DeSantis Takes School Mask War To New Level As Pandemic Rages

A lot of things happened. Here are some of the things.

Florida Punishes School Boards For Mask Mandates

The Florida Department of Education has begun withholding the salaries of the school board members in Alachua and Broward Counties who voted to establish mask mandates in defiance of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ (R) ban.

• Those salaries will be withheld monthly until the districts comply with the ban, according to the department.
• Commissioner Richard Corcoran framed his agency’s strong-arming as a “fight to protect parent’s rights to make healthcare decisions for their children.”
• Broward County Public Schools (BCPS) is still sticking to its mandate, however, with interim Superintendent Vickie Cartwright asserting that “the health and safety of our students, teachers and staff continue to be our main priorities.”
• The Biden administration has pledged to pay those school officials’ salaries through federal COVID-19 relief funds if Florida made good on its threat to withhold the funds.

The End Of America’s Forever War

As of yesterday 3:29 p.m. ET, 11:59 p.m. local time, all U.S. troops have been withdrawn from Afghanistan after 20 long years.

• The price paid over the course of the two-decade deployment was enormous:
  • More then 171,000 lives lost
  • Tens of thousands of civilian casualties
  • More than 2,400 U.S. military deaths
  • More than $2 trillion in U.S. government war spending
• Shortly after the last U.S. military plane left Kabul, Biden praised the troops’ work in evacuating U.S. citizens and allies.
• The President will give a speech today at 1:30 p.m. ET.

Must-Read

“Victims of A Drone Strike, Momentarily Visible” – Spencer Ackerman

Leaking Pro-Trump Elections Clerk Faces A Removal

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold is now suing to get Mesa County Clerk and Recorder Tina Peters kicked out for allegedly giving pro-Trump conspiracy theorists access to election equipment.

• Peters has been “absent,” according to the lawsuit, and “even if she returns to the Mesa County Clerk and Recorder’s Office, she is unable to perform the required duties as a result of her above wrongful acts and breaches of duties.” 
• Griswold’s office, the FBI, and the Mesa County district attorney are currently investigating the breach. 

Thousands Of Hours Of Clear Insurrection Footage Out Of Reach

There’s ​​14,000 hours of surveillance cam footage inside the Capitol building on Jan. 6, but the government, including prosecutors in the cases against the insurrectionists, are fighting to keep most of it out of public sight.

• The authorities argue that releasing the footage would reveal to future potential attackers where the cameras are positioned.
• But the Capitol Police already said they would be upgrading their surveillance tech in wake of the siege, so whatever would-be attackers could theoretically figure out about the cameras would be “obsolete or soon to be,” one of the lawyers suing to obtain the footage pointed out to Buzzfeed News.

A Judge Forces A Hospital To Allow Horse Meds As COVID-19 Treatment

A hospital in Ohio has been ordered by a state judgeto allow a doctor to give a patient ivermectin, a dewormer for horses and a COVID-19 miracle drug for conservative media.

• The judge’s order says the patient must be allowed to be prescribed a daily dose of 30 mg of ivermectin for 21 days.
• Ralph Lorigo, the attorney who brought forth the lawsuit and the chair of the Erie County Conservative Party in New York, has also successfully sued multiple other hospitals to treat COVID-19 with the dewormer: three in New York and one in Illinois.
• Lorigo has filed a similar lawsuit against another Illinois hospital.

A Huge Fight Over Texas GOP’s Extreme Anti-Abortion Restriction

Reproductive rights advocates have asked the Supreme Court to block Texas’ new six-week abortion ban, which is set to go into effect on Wednesday.

Alright Let’s Have A Cute Animal Video Please

My new favourite WFH problem. I don’t know why, it just gets funnier pic.twitter.com/NiIX5osHh7

— rose (@rosevalentee) August 30, 2021

Do you like Morning Memo? Let us know!