TV News LIES

A federal judge on Monday ruled in favor of three major U.S. drug distributors in a landmark lawsuit that accused them of causing a health crisis by distributing 81 million pills over eight years in one West Virginia county ravaged by opioid addiction.

The verdict came nearly a year after closing arguments in a bench trial in the lawsuit filed by Cabell County and the city of Huntington against AmerisourceBergen Drug Co., Cardinal Health Inc. and McKesson Corp.

"The opioid crisis has taken a considerable toll on the citizens of Cabell County and the City of Huntington. And while there is a natural tendency to assign blame in such cases, they must be decided not based on sympathy, but on the facts and the law," U.S. District Judge David Faber wrote in the 184-page ruling. "In view of the court's findings and conclusions, the court finds that judgment should be entered in defendants' favor."

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The Federal Reserve is expected Wednesday afternoon to announce its largest interest rate hike since 1994 — a bigger increase than it had previously signaled and a sign that the central bank is struggling to restrain stubbornly high inflation.

The central bank is considered likely to raise its benchmark short-term rate by three-quarters of a percentage point, far larger than the typical quarter-point increase, to a range of 1.5% to 1.75%. It will also likely forecast additional large rate hikes through the end of the year.

A series of sizeable increases would heighten borrowing costs for consumers and businesses, likely leading to an economic slowdown and raising the risk of a recession. The Fed's previous rate hikes have already had the effect of raising mortgage rates roughly 2 percentage points since the year began and have slowed home sales.

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Lawmakers investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection said Sunday they can provide evidence that Donald Trump tried to overthrow his election loss to Joe Biden even though he knew he had lost – a key legal point if he is prosecuted over actions that led directly to the violence at the U.S. Capitol.

Future hearings, including one on Monday, will demonstrate how a succession of advisers also told Trump that his claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election were bogus, Jan. 6 committee members said during a string of Sunday show appearances.

"I think any reasonable person in America will tell you, he had to have known he was spreading a 'Big Lie,'" said Rep, Jamie Raskin, D-Md., a member of the Jan. 6 select committee, speaking on CNN's "State of the Union."

Raskin added: "He continues to spread it to this very day."

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A jury on Wednesday ruled in favor of Johnny Depp in his libel lawsuit against ex-wife Amber Heard, vindicating his stance that Heard fabricated claims that she was abused by Depp before and during their brief marriage.

The jury also found in favor of Heard, who said she was defamed by Depp’s lawyer when he called her abuse allegations a hoax.

Jury members found Depp should be awarded $10.35 million in damages, while Heard should receive $2 million.

The verdicts bring an end to a televised trial that Depp had hoped would help restore his reputation, though it turned into a spectacle of a vicious marriage. Fans — overwhelmingly on Depp’s side — lined up overnight to grab a seat in the courtroom. Spectators who couldn’t get in lined up on the street to cheer Depp and jeer Heard whenever either appeared outside.

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Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez took a break between visiting Amazon union workers and endorsing progressive candidates to get engaged to her longtime partner Riley Roberts.

Ocasio-Cortez, 32, confirmed to Insider on Thursday that she and Roberts, who met while both were at Boston University, got engaged last month while visiting her parents’ home town in Puerto Rico.

She then wrote on Twitter: “It’s true! Thank you all for the well wishes.”

According to Insider, the pair were quiet about their relationship even before Ocasio-Cortez became a popular political voice, and their friends at university did not always know they were together.

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The Biden administration has gone all in on the COVID-19 antiviral Paxlovid, announcing new measures to make the oral treatment more widely available and making it clear that Vice President Harris used it as she recovered from the coronavirus.

The White House has said it will nearly double the amount of Paxlovid available around the country and that it is working to set up more Test-to-Treat locations in pharmacies and other locations.

But the administration faces a number of obstacles in really making Paxlovid, and a similar treatment from Merck and Ridgeback known as molnupiravir, easily accessible to Americans.

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1837: As a result of a missile attack in the Odesa region, the runway of the Odesa airport has been damaged, the Ukrainian military’s Operational Command South reported. The airport runway has been put out of action, the military said.

1756: Ukraine and Russia held another exchange of prisoners on April 30, with 14 Ukrainians returning home - seven soldiers and seven civilians. The prisoner exchange was announced by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Reintegration of the Temporarily Occupied Territories Iryna Vereshchuk.

1704: Almost all the buildings on the territory of the Azovstal plant, which is regularly attacked by the invading Russian forces and which has become a refuge for the residents of besieged Mariupol, have been destroyed. A new satellite images from the private U.S. company Maxar Technologies shows the level of devastation at the plant, writes CNN.

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