Sunday, May 1st, 2022 

Nancy Pelosi meets with Zelensky in Kyiv Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) became the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit Ukraine since the war began in February when she met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv in Saturday. Her trip to Kyiv comes on the heels of last week’s visit by Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Accompanying Pelosi was a delegation that included Democratic Reps. Adam Schiff (Calif.), Gregory Meeks (N.Y.), and Jim McGovern (Mass.). Zelensky awarded Pelosi with the Order of Princess Olga, a decoration honoring women for “personal merits” in several “spheres of social activities.” The delegation’s next stop is Poland, where they will meet with Polish President Andrzej Duda. CNBC 

‘Some guy named Brandon’ is having a ‘good year,’ Biden quips at White House Correspondents’ Dinner President Biden mocked his predecessor at Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Dinner, referring to former President Donald Trump’s administration as “a horrible plague followed by two years of COVID.” Saturday marked the first time in six years that a president had spoken at the star-studded fundraiser, due to the pandemic and Trump’s acrimonious relationship with the press. In his speech, Biden praised the journalists in attendance as “guardians of truth.” The president also made light of the slogan “Let’s go Brandon” — a right-wing euphemism for “F–k Joe Biden” — quipping that “some guy named Brandon” is having “a really good year.” NPR 

About 20 civilians escape besieged Mariupol steel plant About 20 women and children were evacuated from Mariupol’s besieged Azovstal steel plant on Saturday. As many as 3,000 Ukrainian troops and civilians may remain trapped inside. On April 19, Russian President Vladimir Putin declared victory in Mariupol and ordered his troops to seal off the steel plant, which represents the last bastion of resistance inside the city, instead of storming it. The Azovstal plant’s defenders have refused multiple Russian demands for surrender. Russian media claim that 25 civilians — including six children under the age of 14 — escaped the plant on Saturday. Sviatoslav Palamar, the deputy commander of Ukraine’s Azov Battalion, said the civilians would be evacuated to Ukrainian-controlled territory. BBC 

Russia’s offensive in the Donbas is ‘not succeeding,’ Ukrainian military says Russian forces pressed the attack in eastern Ukraine on Saturday but failed to capture their three main objectives, the Ukrainian military said. Per the general staff of Ukraine’s armed forces, the Russians were attempting to capture the city of Lyman in the Donetsk Oblast and the cities of Sievierodonetsk and Popasna in the Lukahsk Oblast. The Pentagon said Russian forces are making minimal progress in the face of intense Ukrainian resistance. REUTERS 

GOP is a ‘hot mess’ that’s ‘tinkering on fascism,’ DNC chair says The Republican Party is a “hot mess” built on “fear” and “fraud,” Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison said on MSNBC Saturday. “They are tinkering on fascism right now in the Republican Party,” he added. Harrison’s comments came during a discussion with MSNBC host Tiffany Cross, who asked him how “millions of voters” could be “so eager to turn this country over to the right-wing extremists that now comprise the GOP.” To counter Republican messaging, Harrison said, the Democratic Party “has to be a party that is about hope.” FOX NEWS 

Biden’s Disinformation Governance Board draws comparisons to Orwell’s ‘Ministry of Truth’ Former Democratic congresswoman and presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard denounced President Biden’s new Disinformation Governance Board as “the kind of thing that you see in dictatorships” during an appearance on Fox News’ Hannity on Saturday. Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, whose department will oversee the Disinformation Governance Board, said last week that the board’s mission would include combating the threat of Russian misinformation. Gabbard was not the only one to criticize the board. Fox News host Tucker Carlson compared it to the Ministry of Truth in George Orwell’s 1984 and suggested that the parents of Nina Jankowicz, the disinformation expert who will head the board, had “failed” and should feel “shame.” THE WASHINGTON POST 

Amazon to stop offering paid leave for employees with COVID-19 Amazon told workers on Saturday that it will stop offering paid leave for employees with COVID-19. The online retail giant originally offered two weeks of paid time off for COVID before reducing the amount of paid leave to 40 hours in January. Under the new policy, which takes effect on Monday, U.S. employees will get five days of unpaid leave to recover from the virus. Amazon said the change stems from the widespread availability of COVID vaccines and revised guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “We can continue to safely adjust to our pre-COVID policies,” the company said. REUTERS 

Rand Paul says he’ll investigate COVID lab leak theory if GOP retakes the Senate Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) said at a campaign rally in Kentucky on Saturday that he plans to launch an investigation into the origins of the COVID-19 virus if Republicans retake the Senate after the midterms. “When we take over in November, I will be chairman of a committee and I will have subpoena power. And we will get to the bottom of where this virus came from,” Paul said, adding that “the evidence points to this virus being a leak from a lab.” Paul, an eye surgeon and a libertarian, has frequently clashed with White House medical adviser Anthony Fauci over the government’s COVID restrictions and the politically fraught question of the virus’ origins. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

Country singer Naomi Judd dead at 76 Country singer Naomi Judd has died at the age of 76, her daughters announced Saturday. “Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness,” Ashley Judd wrote on Twitter. Naomi Judd formed one half of the Grammy-winning family duo The Judds, in which she provided harmonies for her daughter Wynonna. The two performed at the CMT Music Awards in April and were set to embark on a stadium tour this fall. Naomi Judd’s death came just one day before The Judds’ official induction into the Country Music Hall of Fame. Hall of Fame CEO Kyle Young said the induction ceremony will still take place. CNN 

Saturday, April 30th, 2022 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov says that sanctions must be lifted as part of the peace negotiations between Ukraine and Russia. (Reuters) 

Governor of Kursk Oblast Roman Starovoyt says that shells have been launched at a border checkpoint from the direction of Ukraine. (Reuters) 

Around 20 civilians have left the steel plant, a deputy commander of the Azov Battalion says. (The Times of Israel) 

At least one person is killed and three others injured when a van explodes in Kabul, Afghanistan. (Reuters) 

A tornado strikes Andover, Kansas, United States, inflicting heavy damage. As part of the same weather system, three storm chasers are killed in a car accident due to aquaplaning. (BBC News) (USA Today) 

Five people are rescued and dozens of others remain trapped after a building collapses in Changsha, China. (BBC News) 

It is announced that Beijing residents must show proof of a negative COVID-19 test in order to enter public spaces as part of a major tightening of restrictions in the Chinese capital. (BBC News) 

Taiwan reports a record for the third consecutive day of 15,419 new COVID-19 cases. (Focus Taiwan) 

Hamas warns that, if another attempt to storm the al-Aqsa Mosque is made by Israel, war could break out. (France24) 

A natural gas pipeline is blown up in Bir al-Abd, Egypt by suspected jihadist militants. (Times of Israel) 

Russia is making ‘slow and uneven’ gains in Ukraine at ‘significant cost,’ U.S. and U.K. assess Russia fired missiles at locations across Ukraine on Thursday, but “the Battle of Donbas remains Russia’s main strategic focus,” Britain’s Ministry of Defense said early Friday. “Fighting has been particularly heavy” around Izium, but “due to strong Ukrainian resistance, Russian territorial gains have been limited and achieved at significant cost to Russian forces.” On Thursday, a senior Pentagon official said, “We would assess that Russian forces are making slow and uneven and, frankly, we would describe it as incremental progress in the Donbas.” The official also described a lot of “back-and-forth in the Donbas in terms of territory gained and/or lost by, frankly, both sides.” U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE 

Sean Hannity warned Mark Meadows about ‘fing lunatics’ advising Trump, texts show Fox News host Sean Hannity exchanged more than 80 texts messages with Mark Meadows, then-President Donald Trump’s White House chief of staff, between Election Day 2020 and President Biden’s inauguration. According to messages released Friday by CNN, Hannity strongly supported Trump’s baseless claims of widespread voter fraud, telling Meadows it was “mathematically impossible” for Biden to have received as many votes as he had. Hannity also warned Meadows about some of the “fing lunatics” pushing Trump’s stolen election claims. “They are NOT helping [Trump]. I’m fed up with these people,” Hannity wrote. CNN 

Biden requests $33 billion for Ukraine fight as Congress passes ‘lend-lease’ arms authorization The House on Thursday cleared a bill that will allow President Biden to more easily supply weapons to Ukraine to help it fend off Russia’s invasion, using a 1941 lend-lease law created to arm allies against Nazi Germany. “President Zelensky has said that Ukraine needs weapons to sustain themselves, and President Biden has answered that call,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said. The Senate passed the bipartisan Ukraine Democracy Defense Lend-Lease Act by unanimous consent earlier this month, and the House sent it to Biden’s desk on a vote of 417 to 10. Hours earlier, Biden had asked Congress for another $33 billion for the Ukraine fight. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

Former U.S. Marine killed while fighting in Ukraine Former U.S. Marine Willy Joseph Cancel was killed while fighting against Russian forces in Ukraine. Cancel, age 22, reportedly volunteered to travel to Ukraine and fight after Russia invaded. He had reportedly been working in Ukraine since mid-March with a private military contracting company and was killed Monday. His family confirmed his death, while a U.S. Department of State official said they “are aware of these reports and are closely monitoring the situation,” but declined to comment further “due to privacy considerations.” His body has not yet been found. ABC NEWS 

The S&P 500 is down 13.8 percent in 2022, the worst year-to-date performance since World War II The stock market plunged on Friday, with the Dow Jones industrial average down 939.18 points, or 2.8 percent. Tech stocks were particularly hard hit, with the Nasdaq down 4.2 percent. The S&P 500 lost 9.1 percent of its value in April, closing out its worst month since the COVID-19 pandemic began in March 2020 and marking its worst year-to-date performance since World War II. “The economy is fundamentally soft: The Fed is going to hike next week, the situation in Ukraine is not getting better, and high inflation is cutting into costs,” said Joe La Vorgna, who served as a White House economic adviser under former President Donald Trump. THE WASHINGTON POST 

U.K. should suspend local government in the British Virgin Islands, report recommends A report released Friday by the United Kingdom’s government recommended suspending the constitution of the British Virgin Islands, dissolving its elected government, and ruling the Caribbean archipelago through its crown-appointed governor. The governor, John Rankin, ordered the report in 2021 to shed light on “corruption, abuse of office, and other serious dishonesty.” On Thursday, the islands’ elected premier, Alturo Fahie, was arrested in Miami, Florida, on drug trafficking and money laundering charges. The British Virgin Islands, which have a population of around 30,000, have been autonomous since 1967 but remain a British overseas territory rather than a sovereign country. REUTERS 

Elon Musk reportedly eyes new ways to monetize tweets as he lines up next Twitter CEO Elon Musk doesn’t officially own Twitter yet, but he’s already eying some changes. Days after Twitter reached a deal with Musk, the Tesla CEO has told banks he’s looking to “develop new ways to monetize tweets.” According to the report, Musk says he’s, in particular, looking to introduce “new ways to make money out of tweets that contain important information or go viral,” with one idea being to charge websites a fee if they want to quote or embed tweets from verified accounts. Musk has also reportedly said he has lined up a person to be the next CEO of the company but has declined to reveal who it is. REUTERS 

Airbnb to allow employees to permanently work from home Most Airbnb employees never have to return to the office again, as the company has announced it will allow workers to permanently work remotely. “You can work from home or the office — whatever works best for you,” CEO Brian Chesky said. Airbnb previously planned to have employees return to the office in September 2022. But Chesky said the new policy was informed by the fact that Airbnb had its “most productive two-year period” ever while employees worked from home during the pandemic. “This is where the world is going,” Chesky said. THE NEW YORK TIMES 

MLB suspends Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer for 2 seasons over sexual assault allegation Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer has been suspended by Major League Baseball for two seasons after he was accused of sexual assault. The league announced Friday that following an investigation, Bauer has been suspended for 324 games, two full seasons, for violating its policy against domestic violence. In 2021, a woman filed for a restraining order against Bauer, alleging he sexually assaulted her. On Friday, Bauer denied violating the MLB’s domestic violence policy in the “strongest possible terms” and said he will appeal the decision. His two-season suspension is reportedly the most severe punishment the MLB has ever imposed over a violation of its domestic violence policy. MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL 

The End