Star Tribune
Tornado touched down in northern Minnesota
A National Weather Service survey team will be in St. Louis County in northern Minnesota on Friday to assess damage and try to determine the strength of a twister that touched down Thursday afternoon.
“It was a confirmed tornado,” said Krystal Lynum, a meteorologist with the Weather Service’s office in Duluth.
Numerous photos and videos posted online showed the tornado that felled trees near Bug Creek Road just east of Cotton, and as it crossed Hwy. 53 near Canyon, Minn. between 4:45 and 5:30 p.m., Lynum said.
Shingles were torn from a two-story home and debris was strewn near Cotton, the Weather Service reported.
“Fortunately, a remote area with few buildings,” St. Louis County Sheriff Gordon Ramsay wrote in a Facebook posting. No injuries were reported, he said.
The two small towns are about 40 miles northwest of Duluth.
While not unprecedented, the September tornado in northern Minnesota is rare, Lynum said.
“Usually severe weather starts to end the last part of August, but it’s been so warm we are seeing severe weather in September.”
Star Tribune
Porn-making former University of Wisconsin campus leader argues for keeping his teaching job
The case has garnered national attention both for the salaciousness of a high-profile university official making pornographic movies and publicly talking about it and the questions it raises about free speech rights.
Gow argued that his videos and two e-books he and his wife, Carmen, have published about their experiences in adult films are protected by the First Amendment.
”You don’t need the First Amendment to protect ‘The Star Spangled Banner,”’ Gow’s attorney, Mark Leitner, told the committee. ”You don’t need the First Amendment to protect easy and comforting speech. It’s exactly the opposite. We need the First Amendment precisely when the danger of stifling, controversial, unpopular speech is at its highest. And that’s what we have here.”
Harrison, the university’s attorney, countered that the videos themselves are legal, but they are not protected speech under his employment contract.
”Gow’s pornography videos are not protected by the First Amendment,” Harrison said.
Gow has gotten what he wants, which is attention on his books and videos, Harrison said.
BISMARCK, N.D. — The adult son of U.S. Sen. Kevin Cramer is scheduled to change his not-guilty plea on Friday in the crash that killed a North Dakota sheriff’s deputy last year.
Ian Cramer, 43, was charged with homicide while fleeing a peace officer, preventing arrest, reckless endangerment, fleeing an officer and drug- and driving-related offenses in the Dec. 6, 2023, pursuit and crash that killed Mercer County Sheriff’s Deputy Paul Martin, 53.
Cramer was initially charged with manslaughter, later upgraded to the homicide offense, which is punishable by up to 20 years in prison and/or a $20,000 fine. In April, Cramer pleaded not guilty to the charges.
A notice filed Wednesday indicated his change of plea, but court filings didn’t provide details.
Cramer’s father, Kevin Cramer, a Republican running for his second Senate term, has said his son ”suffers from serious mental disorders which manifest in severe paranoia and hallucinations.”
Before the crash, Ian Cramer’s mother had taken him to a hospital because of mental health concerns. When she stepped out of the vehicle, Ian Cramer crawled into the driver’s seat and sped in reverse, smashing through a closed garage door to the ambulance bay and fleeing the hospital, Bismarck police said.
He later fled again when a deputy confronted him in Hazen, about 70 miles (113 kilometers) from Bismarck, and hit speeds over 100 mph (160 kph), continuing even after a spiked device flattened two tires, according to court documents.
More spikes were set up, and Cramer swerved and then crashed head-on into Martin’s patrol vehicle, launching the deputy about 100 feet (30 meters), authorities said. Martin was pronounced dead at a hospital.
Star Tribune
Secret Service report details communication failures preceding July assassination attempt on Trump
The Secret Service’s investigation is one of numerous inquiries, including by Congress and a watchdog probe by the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general office.
Rowe has said the July shooting and Sunday’s episode, in which 58-year-old Ryan Wesley Routh was arrested after Secret Service agents detected a rifle poking through shrubbery lining the West Palm Beach, Florida, golf course where Trump was playing, underscore the need for a paradigm shift in how the agency protects public officials.
