated the management of tax collection, the building of the pyramid and the navigation of the River Nile. But what was just a scribal necessity for those who work for the pharaohs, began to achieve the status of a tenured and salaried profession that mediated the famous Roman infrastructures, especially the aqueducts and highways. After the French Revolution of 1789, the loyalty of the civil servants shifted from emperors and monarchs to the state as an administrative unit. These historical developments fed into Max Weber’s theoretical formulation of the shapes and processes of administrative system, especially starting from the Prussian governance and military command structure. This was the basis of his development of the Weberian bureaucratic model. Government all across the world are defined by three complementary functions: the policy, regulatory and service delivery functions. And these functions are backstopped by an efficient public administration and bureaucratic machinery. It is this efficient system that translates government policies into concrete and tangible development outcomes and dividends that positively affect the well-being of the citizens. However, the operationalization of the public service system in Nigeria comes with both a boon and a bane. On the one hand, the most significant challenge that faced the transplantation of the bureaucratic model to Nigeria, after independence, is that as a migrated structure that emerged within a specific sociocultural context, the civil service system — and the state system as an administrative unit in general — was implanted without the full complement of its underlying value framework that would have grounded its efficiency and effectiveness. When the amalgamation of the Northern and Southern protectorates happened in 1914, the state system was established to facilitate the extractive objective of colonialism. And so, the system could not be grounded in the value foundation deriving from the cultural lifeworlds of the people and societies that make up precolonial Nigeria. The deconstruction of the value foundation of the administrative system becomes even more complicated because public administration experts and scholars all across Africa also failed to harness their expertise in ensuring the reconstruction of the value basis of the public institution in the values and traditions that would have instigated their resilience in assimilating the many sociocultural and political shocks they were bound to confront. And so, the bureaucratic model eventually turned out to be a mere instrument for political intervention and extractive exploitation rather than a tool for real development of the colonies. On the other hand, however, the pioneer Nigerian public servants inherited fully the founding values and virtues which Weber made the core of the managerial model of public administration, and which the British administrative system further grounded in the Victorian ideals and moral codes founded on gentlemanliness and the imperatives of truthfulness, personal responsibility, and public accountability. These values and moral codes easily translate into an institutional morality in terms of an acute sense of duty and work ethic, noblesse oblige, deferred gratification, and integrity of service. There was also significantly a philosophical underpinning that connects the relationship between the self and service which led to the fascination with knowledge and honor as the key components of professionalism. Talents, competence and hard work combined with moral rectitude, godliness and personal discipline to determine success, well-being and career fulfilment. This moral code and imperatives were further undergirded by the understanding of the bureaucracy as a hierarchical organization functioning as a legal-rational system determined by rules, systems, processes and procedures. That organization is conceived as being neutral, efficient, precise, strict, reliable and very disciplined. All this is supposed to articulate the understanding of the bureaucracy as a vocational calling that those who must be recruited into it must see as honorable, spiritual and value-based institution that demands their intense commitment and loyalty. For Weber, honor is the sole key that ties a public servant to the dynamics of integrity in the workplace. An honorable public official sees to the execution of a policy to the best of her ability even if she disagrees with the policy choice. This is an honorable act because it demonstrates that the bureaucrat’s sense of duty and of service overrides his personal preferences. Honor also instigates the need for spirituality which is encompassed by the search for meaning and significance that is demonstrated through the public servant’s commitment, trust and dedication to the tenets of professional service. This implies that public service transcends any mechanical sense of transactional business that brings people to the workplace without transforming their well-being. Spirituality characterizes the public servant as a selfless person with a deep sense of deferred gratification that defined the priesthood in the Levitical Order. In the Old Testament, the tribe of Levi, out of all the other tribes of Israel, had to forfeit its inheritance in the promised land in order to be able to adequately consecrate itself to the service of God. The totality of these moral imperatives is what turns the public service into a value-based institution that not only molds the actions and attitudes of the public servants, but also encompasses the democratic codes that transform democratic governance. A public servant, within this preceding value framework, is defined by three cogent virtues. The first is the virtue of public spiritedness. A public servant is first a servant called into a deep and committed service to others that constitute the public. This makes him or her more than a careerist professional who is solely motivated by personal preferences and the imperatives of making a livelihood. Being a public servant means that one swears fealty to the common good and the public interest. The second administrative virtue that distinguishes the public servant is professionalism grounded on expertise and competence that are earned on meritocratic basis. While public-spiritedness provides the public servant with a broad sense of occupational responsibility as the custodian of the commonwealth, it is professionalism — the occupational framework of professional conduct —that arms the public servant with specialized skills and expertise to perform whatever functions will enable the realization of the objectives of state policy. The third and final administrative virtue is that of leadership. This encompasses public spiritedness and professionalism in ways that make the public servant more than a mere manager or administrator. This leadership virtue demands that the public servant becomes a transformational, rather than a transactional, change agent with a shared capacity that draws all relevant stakeholders into a framework of collective responsibility that makes the public service an effective and efficient mechanism for delivering public goods that activate democratic governance on behalf of the people and their well-being. All the preceding enables us to grasp the significance of the emergence of the Nigerian pioneers of the British public service. The need to achieve law and order in the colonies demanded that the British Colonial Office train a cadre of highly skilled, loyal and dedicated public servants to implement the demands of colonial administration. This led to the emergence of the administrative generalist cadre that eventually threw up the early bureaucratic pioneers, from Simeon Adebo to Jerome Udoji to Sule Katagum to Allison Ayida, and from Abdul Aziz Attah to Prince Solomon Akenzua to Francesca Emanuel to Tejumade Alakija to Theophilus Akinyele. These pioneers were saddled with the responsibility of ensuring that the nascent Nigerian state made good on its promise to the teeming Nigerians who believed that independence would bring betterment to them. From Adebo to Akinyele, the administrative pioneers had to sustain the core of the public service as value-based institutions through a commitment to the public service as an honorable vocation that demanded they give their all in making the Nigerian state work. A critical component of their value training derived from a model of politician-administrator collaboration that facilitates a relationship between the two for developmental progress. There are three models that account for this relationship. The first, legal or traditional model, involves the rare or ideal situation in which the minister/commissioner takes responsibility for policy making while the permanent secretary simply implements. The second model is the adversarial one—dramatized in the popular BBC sitcom, “Yes, Minister,” in which the minister and the public servant are in constant conflict over policy formulation and implementation. The third is the community model that sees both operating under a contractual obligation and therefore being mutually dependent on each other’s responsibilities. This third model might seem the most appropriate, but in reality, the relationship is a mix of the three models, with all the attendant tensions, conflicts and understanding. This is the best way I think one could see the famous Awolowo-Adebo partnership in the old western region, or the Gowon-super permanent secretary partnership during the Nigerian Civil War; a collaboration that benchmarked Nigeria’s glorious era of distinct public administration and governance achievements. The commitment to institution building in the public service that stood the administrative pioneers out as exemplary public servants include the following: (a) they were exemplary leaders in terms of the integrity they brought to service; (b) the establishment of the Public Service Commission was not just a gatekeeping mechanism to ensure meritocracy, but also a measure of integrity needed in the system; (c) Establishment control, among other internal management mechanisms, mediates the expansion of the size, scope and growth of the service; (d) the town-and-gown/policy-research collaboration facilitated a networked relationship between practitioners and academics in ways that ensured the continuing flow of ideas and innovative reflection about the optimal functioning of the system; (e) the work-life balance complemented the staff development initiatives through housing, pension and other social security schemes to facilitate performance and productivity; and (f) a developmental industrial relations ensured constant consultation that resulted in decent welfare package to improve the condition of service of the workforce. Unfortunately, all these distinct institutional mechanisms collapsed under the burden of a series of historical and administrative circumstances that consolidated a bureaucratic culture in the public service. Three significant trajectories of events jumpstarted the debilitating process of bureau-pathology in the Nigerian public service system. The first was the attempt to mediate the multiethnic nature of the Nigerian state in recruitment into the public service, and how this framework of representativeness collapsed every effort at achieving meritocracy. The second was the missed opportunity with reforming the entire system through the Udoji Commission report and its recommendation of a performance management system patterned along the imperatives of managerialism. The third and last was the massive purge of the public service in 1975 and the grounding of the culture of instant gratification that displaced that of deferred gratification. The reform efforts to undermine the virulent effect of bureau-pathology and its terrible consequences for performance and productivity have been varied. The cumulative effort was to transform the system away from the “I-am-directed” bureaucratic culture to a more performance-oriented managerial culture that will instill value and efficiency into the system. There was, for instance a reform to redefine the role of the state in ways that allow for institutional restructuring that makes public-private partnership and other alternative service delivery approaches possible. There were also significant modernization and digitization of core operations of the civil service to eliminate non-value adding processes and to eliminate silos operations, red tapes and other bureaucratic bottlenecks. There were reforms to reengineer the MDAs operating system to hold them to some form of performance accountability using new metrics different from the APER appraisal instruments. This is, so they would be able to deliver measurable outcomes. There was a series of culture change reforms to deepen the value foundation of the service, as well as reforms to resolve capacity deficits through workforce reprofiling and audit, professionalization of cadres, job evaluation rooted regrading and pay reform, systematic injection of staff skills, and the building of new skills within framework of the restoration of merit system and competency-based HRM. Read Also: 5 countries that don’t have airports What more needed to be done? To get the public service system in line with the expectation of featuring in the fourth and fifth industrial revolutions, the workforce needs to be re-professionalized within a framework to reform the many reforms. This is the first step in facilitating the emergence of a new breed of public managers competent enough to bring the system into the knowledge society. This is also connected with the need to beef up the IQ through deepening the core skills and competences in project management, data science, evidence-based decision-making, acquisition of legal and regulatory skills rooted in the knowledge of market dynamics, etc. The essence is to achieve the creation of a multidisciplinary elite cadre of senior executive service (SES) that leads the charge in the institutional transformation of the system. The public service requires a culture change programme that enables the putting in place of the right values enabled by significant frameworks of mental remodeling to help public servants think outside of the box. This will require value audit and cognitive redefinition to increase and improve staff capacity that enables the system to stay centered on leading change sustainably. This must be complemented by significant adjustments in the incentive structure and the entire system of motivation that manages redundancy through a redesign of the job evaluation framework that will instigate performance better. Internal control mechanisms need strengthening to ensure that the systems retain a sustained maintenance, continuous learning and relearning, incremental improvement and organizational resilience in a vulnerable, uncertain, complex and ambiguous (VUCA) environment. The public service needs to strengthen its policy-research nexus in ways that professionalize the planning and policy analysis function, deepen action and policy research, as well as achieve adequate talent and knowledge management. Lastly, strengthening the system to handle commercially-centered partnerships like the PPPs must go hand in hand with a larger vision of launching and managing a national productivity movement to reprofile national programmes and project management practices, create a new national waste reduction strategy and maintenance culture. The effort to transform the public service system into a world- class type requires a blueprint that, interestingly, had already been foreshadowed by the generation of Pa Theophilus Akinyele and their capacity to embody the values and virtues that distinguish a public service system as a worthy mechanism around which democratic governance flourishes. And that, I believe, is the legacy of that generation for current public administration in Nigeria. Prof. Olaopa is the Chairman, Federal Civil Service Commission, Abuja and Professor of Public Administration . [email protected] (Being Excerpt from the Guest Lecture Delivered at the 4th Theophilus & Elizabeth Akinyele Foundation Memorial Symposium held in Ibadan on Thursday, 21st of November, 2024) Get real-time news updates from Tribune Online! Follow us on WhatsApp for breaking news, exclusive stories and interviews, and much more. Join our WhatsApp Channel now
CROTON, N.Y. (AP) — A federal judge on Wednesday threw out a defamation lawsuit against Fox News by a former Donald Trump supporter who said he received death threats when the network aired false conspiracy theories about his involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection . Raymond Epps, a former Marine, was falsely accused by Fox of being a government agent causing trouble near the Capitol that day so that it would be blamed on Trump fans. U.S. District Judge Jennifer L. Hall in Delaware granted, without comment, Fox's motion to dismiss the case. Epps was the subject of a “60 Minutes” interview in 2023, shortly before filing his lawsuit. He claimed that he and his wife sold an Arizona ranch where they lived and moved because of the harassment they faced because of the reports. Epps had named Tucker Carlson, who was fired from Fox in April 2023 for reasons never fully explained, as being the most active promoter of the conspiracy theory. At the time, Carlson hosted Fox's most popular show. In a statement, Fox News on Wednesday cited two other defamation lawsuits against the company that were also recently dismissed. They involved former Biden administration disinformation expert Nina Jankowicz and Tony Bobulinski, one of Hunter Biden's former business partners. “Following the dismissals of the Jankowicz, Bobulinski and now Epps cases, Fox News is pleased with these back-to-back decisions from federal courts preserving the press freedoms of the First Amendment,” the network said. The Associated PressInternational Disruptors: Congolese Rumba Star Fally Ipupa & Writer-Director Hamed Mobasser Talk Importance Of Portraying Congo “In A New Light” For ‘Rumba Royale’
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