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Republican Senator Bernie Moreno is getting blasted for losing his temper at Dr. Anthony Fauci during a Senate hearing Wednesday, while remaining silent on the alleged abuse of his daughter by her ex-husband, Republican Representative Max Miller.

Fauci continually pleaded the Fifth rather than answer invasive questions from Senate Republicans who accuse him of a cover-up with the Covid-19 pandemic, and Moreno flipped out.

“Who the fuck do you think you were for doing that? It is a total disgrace what you did to this country, and then my Democrat colleagues are standing there defending you,” Moreno said. “You may have had a 50-plus year legacy of public service, but it ends in total and complete disgrace.”

It’s harsher language than anything Moreno has said about Miller, who has a long list of alleged abuse against his ex-wife, Moreno’s daughter Emily. Miller allegedly threw boiling water from a skillet onto Emily Moreno’s chest, scalding her; put a gun to her head; pushed her against a wall, hitting her head; and fractured their two-year-old daughter’s collarbone and bruised her shoulder. Several people on social media quickly pointed this out.

Senator Moreno seems more concerned with scoring political points against one of the GOP’s favorite punching bags than he is with defending his daughter. Miller not only denies the allegations against him, but he claims Emily is lying, has bipolar disorder, is stalking him, and is trying to damage his reputation. Miller and Emily Moreno’s daughter even told her mother, according to court documents, “Daddy kill you.”

Waymo robotaxis are now using freeways in Phoenix with more cities to follow in the coming days.

The ban largely affects U.S. imports from China, which currently dominates the global market for making humanoid robots and solar inverters.

Todd Blanche’s chance at becoming attorney general is in genuine jeopardy after  Republican Senator John Cornyn canceled a meeting with the nominee amid an ongoing standoff over President Trump’s $1.776 billion “Anti-Weaponization Fund.”

Cornyn was approached by CNN’s Manu Raju in the Senate halls on Wednesday after news that his morning meeting with Blanche had been canceled.

“So, are you a ‘no’? Are you a ‘no’ tomorrow if this comes to a vote?” Raju asked. 

“Well, [Senate Judiciary Committee Chair] Grassley tells me that we need to know by four o’clock this afternoon whether the markup is still on. So we’ve still got a little time,” Cornyn responded. “And hopefully they now recognize the seriousness of this, and will be responding.” 

“But if it stands as it is now … right now, would you vote ‘no’?”

“I’m not prepared to vote ‘yes,’ lemme put it that way,” Cornyn said. 

Cornyn, along with Senator Thom Tillis, has been demanding written termination of Trump’s $1.776 slush fund to help his allies. Tillis told Semafor on Wednesday that there’s “no daylight” between himself and Cornyn on the anti-weaponization fund’s termination. 

Even one Republican “no” vote would effectively kill Blanche’s nomination, as he needs the support of all 11 Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee to move forward, assuming every Democrat votes ‘no.’ All Blanche has to do is deliver a written statement assuring them that Trump’s fund is dead—and yet he’s refusing. 

“We’ve still got what, about another five or six hours?  That’s plenty of time to resolve this,” Cornyn continued. “There’s no real need to have a meeting if they will just produce the documentation that we’ve requested—and that he testified to under oath during his hearing.”

“Sir, you’ve been incredibly clear with what you would like Todd Blanche to do … for days now,” another reporter asked. “What do you think the holdup is here?”

“Beats me. Maybe they think I’m just going to give up or, you know, go along, but they’re mistaken.” 

John Cornyn’s demands for written language to kill $1.8B anti-weaponization fund have NOT been met as meeting with Todd Blanche scrapped ahead of key committee vote tomorrow. Blanche has til 4p to respond, or vote could be delayed.

“I’m not prepared to vote yes,” Cornyn told us pic.twitter.com/qLBnXOCkLr

— Manu Raju (@mkraju) July 29, 2026

The arraignment for the 19-year-old man accused of murdering a 73-year-old Capitola woman was delayed again to mid-August.

Tyler Leibelt of Santa Cruz is due back in court on August 19. His attorney, public defender Lisa McCamey, declined to comment Wednesday morning on the reasons for the delay.

Leibelt was arrested last Monday after he allegedly stabbed and killed Rachell Summers of Capitola outside the mall in what investigators believe to be a random act of violence. Summers was the manager of the Art of Santa Cruz gallery located in the mall.

Leibelt is charged with first-degree murder and use of a deadly weapon, with an enhancement for lying in wait, in other words, hiding and waiting for a person with the intent to kill or inflict serious bodily harm to them.

Documents filed in Santa Cruz Superior Court last week laid out the alleged sequence of events. Leibelt said that he had the desire to kill someone and had considered killing multiple other people, as well as robbing the Macy’s store, before eventually stabbing Summers. He eventually called 911 to confess and say that he wanted police to come so that he could turn himself in. After Leibelt was arrested, he had told staff that he still had homicidal thoughts, according to the court filing.

Court documents also showed that the Santa Cruz County Sheriff’s Office requested a gun violence restraining order in November 2025, when Leibelt was 18, citing that he had “expressed a desire to cause a mass casualty event.” He had also allegedly written a goodbye letter in which he said he had a desire to kill as many people as possible.

The post Arraignment for murder suspect in Capitola Mall stabbing delayed again  appeared first on Lookout Santa Cruz.

⚡ Quick Take

• X-Men ’97 season two reintroduced the Acolytes, along with their militant leader Exodus, in an episode that reintroduced Colossus.

In one of X-Men ’97 season two‘s best episodes, “Strange Land, Savage Heart,” we find that Colossus, wracked with grief after his sister Magik’s death on Genosha, has joined the militant mutant group, the Acolytes. You may remember this group—albeit a with a different roster of characters—from season four of the original X-Men: The Animated Series. This group, one of the most ’90s of the ’90s, transcend merely following a leader to devoting themselves to a messianic figure.

Marvel

Their history in X-Men comics begins with one of the most pivotal moments in all of Marvel Comics.

The First Acolytes Marvel

The Acolytes first appear in the seminal X-Men Vol 2 #1 from 1991. This is the legendary issue which relaunched the conflict between the formerly rehabilitated Magneto and Charles Xavier’s X-Men teams. As Magneto reemerges as the villain he had been for the balance of the ’60s and ’70s, he has a new team of mutant followers. No longer the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, but instead the Acolytes, those who fervently believe in Magneto’s mutant supremacy.

Of these Acolytes, the most important figure is Fabian Cortez, seemingly the most fawning of the group. Cortez’s mutant abilities are generally in a support role. He can augment the abilities of other mutants, revive them when they’re exhausted, and supercharge them when needed. However, this augmentation becomes like a drug to the augmented, making them dependent on Cortez’s “treatments,” and thus giving him control over them. He can also completely nullify the abilities of mutants, which is obviously a boon to him.

Marvel

The reader and Magneto eventually learn that Cortez is a double agent, actually a member of the Upstarts, working to destroy the Master of Magnetism for the enjoyment of another mutant villain, the Gamesmaster. Cortez crashes Asteroid M, killing all the other Acolytes, though Magneto survives.

The Second Acolytes Marvel

Believing he’d successfully killed Magneto, Cortez assembled a second group of Acolytes, all of whom true believers who exalt Magneto as a martyr. After several violent raids on mutant holding facilities, and run-ins with both the X-Men and X-Factor, a new mutant, Exodus, appears on the scene.

Exodus was a 12th century French nobleman who became one of Apocalypse’s champions in history. Exodus is an Omega-level telekinetic who also possesses a very fitting power, that of enhancement through faith. He can bolster the powers of other mutants or his own if he or others around him believe in that mutant strongly enough. Thus, as a man of faith himself, his powers grow exponentially and is essentially one of the best hype men in X-Men.

Marvel

Exodus knows the truth of Cortez’s treachery and exposes it to his fellow Acolytes. This causes a rift in the group, with most now following Exodus and some remaining to follow Cortez. Upon Magneto’s return, Exodus bent the knee and became one of Magneto’s most staunch supporters. During this in-fighting, Cortez is killed.

During the Fatal Attractions event, Illyana Rasputin, aka Magik, died, the first victim of the Legacy Virus. When the Acolytes arrived to pay their respects at her funeral, her older brother Colossus became enraged with Xavier and his starry-eyed dream for peace. He then joins with Magneto and the Acolytes. Despite Kitty Pryde trying to persuade Colossus to return to the X-Men, he chooses to stay.

Marvel

In the aftermath of the Age of Apocalypse, one of Apocalypse’s Horsemen, his son Holocaust, jumps into the 616 universe. Exodus is thrilled and brings him into the Acolyte fold. However, Holocaust, go figure, is a living nightmare, absorbing mutants into himself and generally causing mayhem. The Acolytes all agree to turn themselves in to the X-Men if they will help, but Exodus remains with Holocaust. Magneto seemingly dies again during this, and Colossus likewise escapes.

The Third Acolytes

Exodus and another small band of Acolytes appear when Joseph, the “reborn” Magneto, arrives on the scene. This group lasts all of four issues, in the Magneto miniseries.

The Fourth Acolytes

A group of Acolytes are among those slaughtered by Wild Sentinels on Genosha during Cassandra Nova’s destruction of the island. This takes place in the first issue of Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely’s New X-Men.

The Fifth Acolytes

Exodus assembles a group of Acolytes yet again following the mass-depowering event, M-Day. During this period, in Decimation and forward, the Acolytes become major figures in the search for the first newborn mutant since M-Day. Eventually, Xavier convinces Exodus to disband the Acolytes once Hope Summers, the selfsame Mutant Messiah, arrives on the scene.

Marvel The Acolytes Return on Krakoa

After Xavier and Magneto announce their new mutant haven on Krakoa, and the new ability to resurrect dead mutants, Exodus, Cortez, and several other former Acolytes choose to move to the island. Cortez would join the space-based S.W.O.R.D. team under Abigail Brand, while Exodus became a member of the Krakoan Quiet Council and a major figure in saving the mutants during the Fall of X.

The Acolytes in X-Men: The Animated Series Marvel

Fabian Cortez and the Acolytes appeared in the two-part fourth season story, “Sanctuary.” It dramatizes the Asteroid M incident from the comics. Magneto seemingly dies and Cortez assumes control of the base, sending missiles to Earth and leading to the X-Men saving the day.

Cortez would appear once more in X-Men: TAS. In the season five episode “The Fifth Horseman,” Cortez kidnaps Jubilee and attempts to revive Apocalypse through using her body as a vessel. Instead, Apocalypse possesses Cortez’s body. Serves him right, the weasel.

The Acolytes in X-Men ’97 Marvel

Exodus appeared briefly in a non-speaking role in season one’s standout middle episode, “Remember It.” He reappears in “Strange Land, Savage Heart,” as the new leader of the Acolytes. This version, which includes Colossus and several other “Oh hey, yeah, that guy” mutants, fulfills the remit of the Magneto as martyr group.

The episode also reinterprets a scene from the comics in which Exodus oversees a trial with Colossus as one of the de-facto lawyers. However, while in the comics, Colossus is defending a mutant accused of betraying the Acolytes, here he’s the judge, Exodus the prosecutor trying the case of anti-mutant leader Graydon Creed, and the man’s half-brother Nightcrawler for the defense.

Marvel

Before Colossus can render his verdict, Exodus believes him a traitor and attacks, leading to a brawl between X-Men and Acolytes. In the skirmish, Creed shoots Exodus in the back, seemingly killing him. (Exodus is too cool to stay dead for long.) Colossus then rejoins the X-Men.

Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Letterboxd.

The post The Marvel Comics History of Exodus and the Acolytes appeared first on Nerdist.

Donald Trump may have personally undone the criminal case against one of his political nemeses, former FBI Director James Comey, thanks to his deep involvement.

The Department of Justice accused Comey of threatening the president’s life when he posted a photo of seashells to his Instagram account last year, arguing that the message the shells spelled out—“86 47”—would be interpreted by any person “familiar with the circumstances” as a “serious expression of an intent to do harm to the president,” according to Comey’s indictment.

But on Tuesday, Comey’s lawyers argued that the entire case should be moot due to Trump’s personal involvement in Comey’s questioning, according to a motion to dismiss first reported on by The New York Times. According to government documents handed over to Comey’s team, Trump told Secret Service agents that interviewed the former FBI director to send their notes to Air Force One for Trump’s personal review.

The Secret Service questioned Comey by phone hours after he shared the protest message on Instagram May 15. Despite being informed by a Secret Service agent that the telephone interview would likely suffice, Comey agreed to further questioning in Washington. “From that point forward, high-level DOJ and White House officials (including the President) involved themselves in the investigation,” stated Comey’s attorneys.

The Secret Service chose to monitor Comey the next day on his drive to Washington despite lacking a warrant—a decision that was noted by at least one agent as, legally, a “bad idea” since there was no “imminent danger to life” that could justify the warrantless surveillance.

They did so at the behest of the “number three” person at the DOJ, according to the legal document. That individual is not named in the memo, but the number three person at the DOJ is  the associate attorney general, a position that was not filled by a Senate-confirmed official at the time of Comey’s surveillance. The agents tailed Comey and his wife even as they visited the grave of their deceased son, according to the filing.

A government document obtained by Comey’s team revealed that “POTUS was requesting a copy of the interview notes to use in his 6 p.m. press conference.” One Secret Service agent described the interview as “a hot topic on the plane,” noting that Trump was “very interested,” according to the Times.

Trump has been very public about his contempt for Comey since the FBI director led the investigation into Trump’s ties to Russia following the 2016 presidential election. Trump fired Comey in the midst of that probe, prompting a follow-up investigation by Comey’s predecessor, special counsel Robert Mueller, that determined that Russian influence in the 2016 election was “sweeping and systemic,” and found substantial (if non-prosecutable) evidence that Trump had obstructed justice by firing Comey.

In another section of the legal filing, Comey’s attorneys revealed that the Trump administration attempted to prove the lethality behind Comey’s “86” post by questioning Sammy “The Bull” Gravano, a notorious gangster who was at one point the underboss in the Gambino crime family and was personally responsible for at least 19 murders. Gravano apparently confirmed the term’s violent definition, though he noted that a “gangster would never use that term” because it was too obvious to law enforcement.

In the hours following Comey’s post, the Secret Service instituted a new policy that redefined “86 47” as a formal threat to the president’s life. However, the agency rolled back the change by the day’s end and returned to “business as usual”as the policy shift resulted in an overwhelming amount of potential leads that lacked “threatening language,” according to the filing.

Comey has denied the accusations, claiming that he was only familiar with the term via restaurant slang, where it contextually means to remove an item off the menu.

On July 21, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Dr. Mehmet Oz, who heads Medicaid programs federally, announced they’re deferring over $850 million from the state of California over its Medicaid-funded home and community-based services program called In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS). The Trump administration has attacked IHSS for the program’s growth over the past decade.

Their argument: the program is so successful there must be rampant fraud.

Home and community-based services got started under President Ronald Regean to help disabled people remain in their communities with the assistance of paid aides, including family members, instead of being institutionalized. From a purely economic standpoint, home and community-based services care is cheaper than care in hospitals or nursing homes. And disabled people find the right to remain in their communities to be so crucial that it has become an essential tenet of disability rights activism.

Hagar Dickman, who directs California-focused long-term services and support at Justice in Aging, told me that disabled people “are entitled to the life that we expect to have of independence, of autonomy, of self-actualization, and agency.”

As of May 2026, nearly a million disabled and aging Californians are authorized for home and community-based services through IHSS. Unlike in some states, like Texas, where people can lag on waiting lists for over a decade, once a disabled Californian goes through the process of qualifying for IHSS, they are able to get services to help them live independently immediately.

The program’s growth, according to Tyler Sadwith, who directs Medicaid services in the state, is proof that it’s working. In February, Sadwith wrote a letter to Dr. Oz’s agency defending it against allegations of fraud. “Outcomes that CMS has repeatedly endorsed and promoted through federal approvals of California’s IHSS and [home and community-based services] programs, because they deliver care at a fraction of institutional costs.”

Experts I spoke with are concerned that the attacks specifically on California could be used to make an example of paid caregiving, which Kennedy has attacked profusely. Attacks on paid caregiving are also happening at the same time that the Department of Justice is trying to undermine Olmstead, a Supreme Court decision which granted disabled people the right to remain in their communities, in addition to brutal federal Medicaid cuts.

“One of the incredible things about paid family caregiving models is that it allows people to have culturally competent care,” Sabrina Epstein, Disability Rights California policy analyst, told me. “The program is set up for people with needs above and beyond the usual care that a family member would provide, and so these claims of fraud are ableist and racist.”

And unlike attacks towards Minnesota and Medicare-funded home health in Los Angeles, there isn’t even a “few bad apples” argument to be made when attacking IHSS. California, like every state, also investigates Medicaid fraud.

“There’s an existing framework to ensure that there’s not fraud. You can’t bill for more hours than you’re allotted,” Elizabeth Zirker, a senior attorney with National Health Law Program, told me. Additionally, Zirker notes, in California, Medicaid home care is not administered through private companies, unlike some other states.

Additionally, getting IHSS is not automatic for disabled Californians on Medicaid who apply. “It’s not as simple as applying for in-home supportive services and then being awarded hours,” Zirker said. “Counties are not incentivized to pay for services people don’t need.”

And California’s model is still not perfect; experts I spoke with cited waiting lists for some smaller Medicaid-funded programs outside of IHSS and pay for care workers needing to be higher.

“The whole assumption that you know growth means fraud is absurd,” Dickman said, “especially given all of the investments that the state has made to actually intentionally grow the program in order to benefit its disabled population and to support people living at home.”

President Donald Trump apparently believes cursing about Iran will distract from his inability to prevent that nation from launching attacks against America and its allies. On Tuesday, Trump reacted to news of Iran firing missiles at U.S. forces based in Jordan by telling Fox News correspondent Trey Yingst, “We are going to beat the fucking shit out of them.

Source

Google is expanding its Play Age Signals API, giving Android developers a privacy-preserving way to tailor experiences based on users’ age ranges.

A cartoon by Tim Campbell. Related | Who will take the fall for Trump’s Iran war fiasco?

Source

UPDATED Watch out for untrusted documents. According to research, an attacker can hide malicious instructions in a Word document that, when included in Copilot for Word’s context, may alter document output and copy the instructions into newly created files that use the affected document as source material, without the victim noticing. Håkon Måløy, a Norwegian data scientist with a PhD in applied AI and ML, publicly disclosed the issue in a blog post Tuesday. Måløy describes the issue in considerable detail while withholding the specific prompt payload, arguing that, because no robust mitigation exists, it would be irresponsible to disclose anything beyond the class of the vulnerability. “To my knowledge, this is among the first public demonstrations of document-borne AI-worm self-propagation through normal workflows in a mainstream commercial productivity suite,” Måløy noted. Måløy said that he has been working with Microsoft since March 2026 on addressing the vulnerability, but after multiple updates to Copilot, this new class of Copilot worm is still viable. Microsoft mitigated the exploit demonstrated by his original proof-of-concept prompt, but Måløy said rewording the payload allowed him to successfully propagate the worm and alter financial data in a target document. Måløy and Microsoft twice delayed public disclosure of the issue, but, after 144 days, he said in his report that people needed to be made aware. “The coordination period agreed with Microsoft has been exhausted, and testing shows that no robust mitigation for the broader vulnerability class is currently available,” Måløy wrote. “Two mitigation attempts, including a model upgrade, did not close the class.” How Copilot propagates a Word worm Måløy explained the worm’s execution with an example involving an employee preparing a financial report for their company. The employee downloads a market analysis from a trusted website to help with the preparation of a financial report in Copilot, unaware that the source had been compromised and the document they downloaded contains hidden malicious instructions. The hidden instructions (inserted as small white text in his proof of concept) tell Copilot to alter figures in the report the employee generates and to copy the worm into the report they create with Copilot. If another employee later adds that report to their own work, the whole process begins again, and documents generated from it also contain the worm, and, as it spreads, it makes tracing the infection to its source extremely difficult. “The attack can therefore continue without further involvement from either the compromised website or the original malicious document,” Måløy said. “The attacker does not need access to the victim’s Microsoft 365 tenant. The attacker only needs to share a malicious document with the victim.” Copilot should use information in documents a user includes in its context for a project without treating instructions embedded in a document as additional prompts, Måløy said, but his research suggests it doesn't always do that. A fundamental flaw Måløy argues that he’s essentially dug up a new type of cross-domain prompt injection attack that abuses a fundamental part of modern LLM architecture. “For AI-assistants to be useful, they often must process emails, documents, webpages, memories, tool outputs, and other information that may be controlled by an attacker,” the researcher said. But if an LLM has to process data in order to determine it contains an attack, the attack could already be influencing that determination. “Relying on the model to detect XPIAs therefore resembles asking an interpreter to execute an untrusted program to determine whether that program is safe to execute,” Måløy asserted. Were Microsoft or some other company to pop another model in front of that model to check for malicious content, it only moves the problem outward, Måløy said, creating a “LLMs all the way down” scenario. “The long-term challenge likely lies in designing systems in which goals and intentions also exist independently of the information being processed,” he said. Until that time, Måløy argues, “any system that integrates an LLM into a trusted workflow today must assume that attacker-controlled content entering the model’s context will result in compromise at some rate.” What can Copilot customers do to reduce the risk? Short of ditching Copilot, there’s not much. “No customer-side remediation fully addresses the issue at the time of publication,” Måløy said, but he does have a few tips. Treat externally sourced documents as untrusted when using them in Copilot, he recommends, and fully review every single document before sending it to Copilot, and fully review any Copilot-generated or edited documents before distributing them. Sheesh - if you’re going to have to actually read that stuff, you might as well just cut Copilot out of the loop and do the thinking yourself. Microsoft has been in touch to confirm the research, but the company's statement doesn't do anything to allay fears this is an unsolved issue. “We have addressed the findings reported by the researcher and thank them for working with us through coordinated vulnerability disclosure. To address this class of risk, we use a defense-in-depth strategy with safeguards that block malicious instructions at multiple points and help keep tasks aligned with users’ requests. We are continuously strengthening these safeguards as the technology and threat landscape evolve. We encourage customers to install the latest updates, use multiple layers of security protection, treat content from unknown sources with caution, and review AI-generated content before using or sharing it.” We also reached out to Måløy, but didn’t hear back before publication. ® Updated at 1841 GMT on July 29 to add Microsoft's statement.

On Tuesday, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) released a trove of diary entries from Dr. Anthony Fauci, the 85-year-old immunologist and public health veteran who led the US response to the Covid pandemic in 2020. On X, Paul posted an AI-generated image of a grinning, pastel-sweater-clad Anthony Fauci lying on his stomach on a purple shag carpet, poring over a unicorn-themed diary and surrounded by teen girl accoutrements. Paul explained to his 5.9 million followers that the image was “What Anthony Fauci looked like every night when he wrote about how great he is in his diary.”

The diary entries contain plenty of cringeworthy moments—Fauci congratulating himself on how famous he had become, for example, and basking in the attention of female celebrities like Julia Roberts and Barbra Streisand. What they don’t contain—much to the dismay of Paul and Fauci’s other critics—is any kind of smoking gun proving that the public health leader deliberately misled the American people.

Undeterred, Covid truthers have only amped up their efforts to prove that Fauci lied—and they’re spinning up conspiracy theories about crucial information they say is missing from the diary.

In an email newsletter Wednesday morning, MAHA Action, the political lobbying group founded by key allies of Health and Human Services Secretary and anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., presented a complex theory concerning University of North Carolina coronavirus researcher Ralph Baric’s absence from the diaries. He has emerged as an important figure for people seeking to prove definitively that Covid came from a lab. Margaret Menge, the author of the newsletter who describes herself on LinkedIn as a “truth seeker and news innovator,” argues that the diary’s omission of Baric is fishy, because Fauci was meeting with him in 2020. “What did Fauci really know or suspect about the origin of the virus?”  Menge writes and then expands her thesis. “It’s not in the diary entries. But leaving Baric’s name off the list is a sign that he was hiding something, and an indication he suspected that the diary entries would one day be made public.”

If Fauci had imagined a future diary release scenario, would he not have allowed that his Barbra Streisand fangirling might make him seem, well, uncool?

While it’s theoretically possible that this happened, the idea of Fauci practicing self-restraint by deliberately omitting the name of a virologist seems dubious, considering the verbose nature of the rest of the diary. If Fauci had imagined a future diary release scenario, would he not have allowed that his Barbra Streisand fangirling might make him seem, well, uncool?

Baric’s absence isn’t the only thing that Covid skeptics find suspicious about the diary. There are the theories from Mary Talley Bowden, the Texas otolaryngologist who gained notoriety during the pandemic for her advocacy around discredited Covid treatments and criticism of vaccines. “I think Fauci scrubbed his diary of all mentions of ivermectin when we sued the FDA and overcame their motion to dismiss,” she posted to her 641,000 followers on X. “It’s odd that there is no mention of it at all.  What else have you noticed that’s missing?” The lawsuit she refers to is one that she and several colleagues filed in 2022, accusing the US Food and Drug Administration of overstepping its authority by issuing public warnings advising against using one of President Donald Trump’s treatments of choice, ivermectin, to treat Covid. The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals ultimately ruled in favor of Bowden, saying the FDA had gone too far in its warnings—but overwhelming evidence still suggests that the horse dewormer ivermectin isn’t an effective Covid treatment.

While the MAHA Action newsletter writer and Bowden appear to believe that Fauci was censoring himself, others in the Covid denialist universe seem to think that nefarious government forces censored the diary. KanekoaTheGreat, an anonymous right-wing account with a million followers, notes that a June 2021 entry about a lung blood clot that Fauci suffered was originally published and then redacted. “Did Fauci’s lawyers demand the redaction?” reads the post. “Why scrub a lung blood clot from 2021 after it went public?”

While KanekoaTheGreat doesn’t allege that the blood clot was connected to Fauci receiving a Covid vaccine, anti-vaccine activists were quick to spin it that way. Children’s Health Defense, the anti-vaccine group co-founded by RFK Jr., published an article titled “Fauci Treated for Pulmonary Infarction Months After Getting COVID Vaccine, Diaries Show.” Vince Langman, a MAGA influencer with 565,000 followers on X, posted, “I was suspended from Twitter 1.0 for telling people the Covid Vaccine can cause blood clots! This makes my blood boil!” But there’s a much simpler explanation for the redaction: It contained personal health information, which would put Paul in violation of federal medical privacy protocol.

At a hearing before the Senate Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday, Fauci repeatedly invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to answer Rand’s questions, arguing that the hearing was little more than a witch hunt. “The sole reason [Rand] is calling me before this committee is to get me to say something, anything, that could vindicate his repeated public pledges that I end up, in his words, ‘behind bars,'” Fauci said. “Any reasonable person who has followed his unhinged obsession with me would readily come to the same conclusion.”

⚡ Quick Take

• It’s been 14 years since we saw Bruce Banner transform into Hulk onscreen.
• We may have imagined we saw Bruce Banner transform into the Hulk at a few different points, but it hasn’t actually happened since The Avengers.
• Will that streak finally end in Spider-Man: Brand New Day?

Spider-Man: Band New Day‘s trailers have shown Peter Parker fighting a former friend, the Incredible Hulk. The film’s promos have teased why two superheroes might find themselves battling. A powerful unseen force with mind control powers looms large. And that mysterious figure could also be why we will finally get to see something that—as impossible as it sounds—hasn’t happened on screen in the MCU in 14 years. Spider-Man: Brand New Day might finally show Bruce Banner hulking out again. That’s right, folks, it’s been nearly a decade and a half since we actually saw Bruce Banner transform into the Hulk, way back in The Avengers.

Marvel Studios/Sony When Did Mark Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner Last Transform Into Hulk Onscreen in an MCU Movie?

Seriously, Mark Ruffalo’s Bruce Banner has not hulked out onscreen since his iconic moment in 2012’s The Avengers. The last time MCU fans actually saw the mild-mannered “always angry” professor transform into a giant green rage monster came after he told Steve Rogers his “secret.” Since then, he has only hulked out off-screen. He tried, and briefly flashed as the Hulk, during Avengers: Endgame, but the “big guy” refused to come out no matter how much Bruce strained to unleash him.

It was very embarrassing for Tony Stark in front of the wizards, but after Thanos kicked Hulk’s ass at the start of that movie, the green rage monsters refused Banner’s pleas. (No, we didn’t see Bruce Banner transform in the Hulk at the start of Infinity War. His first appearance in the movie was as the Hulk.)

Here’s When You THOUGHT You Saw the Hulk Hulk Out, But He Didn’t Marvel Studios

You’re right, the Hulk was a big part of Avengers: Age of Ultron, but all of his transformations happened offscreen. The big guy was already the Grandmaster’s champion when Thor arrived on Sakaar in Thor: Ragnarok. But we never saw Bruce Banner transform into the Hulk with our own eyes during that movie, not even during his battle with Hera’s giant wolf on the Bifröst. In that sequence, we saw him as Bruce crash into the bridge after failing to transform. Bruce then disappeared behind the charging wolf, who was stopped by the suddenly appearing Hulk.

Bruce Banner then appeared in human form in a Captain Marvel end-credits scene. In Avengers: Endgame, we then met Professor Hulk, as Bruce combined the brains and the brawn. In both Shang-Chi and She-Hulk, he was back to being a person thanks to an inhibitor chip he wore on his wrist that kept Hulk at bay. Bruce stopped wearing it and returned to his Professor Hulk form after his cousin became She-Hulk.

Marvel Studios

Since 2012’s The Avengers, we have seen onscreen transformations of other Hulks. That included (though less than you might remember) when Thunderbolt Ross became the Red Hulk in Captain America: Brave New World. But we haven’t watched Bruce Banner transform into the Hulk with our own eyes in a very, very long time.

Will Spider-Man: Brand New Day Show Bruce Banner Transform Into Hulk for the First Time in 14 Years?

“Dr. Banner?”
“No Banner. Only Hulk.”

So, will Spider-Man: Brand New Day break this surprisingly long streak of the MCU not showing Bruce Banner physically changing into Hulk? We know we’re going to see the Incredible Hulk—not Professor Hulk—in this movie, thanks to the trailers. We’ll have to wait to see the movie to find out if we’ll see that iconic transformation from Bruce to Hulk onscreen for the first time in 14 years. We’ll keep our fingers crossed.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day heads to theaters on July 31, 2026.

The post When Was the Last Time Bruce Banner Hulked Out in the MCU? appeared first on Nerdist.

⚡ Quick Take

• Balrogs are ancient demons that slumber through the Second Age according to Tolkien lore. What role will they play in The Rings of Power?

In season one of The Rings of Power, we learned the Balrog makes an appearance in The Lord of the Rings‘ Second Age. Though this messes with Tolkien’s timeline, it’s an inevitable part of the story as we watch the dwarves of Khazad-dûm, their quest for mithril, and their struggles with the Rings of Power into seasons two and three of the show. Even if they have thousands of years of prosperity before Durin’s Bane appears, the shadow and flame were always lurking deep within the mountain.

What Is a Balrog in The Lord of the Rings Lore?

Balrogs are one of the Maiar, spirits created when the Valar, or gods, first created the world. The Maiar were to help the Valar shape the world. Gandalf and the other wizards are also Maiar, but Morgoth, Middle-earth’s original Dark Lord, twisted the Balrogs into demons. In the First Age, the Balrogs fought alongside Morgoth and his orcs against the elves. After the War of Wrath that saw the destruction of Morgoth and ushered in the Second Age, the remaining Balrogs fled and hid in the bowels of Middle-earth.

Prime Video

Tolkien was never quite clear on how many Balrogs there were. Depictions of them vary greatly over the years as well, as evidenced by the animated version below.

Balrogs passed into myth in the Second Age. But in the Third Age, in the deep chasms of Khazad-dûm the dwarves mined too greedily for mithril and awoke one. They were forced to flee their home and King Durin VI was killed. The Balrog of Moria became known as Durin’s Bane. It wielded a sword and whip made of flame. Over a thousand years later, the Fellowship of the Ring entered the mines and encountered the demon.

United Artists The Balrog’s Famous Battle with Gandalf

Gandalf kills a Balrog at great personal cost. What begins as a showdown on the Bridge of Khazad-dûm ends at the Battle of the Peak 10 days later. Gandalf holds the demon back from pursuing the fellowship, calling it the Flame of Udûn, a land of evil before Mordor. But it drags him down as it falls. The rest of the fellowship leaves Moria thinking Gandalf is lost.

Though Gandalf’s staff is broken, he wields his elvish blade Glamdring while fighting the Balrog. They battle even as they fall into the depths of Khazad-dûm and when they reach water at the lowest levels of the mountain. Gandalf then pursues the Balrog as it flees into tunnels and back up the mountain and onto its very peak. They battle for two days above the clouds at the Tower of Durin before Gandalf finally defeats the demon and its body falls down the mountainside. Gandalf the Grey also dies in this battle, though Gandalf the White revives in his place.

New Line Cinema The Balrog in The Rings of Power Seasons 1 and 2

We were surprised to see a glimpse of the Balrog in The Rings of Power season one. Durin’s Bane should have slumbered well into the Third Age. But it seems like The Rings of Power season two explained better how the Balrog can emerge in the Second Age, but not really be prominent until the Third.

Prime Video

In the season two finale of The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, the Balrog fully awakens. This happened because King Durin III, swayed by his Ring of Power, greedily dug deeper and deeper into the mountain. Eventually, he dug so deep that he disturbed the Balrog from its shadows. But this disruption was short lived and Khazad-dûm didn’t yet suffer a downfall at the hands of the Balrog. Coming to his senses at the last minute, King Durin removed his ring and instead, fought the Balrog. The pair of them fell back into the mountain’s depths and were encased by falling rocks, leading to King Durin III’s death. But alas, it seems the Balrog will awaken again.

Prime Video The Balrog in The Rings of Power Season 3 Prime Video

In The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season three, the Balrog will return. And this time, he’ll be meeting with another Maia, Sauron. In early glimpses of The Rings of Power season three, we see Sauron clash with the Balrog. And we learn that Sauron is actually coming to the Balrog for advice on how to forge the One Ring. After all, the Balrog is a creature of fire and stone, so it stands to reason he might be able to assist Sauron in his mission… If he cares to. Sauron and the Balrog are equals, of a sort, as they are both Maiar.

The Balrog Will Have a Voice in The Rings of Power Focus Features/Prime Video

It turns out, we’ve never actually heard the Balrog speak… Only roar. But the Balrog is a sentient being. And in The Rings of Power season three, the Balrog will speak, and he will be voiced by Simon Pegg. What will the Balrog have to say? It’s too early to tell. But we’re seated to find out what wisdom he’ll have and what the heck his voice will sound like.

We’re Still Waiting for More Answers About the Balrog in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

There are still plenty of questions about the Balrog to explore in The Rings of Power. Is Durin’s Bane the same demon who fought over the tree hiding the last of the lost Silmarils? How large of a role will the Balrog play as the series continues? What will the Dwarves do with the knowledge of its existence?

Prime Video

And, of course, how will the rest of the Dwarves come to wear the Rings of Power… and if so, will the evil of the rings call to the Balrog?

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power season three returns on November 11, only on Prime Video.

Originally published on October 6, 2024.

Original reporting by Melissa T. Miller.

The post What Is a Balrog, THE RINGS OF POWER Dark Creature of Fire? appeared first on Nerdist.

Ross Douthat, who has been busy toiling away at The New York Times on his “Interesting Times” podcast, is heading over to “60 Minutes” where he’ll be a correspondent. Yes, Bari Weiss has made another hire that highlights that she really has no idea what she’s doing at CBS News and deepens the death spiral of “60 Minutes,” arguably the most well-respected news program on TV—at least until…

Source

Russia has charged Telegram founder Pavel Durov with facilitating terrorism and placed him on an international wanted list. The country's Federal Security Service (FSB) announced the charges on Wednesday, alleging that Telegram failed to remove channels, chats, and bots used by Ukrainian intelligence to recruit young Russians for sabotage and terrorism. The alleged offenses include armed attacks on law enforcement officers and arson targeting transport, energy, communications, and financial infrastructure. According to an FSB news release, these attacks have resulted in numerous human casualties, including women and children. One focus of the allegations is the popular Telegram dating bot "Leo," which reportedly has more than 13 million users and matches people seeking dates or friendship. The FSB said 46 Russian citizens aged between 12 and 22 have been arrested across the country since July 2025. The FSB alleges they had accepted instructions from Ukrainian intelligence officers to carry out attacks inside Russia. The agency went on to claim that Ukrainian intelligence officers had been using Leo while posing as women to establish contact and build fake romantic relationships with young Russian men. According to the FSB, Ukrainian officials would encourage men to pay for cinema tickets, concert tickets, or gifts through phishing links then blackmail them into carrying out attacks in Russia. "Subsequently, representatives of Ukrainian intelligence agencies, posing as Russian law enforcement or Rosfinmonitoring officers, contacted the individuals through foreign messaging apps," the FSB said. "The fake law enforcement officials claimed that the transferred funds had been deposited into accounts of the Ukrainian armed forces, and that the transferred coordinates had been used by the enemy to plan missile strikes and drone attacks." "After this, the deceived and intimidated citizens, unable to critically assess the situation due to psychological pressure, were threatened with criminal prosecution and coerced into committing armed attacks and arson, ostensibly as part of an anti-terrorism security check of the targets and participating in other 'pseudo-operational activities.'" Leo was banned in Russia on December 23, 2025, on the basis that it contained information relating to child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and LGBT propaganda. Russia's Supreme Court designated what authorities call the "international LGBT movement" as extremist in November 2023, despite no such formal organization existing, and banned its activities in the country. Russia further accused Telegram of failing to take down content relating to these "prohibited activities" as well as the numerous accounts allegedly used by Ukrainian intelligence. The Kremlin has meanwhile been pushing citizens toward the state-backed MAX messenger. Since 2025, smartphones sold in Russia have been required to come with the app preinstalled. However, government agencies still communicate official updates via Durov’s Telegram, which remains vastly more popular in Russia. Neither Durov nor Telegram have responded officially, other than the messaging platform's social media post of the founder holding his middle finger to the camera. Durov, 41, left Russia in 2014 and now lives in the United Arab Emirates. He holds Russian, French, Emirati, and St Kitts and Nevis citizenship. Although the UAE reportedly has close ties with Russia, it remains unclear whether Moscow will secure an Interpol notice or ask Emirati authorities to extradite Durov. Like cybercriminals who avoid countries likely to honor US extradition requests, Durov will now need to consider where Russian demands might be enforced. In August 2024, the Telegram founder was arrested by authorities in France, where he also holds residency and a passport. Durov was charged with multiple offenses relating to alleged failures to prevent criminal activity on Telegram, including drug trafficking, cyberbullying, organized crime, and the distribution of CSAM. The French case remains open, although Durov was allowed to return to Dubai in March 2025. ®

While Republican leadership attempts to pin millions of Covid-19 deaths on Dr. Anthony Fauci, some party members are zeroing in on his dismissal of their alternative “cures” to the virus.

Peter Navarro, who is currently serving as a senior counselor to President Donald Trump, whined to C-Span Wednesday that Fauci had interrupted his hydroxychloroquine business at the height of the pandemic.

“I had a million doses of hydroxychloroquine in warehouses … that I was trying to distribute to hospitals, and he got the FDA to stop me from doing that,” Navarro said. “Thousands of people could be here in this country right now alive if I had been able to distribute that, take that to the bank, that’s what the science says.”

Extensive clinical trials have repeatedly debunked that hydroxychloroquine—an antimalarial drug predominantly used to treat lupus—could have been an effective treatment for Covid-19. The FDA revoked the drug’s emergency use authorization during Trump’s first term after emerging data made clear that it did not treat or prevent Covid-19 but instead had the potential to create dangerous heart palpitations, cause liver or kidney damage, and cause serious gastrointestinal upset.

But six years later, Republicans are apparently still choosing to ignore the science.

In the midst of grilling a Fifth-pleading Fauci on Capitol Hill Wednesday, Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson insisted that ivermectin—a drug used to treat heartworm in livestock, which was touted during the pandemic as another miracle cure—“worked.”

“When it comes to ivermectin … it works,” Johnson said, proceeding to wave a stack of papers while claiming that there were dozens of studies proving the efficacy of ivermectin against the coronavirus.

To this day, the FDA has only approved some ivermectin tablets at specific doses for human use, though their application is limited to treating parasitic worms. The FDA page on the matter still warns against the use of ivermectin to treat Covid-19, asserting that “currently available clinical trial data do not demonstrate that ivermectin is effective” against the virus.

Furthermore, the FDA notes that taking ivermectin—or any drug dosed for an animal—can be dangerous, and that the agency has received “multiple reports” of hospitalizations after people have attempted to self-treat themselves with the drug.

X sued the WFA in 2024 for conducting what it called a "systematic illegal boycott" of the platform after it saw a decline in advertising revenue following Musk's $44 billion takeover of the social network

AI home management startup Hint, co-founded by Martha Stewart, wants to become an “AI for your home,” combining property records, maintenance schedules, home documents, and an AI assistant into a single app.