Covid

• The White House will offer drug makers billions of dollars to increase the production ability of mRNA covid vaccines to one billion doses per year. [Link]
• The US will send Johnson and Johnson covid vaccines to the border of Thailand and Myanmar. The donated vaccines are a part of the 15 million doses the US pledged to war zones. The J&J vaccines were potentially contaminated and sat in a warehouse before being cleared by the FDA. [Link]
• The US donates one million Moderna covid vaccines to Vietnam. [Link]
• Fauci says the number of people who are vaccinated but not boosted is an increasing number of the covid hospitalizations. [Link]
• Companies that made record profits during the pandemic are having their PPP loans forgiven. [Link]

US News

• Unedited video shows Pennsylvania police murdering teenager Christoper Hall with his hands in the air. Police initially released footage with the video blurred and said Hall “committed suicide by cop.” [Link]
• Georgia police arrested Ju’zema Goldring for jaywalking. Then, police cut open a stress ball found in her purse to check for drugs. The police incorrectly used a Nark II field test and produced a false positive. Goldring spent six months in jail before the mistake was corrected. [Link]
• Six prison guards in Georgia have been charged with murder for torturing Antonio May to death. [Link]
• Two of the three men convicted of killing Malcolm X will be exonerated today. [Link]
• Jacob Chansley – the ‘Q Anon Shaman’ – was sentenced to 41 months for obstructing Congress. [Link]
• Kyle Rittenhouse’s defense team files a motion for dismissal with prejudice because the prosecution withheld higher quality drone footage from the defense. [Link]

Pentagon

• Senator Paul will attempt to block a missile sale to Saudi Arabia. [Link]
• Senate Republicans are threatening to hold up the NDAA bill over Senate Leader Schumer’s decision to include China competition legislation in the bill. [Link] Schumer walked back the plan and votes on the NDAA are expected today. [Link]
• The Pentagon failed its annual audit. The Pentagon has never had a successful audit with failures four years in a row. [Link]
• The Air Force spent $19,000 per unit on new night vision goggles that went unused because they couldn’t be mounted to helmets. An airman independently engineered a piece of plastic to allow the night vision to mount, fixing the leadership’s costly mistake. [Link]

Poland-Belarus Border Crisis

• Poland’s President Duda says there is no military threat, but his forces are sealing the border of the EU to prevent illegal immigration. [Link]
• Over 400 Iraqi migrants were removed from the Poland-Belarus border and flown back to Iraq. [Link]

China

• A Congressional advisory board issues a report calling for the US to take a harder line on Taiwan. [Link]
• Taiwan deploys its first squadron of upgraded F-16Vs. [Link]
• The US is testing the Iron Dome air defense system in Guam. [Link]
• Japan and the US hold anti-submarine drills in the South China Sea. [Link]
• Japan and South Korea refused to attend a planned press conference with a State Department official over a South Korean-Japanese dispute over island control. [Link]

India

• The US is undecided if it will give India a sanctions waiver after buying the Russian S-400 air defense system. US law requires countries that buy Russian weapons to face sanctions. [Link]

Afghanistan

• ISIS-K claims that it was behind two suicide bombings in Kabul that killed four. [Link]

Israel

• On a trip to Israel, US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield said the US would replenish Israel’s Iron Dome missiles. [Link]
• Israeli soldiers raided a Palestinian home in the middle of the night to photograph the children. [Link]
• Israeli neglect of a Palestinian prisoner – Sami Umour – led to his death at 39. [Link]
• The UAE and US-brokered a water and energy deal between Israel and Jordan. Jordan will build a large solar farm to power Israel and Israel will export desalinated water to Jordan. [Link]
• National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan suggests a temporary agreement with Iran to buy more time to same the Iran Nuclear Deal. An Israeli official rejected the suggestion. [Link]

Middle East

• US federal agencies claim Iran is backing ransomware hackers targeting American companies. [Link]
• The head of the IAEA will visit Iran on Monday. [Link]
• The UN says two of its staff are being held by the Houthi without communication. [Link]

Africa 

• Burkina Faso updates the death toll in a weekend militant attack on a military outpost to 53. It reports 49 of its soldiers and four civilians were killed. [Link]
• At least 15 people were killed after security forces opened fire on protesters in Sudan. [Link]
• Unidentified gunmen killed 25 members of a local militia in Niger. [Link]